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Sumit Singhal
Sumit Singhal loves modern architecture. He comes from a family of builders who have built more than 20 projects in the last ten years near Delhi in India. He has recently started writing about the architectural projects that catch his imagination. White-ZS Lab in Guangzhou, China by DOMANI Architectural ConceptsJanuary 14th, 2021 by Sumit Singhal
Article source: DOMANI Architectural Concepts White in the East has always been a concept. From the techniques of line drawing in Chinese painting to the intention of leaving blank with ink splashing, until the status change to conceptual “emptiness” from “white” by means of religion, can be a milestone upgrading of collective thinking. Modern western architecture also uses “white”, but the western white is a logical strategy to lighten or give up, which is simple and “straightforward” with less concept. “White”, was born in the East.  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu
 Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu Review the preach of “white” in Zhuangzi’s The World of Human（Ren Jian Shi）：the emptiness and cleanness make a room well-ventilated while the peaceful heart brings wellbeing. At that time, “white” still had some substantial content on the brink of nihilism, such as silence or the meaning of useless. It’s also the wisdom of ignorance. The interpretation of “white” by Zhuangzi’s is actually a functional appeal. He tried to use “white” to explain a kind of flexible relationship. “White” is his way of life. Therefore, we take this kind of “white” and put it in a fixed environment to frame a building. It is not to show, in essence, the extreme simplicity of popular modernism design (but it does not refuse or care either). What it expresses is calm. No matter the role settling of a small building in a narrow street, or the expression of a new brand in its beginning, the sense of calm and openness are all the decisions at the beginning of thinking and drafting. This kind of decision is greater than and controls all forms of the whole scheme afterward.  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu What we are talking about is a kind of “white” in the creative process which is divorced from the formal logic. Therefore, it develops “meaning” and then forms “environment” with techniques. ZS is a new brand focusing on the pure white (black-grey) T-shirt and sweater category. At the product technology level, it was deep plough in fabric technology, pattern, sewing, and closing. This logic of product is of deep architecture, which naturally becomes our principle in the architectural space construction techniques of the project. In the design background of the above concepts, our technology focuses on pure rational physical construction such as rationalization of material organization and setting, function construction, optimization of spatial dynamic line, closure of materials and structure, passive energy conservation of buildings, etc. While the architecture and interior space release the clear rational tension because of the expressed desire in the form of relief. At the same time, we are talking about “white” in technique.  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu New, nothing new, but surprisingly interesting Can a store be an office? Can designers face the market and play the role of sales? Can the office module effectively combine with the product display to form an open tour line? Can the organizational structure of innovative companies be extremely flat? Can the utilitarian sense of product sales be relaxed or eliminated in another cost logic? Can R&D itself constitute the content of selling? In fact, the furthest boundary of business creation is not the cost or the operation, but regulation. There is really nothing new things we have today, but in a reasonable logical closed-loop and regulatory scope, the interwoven combination of different behaviors will bring unexpected experience and spatial form of great interest. We often call it: new formats. As to the offline sales in the Internet age, can the words like SHOP or STUDIO be explicit enough to unveil the business activities, those communications filled with human nature? Not Studio or shop, we stand here as ZS Lab.WHITE. Architecture, the honesty needed since the agreement reached  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu We prefer the most traditional building coating materials, as an unexpected choice, by applying texture coating and latex paint to form a complete space surface. We believe that the bones decide the detail, not the skin. Ever since the beginning of the project, Party A and Party B would start the journey together: communicate with each other thoroughly to reach the bottom, offer the amount of controllable investment, carefully adjust the expected rate of return, rapidly reach the consensus on concepts, and promise to stand shoulder by shoulder in facing with the landing difficulties and risks. The mutual trust and honesty showed during the process could guarantee the truthful demonstration of the building quality, as well as its style. “Design with beauty, build in truth.”, AA School of Architecture’s motto resonates with the above concept. So does the Greek philosophy, as “Beauty is truth, truth is beauty.” Both sentences sound simple in nature, and honest like white color.  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu Internet celebrity, a pose to the trend As a result of faithful reflection of the design concepts of ease and inclusiveness, the project site has soon become an internet-famous site in Guangzhou after the completion of works. When searching the keywords of “TIT” on a famous lifestyle community platform, your eyes would be flooded by those short videos and articles published by trend leaders and shop visitors with cameras; not to speak of the key words like “TIT white building”, “Guangzhou Aranya”, and so on. Even when we planned to film the completion of the project, we could not help but feel “disturbed” to avoid the selfies of those shining vloggers and bloggers. But, in the design circle, internet celebrity is a neutral existence. It is a complex and ambiguous context, just like a writer’s judgment, “Real literature refuses the title as a best-seller.” What he means is that the attraction of huge followings reveals its superficial contents. Sadly, it exists obvious logical error. The phenomenon of huge followings could only deduce that the consensus has been achieved in a very short period, not the depth of the content (no need to list examples here). So, if we take it in words like: real design refuses web celebrity, the implied word of superior sense should be — not care.  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu In this way, when changed into “Real literature never cares the title as a best-seller.”, “Real design never cares about web celebrity.”, it does look much better. There always exists human nature in trending phenomena, forming a trackable undercurrent form the bottom. It needs some skills to trace and summarize the general rules in it, the same to those Internet celebrities, let alone those riding the tides. We should neither be driven by trends, nor the context. This is our attitude, pure as white.  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu  Image Courtesy © Vincent Wu
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