MVRDV transforms old Taiwanese shopping centre into "lush lagoon"

The remnants of a shopping centre evoke concrete follies at Tainan Spring, a sunken park and public pool by MVRDV in southern Taiwan.

Described by MVRDV as a "lush lagoon", the project replaces the vacant China-Town Mall close to Tainan's canal network and forms part of a wider masterplan to rejuvenate the area.

It has been surrounded by local plants that will "develop into a lush jungle" overtime, offering the city greener public spaces that mimic natural landscapes found elsewhere on the island.

"In Tainan Spring, people can bathe in the overgrown remains of a shopping mall," said Winy Maas, founding partner of MVRDV. "Children will soon be swimming in the ruins of the past – how fantastic is that?"

"Inspired by the history of the city, both the original jungle and the water were important sources of inspiration," he continued.

"Tainan is a very grey city," he continued. "With the reintroduction of the jungle to every place that was possible, the city is reintegrating into the surrounding landscape."

Tainan Spring replaces the China-Town Mall that was built over the city's old harbour in 1983, beside the canal. According to the studio, the shopping centre had since become a "drain on the vitality" of the city.

MVRDV hopes the overhaul will demonstrate how unused shopping facilities can be turned into more beneficial public spaces, as online shopping becomes increasingly popular.

"Tainan Spring shows what solutions are possible for unused shopping malls now that online shopping is supplanting physical stores," explained the studio.

The Tainan Spring lagoon is embedded into the shopping centre's former underground parking zone, positioned down below street level.

This is surrounded by plants, playgrounds, gathering spaces, and arcades made from the shopping centre's foundations.

According to MVRDV, the pool is designed to offer a gathering space suitable for all seasons.

The water level change in response to the rainy and dry seasons, and in summer months water vapour mist will be sprayed to lower temperatures – rather than depending on air conditioning.

Preserving elements of the shopping centre as part of Tainan Spring was important to MVRDV as the studio wanted it to serve as a reminder of the "the historical decision to close a port in favour of a mall".

The studio decided to retain the foundations as follies, which will be transformed into spaces for shops or kiosks in the future.

Tainan Spring was commissioned by the Urban Development Bureau of the Tainan City Government to create public space, but also to help improve pedestrian pathways and reduce traffic in the city.

As part of the scheme, a number of local plants have been introduced around the site on Haian Road to help further the amount of greenery in the area. The studio expect for the site to reach its desired appearance of a lush garden in two to three years.

MVRDV is a Rotterdam architecture studio founded in 1991 by Maas with Nathalie de Vries and Jacob van Rijs.

Tainan Spring was first revealed in 2015 under the name of Tainan Axis, and featured in Dezeen's roundup of architecture projects to look forward to in 2020. It is the first of two MVRDV projects slated for completion this year in Tainan, with the food market with undulating rooftop farm terraces in the final stages of construction.

Elsewhere, the studio is developing a residential development in the Netherlands that will have a facade of plant pots, and collaborating with Airbus on an investigation into how vertiports can be introduced into cities.

Photography is by Daria Scagliola.

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Project credits:

Architect: MVRDV
Principal in charge: Winy Maas
Partner: Wenchian Shi, Jeroen Zuidgeest
Project coordinator: Hui-Hsin Liao
Design team: Hui-Hsin Liao, Angel Sanchez Navarro, Stephan Boon, Xiaoting Chen, Andrea Anselmo, Yi Chien Liao, Zuliandi Azli, Olivier Sobels, Dong Min Lee, Chi Yi Liao
Visualisation: Antonio Luca Coco, Costanza Cuccato, Davide Calabro, Paolo Mossa Idra
Local architects: LLJ Architects,
Sustainability, landscape and urban designers: The Urbanists Collaborative
Structural engineers consultant: Evergreat Associates , SE
Transport planners: THI Consultants Inc
Lighting designer: LHLD Lighting Design
MEP engineers: Frontier Tech Institute
General contractor: Yong-Ji Construction co. Ltd.

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Dezeen announces Virtual Milan, a digital design week taking place from 20-24 April

With design fairs being cancelled or postponed due to coronavirus, Dezeen is announcing Virtual Milan, a digital platform that will allow brands to launch their products.

