Poly International Plaza is an innovative office, retail, and exhibition center development located in the Guangzhou trade district. Sited along the Pearl River and adjacent to historic Pazhou Temple Park, the project presents a precedent toward integrating development with its site and context, embracing the place of garden and sustainability in the society’s rapid move toward modernization. The site plan forms a series of gardens and plazas. A major North-South promenade along the west boundary provides connections to an offsite hotel development and convention hall and a diagonal spatial arrangement enhances visual connections to the Pagoda Park south of the site and the Pearl River north of the site. The complete design seeks to integrate the southern Chinese landscape traditions with a modern sensitivity toward local context, climate, flora and SOM’s modern architecture. Tall, continuous tree canopies in combination with water features help to moderate the climate in providing shade and capturing cooling breezes for exterior spaces.
Electronic Arts
The plan for the Electronic Arts corporate campus included nine office buildings, a commons building (including a cafeteria, health center, and fitness center), a theater, a parking structure, and a childcare center. The computer game software company’s offices support a grand lawn quad. The quad not only provides a campus focus but also serves as a stor...
Weyerhaeuser Corporate Headquarters
Founding SWA partner Peter Walker collaborated with architects SOM on site analysis, planning, and landscape development for this hugely influential corporate headquarters, which remains notable for its unique integration of landscape, architecture, and environmental stewardship. The 425-acre site was chosen by the design team with George Weyerhaeuser for its ...
Exxon Corporate Headquarters
Exxon’s Corporate Headquarters is situated on 200 acres of rolling mesquite woodland in Texas’ Las Colinas Development. The design captures the essence of a subtle Texas landscape by careful selection of native plants and preservation of existing woodland and wetland areas. The building itself is surrounded by a more “domestic” landscape within a forest ...
Tencent Shenzhen Headquarters
Spanning nearly two million square meters on a peninsula sheltering Shenzhen’s Qianhai Bay, Tencent’s new headquarters serves as the domestic anchor for the tech giant’s global operations in China. Once completed, it will be one of the largest tech campuses in the world, roughly the size of Manhattan’s Central Park.
The campus is entirely car-free...