Location Fangjialiang Village, Chicheng, China
Site Area 471m2
Floor Area 399m2
Status Under Construction
Design Architect O Studio Architects
Local Design Institute Wanpin International Engineering Design Co. Ltd.
Unico is the rural vitalization project of Fangjialiang Village in Chicheng which invites investors as the co-building new villagers to construct their ideal rural living model while improve the living environment of the existing villagers. The community gym is the feature public building of Unico which offers an option of indoor sport venue for the villagers while they enjoy the beautiful scenery of Chicheng throughout four seasons.
Situated at a beautiful valley on the east side of Fangjialiang Village, the project site has a strong sense of privacy while being intimate with the adjacent village houses. The natural scenery of mountains and trees viewed from the site is phenomenal and varies drastically at different directions. The primary design intention is to envision the building as a view finder where the beautiful scenery and seasonal changes could be seen through different picture windows while one is walking inside the building. Despite the building’s singular function and exquisite scale, this design divides the overall massing into many fragments instead of forming a singular building mass. By shifting and shuffling these fragments, a cluster of small rooms and courtyards is formed. As a result this 400 square meter small building becomes miniature of a village. While one walks inside, the alternating experience of light and darkness, cold and warmth, humid and dry and the presence and absence of scenery is strong and persistent. In this spatial experience, one is extremely intimate with nature while he is well sheltered by architecture. The architectural form has no particular articulation: the pitch roofs subtly echoes with the existing village, the picture windows have no elevation design, and the rough dark red walls respond to the texture of the local rocks. With a subtle and minimal expression of contemporaneity, this building humbly sits in the natural landscape and harmonizes with the rural fabric.