A proposal for the Athlete Village in the 2022 Asian Games

• International Competition & Consultation I 2017 I 1st Honorable mention
• Location: Hangzhou, China
• Team: J. Würbach, Y. Tanewski, S. Schramel, Z. Yang, Aikaterina Myserli
• External advisor: Dr. Andreas Brück
• Status: Presented in the 19th Asian Games Hangzhou 2022 Organising Committee in July 2017

For the 2022 Asian Games in Hangzhou, the design team explored creative possibilities for a resilient and environmentally friendly development. Specifically for the residential area of the Athlete Village, the project brought forward concepts on how an ecological community of 80.000 future residents can be planned under the conditions of a high-density development. While achieving the standards of the desired high density as well as incorporating urban farming and water harvesting infrastructures in buildings, the proposal transformed repetitive, monolithic high-rises into a series of hybrid, mixed typologies. In addition, organising the building chain as well as food, waste and energy flows in a circular way could help the whole area achieve a 3%-10% productivity increase worth ¥ 631.000.000/year. This revenue stream comes with a considerable improvement of local environmental conditions and reduction of pollution in the area. The perspective of harnessing the maximum potential of the area’s metabolic flows was welcomed by local stakeholders and developers and has been taken into consideration for the development of the Athlete Village in the future. The proposal made it evident that open-ended design briefs, accentuating circular metabolic processes and lively urban conditions, could lay the groundwork for re-thinking China’s current high-density context.