Taking place on Dezeen from 20-24 April, Virtual Milan will attempt to replicate the buzz of Milan design week, but online.

The five-day programme will feature video interviews with designers, live streams of product launches, virtual panel discussions and more.

We are already in discussion with a number of brands that are looking for alternative ways of announcing their new products.

In addition, we are planning a range of cultural activities such as talks, interviews and even networking events that could take place online instead of in real life.

This year's Salone del Mobile was originally due to take place during the week of 20 April – the week that Virtual Milan will take place.

Last month the fair was postponed until 16-21 June, leaving many brands with a dilemma over whether they should hold back their product launches until June, or focus on an alternative fair.

However, as coronavirus spreads around the world, an increasing number of events are being cancelled or postponed.

Dezeen usually takes a large team to Milan for the Salone del Mobile and all the fuorisalone events around the city, working with numerous partners to make videos, host panel discussions and conduct interviews for brands.

The coronavirus outbreak means that international travel and large congregations of people are off-limits. But most of these activities can take place remotely via video conferencing, live streaming and virtual reality.

The architecture and design industry is already adapting to the new reality of life in the time of coronavirus, as our story earlier this week revealed.

"We have been considering how to show products and interiors using 3D renders and virtual reality, or using live streams so we don't have to travel for presentations," said Note Design Studio.

Earlier this week, trend forecaster Li Edelkoort told Dezeen that real-world events would have to be replaced by digital alternatives during the pandemic.

"Anyone still planning public events in the coming months might as well stop organising today and find innovative ways to communicate and relay the information differently," she said in an exclusive interview with Dezeen.

If you're interested in participating in Virtual Milan and would like to discuss opportunities, drop our sales team a line at sales@dezeen.com.

For the latest news on trade shows, conferences and design weeks affected by the Covid-19 pandemic, check our dedicated page on Dezeen Events Guide.

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Nine playful lighting designs from Collectible 2020

Quirky and experimental lights were among the standout designs from this year's Collectible design fair in Brussels. Anna Winston selects her favourites.

This year, many galleries at Collectible showcased playful lighting designs, targeting collectors who are looking for functional, unique objects that don't represent a large commitment in terms of wall or floor space.

"In the design world, seating and lighting are the most covetable pieces," said Husk gallery founder Chloé Valette.

The design fair, which is dedicated to contemporary, limited-edition and one-off designs, took place this year from 3-5 March, and saw brightly coloured lamps made to look like bubblegum and impasto paintings.

Read on for 10 characterful lighting highlights from the event:

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Foam orange lamp by Joseph Algieri

New York-based Joseph Algieri makes lighting using clay and expandable foam. This brightly pigmented lamp consists of polyurethane foam, which has solidified as it drips down to create a blobby cone.

With a large, exposed bulb on top and smaller bulbs protruding from its sides, the end effect is intentionally comedic.

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Fold Lamp by Maria Tyakina

Made using manual labour instead of machine manufacturing, Maria Tyakina's Fold Lamps express the invisible forces of tension and compression that are created by folding a single, very thin sheet of steel to create a surprisingly strong structure.

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Trashformers light by Savvas Laz

This giant two-metre-tall green floor lamp is part of an ongoing series of work made from trash.

Athens-based Savvas Laz wanders the streets of his city, picking up discarded packaging foam – usually from electrical appliances – before piecing it together to create new shapes.

These forms are then coated in fibreglass, powder, water-based resin and pigments to give it a new function.

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Rainbow lamp by HAHA Studio

Just five of these lights were made by Sweden's HAHA Studio as part of the new limited-edition Arcade project from Relay Design Agency.

Each one is made from a gently bent tube of oxidised metal, with the final rainbow-like colour created by hand-heating, grinding and polishing each piece. Two opaque, white glass orbs fill each end of the tube, which sits on a small, round base.

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Lamp TB-001, 002 and 003 by Nicolas Erauw

Small but surprisingly heavy, each of these lamps is cast from solid metal using a technique developed by Belgian designer Nicolas Erauw, which uses lost-wax casting and a dipping process that is similar to the technique used for making candles.

