After winning a design competition in 2017, SWA undertook two projects within the Guicheng Riverfront park system, a defining blueway and leisure loop belt. The two completed parks – South Bank Waterfront Park and Eco-Island Park – are designed with distinct programmatic elements and characters based on the riverfront’s surrounding land use and urban settings, assisting the region in its transition from transportation and industrial uses to a more leisure-based orientation.
The three-kilometer-long South Bank Waterfront Park encompasses several distinct character zones, offering leisure, recreational, and event spaces for diverse users in surrounding residential communities as well as Nanhai’s financial district. The design was inspired by Foshan’s riverside history and dragon boat races, as well as by a phrase from a renowned poem: “A hundred barges are vying forward; a thousand boats are competing across the river,” These thematic elements were incorporated into the landscape, creating a distinctive series of outdoor places, water features, and furniture.
Eco-island Park is located on the west bank of the Pingzhou River, outside of the city levee system. The park seeks to establish balance within a dynamic river environment, accommodating rapidly fluctuating flood waters while establishing a restored riparian landscape. The park provides a valuable urban destination with passive recreation opportunities through a network of trails, viewing decks, restored beachfront, and children’s play environments to provide an immersive experience for a wide range of park users. The design also established a network of lakes and wetland waterways to filter stormwater and relieve hydraulic stresses on the park.
South Waterfront Greenway
A bold new plan for the area along the Willamette River includes a 1-1/2 mile extension of the City’s downtown’s parks and the reclamation of the river’s edge for public recreation. Working closely with the City of Portland, developers, and natural resource advocates, the design team devised a rational plan that places access and activity in targeted nodes wit...
Rio 2016 Olympic Park Competition
SWA was awarded 2nd place in the 2016 Olympic Park Competition in Rio de Janeiro for their master plan and landscape architecture proposal. The Olympics will be located on a 118-hectare site in the neighborhood of Barra da Tijuca. The underlying concept of ‘Embrace’ weaves through the design in a grand planning gesture, which both defines the Olympic Games and...
Hangzhou Grand Canal
For centuries, the Beijing-Hangzhou’s Grand Canal – a staggering 1,000 linear miles which remain the world’s longest man-made waterway – was a lifeline for commerce and communication. The water’s edge was necessary for trade, a logical place to live, and often a driver of innovation. However, as with many waterfronts globally, it eventually fell victim to the...
Fort Wayne Riverfront
As a city that was built and thrived because of its location as a crossroads between wilderness and city, farm and market, the realities of infrastructure both natural and man-made are at the heart of Fort Wayne’s history. We consider waterways as an integral part of open spaces of the City, forming a series of infrastructural systems that affect the dynamics ...