After it was decided to locate the main concert venue on the building’s top floor to create a covered indoor/outdoor public realm, SWA designed the entire ground level of this venue for traditional Cantonese opera, including a dramatic, covered open-air landscape space. There, an urban stage facilitates movement, provides a gathering space, and enhances the visitor experience, while harmonizing with the architecture. The concept of “Qi” (flow) is expressed in materials, colors, forms, and textures united throughout. At three main entry areas on the ground floor, the façade was lifted to allow access. SWA worked on the grading and employed sloping planes with a grand curving stairway/ramp/amphitheater to connect them, also determining the levels for architectural space at the sides. The box office exists in the space below the landscape amphitheater seating. Groups of trees at each entry and in the central space bring the outdoors in. Outside, SWA designed paving for the first and second floors of the building as well as two outdoor gardens flanking the main performance hall on the 4th (top) floor. The bold upward move allowed space for a new entrance to the subway and the creation of an outdoor urban living room/garden stepped back from the heavily trafficked street. A parterre of planting and seating there provide separation as well as a dedicated entryway setting. An amphitheater with an outdoor performance area caps off this unique urban destination for the West Kowloon Cultural District.
Culver Steps and Main Plaza
As cities consider the future of their streets in light of pandemic-inspired innovations and federal infrastructure investment, placemaking solutions can help communities achieve more value from public rights-of-way.
In Culver City, California, landscape design born of public and private sector collaboration has resulted in a lively and accessible outdo...
Nanchang Greenland Jiangxi Gaoxin
This urban open space within Nanchang’s new city center provides clear definition of building entries and functions while supporting outdoor gathering areas and circulation routes to enhance visibility, access, and full use of the project’s mixed-use program elements. The design of outdoor spaces and rooftops reflects the strong geometry of the signature tower...
Nasu Highland
SWA collaborated with the architect to provide site planning, schematic landscape design and design development for this brand new membership clubhouse facility with an 18-hole golf course designed by Robert Trent Jones, Jr., International. The development includes a major arrival entry with a stone podium surrounded by a fountain pool. The clubhouse is surrou...
San Jacinto Plaza
SWA’s redesign of San Jacinto Plaza, a historic gathering place in El Paso’s downtown business district provides a state-of-the-art urban open space, while protecting and celebrating the history and culture of the site. The project was the result of an intensive community process involving input from a wide range of constituents. Active programming, environmen...