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Bubblegum 2019 by Studio Job

Modelled on Studio Job founder Job Smeets' partner Rebecca Sharkey, the Bubblegum 2019 wall light features a polished, cast-bronze base shaped like a mouth blowing a hand-blown, pink glass bubble.

Inside the bubble is an LED bulb that grants the lamp its soft glow. The light is produced in a limited edition of eight.

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Baracche by Paolo Gonzato

Created exclusively for Milan's Camp Design Gallery by Italian designer Paolo Gonzato, each Baracche light is made from sheets of glass that are formed by floating the molten material over metal – known as Float Glass.

This process is used to create a shape informed by the "instantaneous architecture" of discarded construction waste found by roadsides.

The glass forms are mounted to the wall using pieces of metal reinforcing bar (rebar), commonly used for building.

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Speckle Lamps by Hannah Bigeleisen

Originally an artist, Hannah Bigeleisen used theories of perception and repetition and an unusual approach to materials to shape her work.

Although the postmodern shapes of the Speckle Lamps look like they should be made from stone, they are actually constructed from lacquered papier-mache, with brushed brass components and shades made from hand-knotted fringe.

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Neon by Johan Destrumelle

Young French designer Johan Destrumelle creates objects "like a pastry cook", layering up dots of concrete by hand to form objects that attempt to translate the painting techniques of Pointillism into three-dimensional volumes.

His Neon light uses pale pink-and blue-dyed concrete, responding to the colours of neon lighting from Japan.

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Anish Kapoor to reveal first Vantablack artwork at Venice Architecture Biennale

Anish Kapoor's art using Vantablack will go on display to the public for the first time at this year's Venice Architecture Biennale.

British artist Kapoor has exclusive rights to make art with Vantablack, a material that absorbs 99.96 per cent of light.

Speaking to the Art Newspaper, Kapoor said he wasn't allowed to know exactly how the scientists at Surrey NanoSystems – the British scientific research company that invented Vantablack – will apply the material because it has military and defence applications.

The super-dark material could be used  as "a cloaking material for hiding satellites" he said.

Kapoor has exclusive rights to make art with Vantablack. Photo by Bengt Oberger

Coating an item in Vantablack requires the use of a specialised reactor.

"[It] does not come out of a tube," said Kapoor. "The particles stand up like velvet when they are put to a reactor."

"To give you a sense of scale if the particle were one-metre wide it would be 300-metres-tall," he added. "When the particles stand up next to each other light gets trapped in between each particle."

Transporting Kapoor's Vantablack artworks to Venice will be tricky, reported the Art Newspaper, because they cannot be touched by human hands. Currently they are protected in transparent plastic boxes.

The Venice Architecture Biennale 2020 has been postponed until August due to coronavirus.

Vantablack was invented by Surrey NanoSystems

The Vantablack art will be on display in Venice alongside several of Kapoor's voids, geometric forms that protrude from a wall and create optical illusions.

One of Kapoor's voids recently caused a kerfuffle in an art museum in Portugal when a visitor fell over in an exhibition featuring a black hole displayed on the floor.

Kapoor has been criticised for acquiring the exclusive rights to use Vantablack for art. However, he called the uproar over it "misinformed".

When news broke in 2016 that Kapoor was the only person allowed to paint with Vantablack British artist Christian Furr accused Kapoor of "monopolising" a colour that could have been "dynamite in the art world".

The artist Stuart Semple challenged Kapoor by creating the "pinkest pink" pigment and banning Kapoor from using it. But Kapoor managed to get his hands on the pink despite the ban, posting a photo on Instagram of his middle finger dipped in it.

BMW has made a car coated in Vantablack VBx2 – a sprayable version of the super black material, Architect Asif Khan used Vantablack VBx2 to create a void-like pavilion for the Winter Olympics 2018.

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Sofia Pashaei’s animation for Adult Swim teaches us how to shake bad habits

As part of the Off the Air series on Patterns, the New York-based animator focuses in on a family and their individual bad habits.

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