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G.
MASS SCULPTING
Sliced Porosity Block,
Chengdu, 2007-12
The Sliced Porosity Block shares some common qualities with the previ-
ous Linked Hybrid project, also in China. Again, the project is a hybrid of
different functions like a giant chunk of a metropolis.
However, there are several differences between them. While Beijing’s
building was conceived as a fragmentation into blocks and afterwards
joined by bridges, this project is a unique mass that was carved by the
artist-architect. Its slices are the results of required minimum daylight ex-
posures to the surrounding urban fabric, calculated by the precise geom-
etry of sun angles. The result is an eroded superstructure whose design
procedure has a strong resemblance to sculptor Eduardo Chillida’s pro-
ject in Mount Tindaya.
Regarding the formal aspects of Steven Holl’s design, he uses the regular
grid as a skin for the buildings as he did in Simmons Hall -but scaling it
down- or in Beijing. Nevertheless, this proposal is more artistic and more
elaborated from its conception than the Linked Hybrid. The interstitial
spaces are the result of the mass sculpting, enriched by the change of
the skin in which the grid disappear, enhancing the peeling cuts effect.
The bridges that join the buildings are more subtle, closer to the ground
and not so visible. In Beijing’s project Steven Holl claims that they all have
functions but the general criticism said that they were over scaled and not
so useful.
The urban strategy of the block creates a new terrain of public space; an
urban terrace with three ponds functioning as skylights to the six-story
shopping located below. The eroded morphology of the proposal acts as a
wind-catcher. The wind can be heard and felt in the interior void, following
Holl’s phenomenological philosophy. This platform also contains three ar-
tistic pavilions designed by Holl, American architect Lebbeus Woods and
Chinese artist Ai Wei Wei.