2018 Architecture Awards

Build 2018 Architecture Awards 84 ince its foundation in 2012WoWAhas specialized in designing high end landmark project including supertall tower, class A office, five star hotel, large scale mixed use complex and city planning. Shih-I discusses the firm’s approach to projects and how it works to ensure that every client receives the outcome they need. “At WoWA, our approach to designing each project is to carefully study client’s need, the strength of the site, the market trends and what we think the project should carry. Each project is unique and should have its own character. Our design experience and understanding of how a successful commercial project should run gives us design strength and reasoning to convince our client that a good commercial architecture should be done in certain ways. “To provide astonishing design, first, we have to know what we are doing. We need to understand client’s need, and the expectation from the city, how our buildings response to the context and present itself to the public, what values and enhancement will our design bring. Then we carefully study the site, the function program, and the local culture as the base to start exploring our design concept and layout. Working together with client with several rounds of design searching and problem solving always lead us to a better and more practical solution. We always try to find the balance between creativity and functionality.” Among the firm’s projects currently is an innovative tower which is providing the firm with many exhilarating challenges and opportunities to expand its knowledge, as Shih-I is keen to showcase. “Currently we are designing a 520m tall tower in Xi An, China, a famous city with terracotta warriors. The design concept is an old Chinese instrument, ‘Qin’, for a landmark building in a city with rich culture and history background. The complex contains different functions of retail, office, hotel, service apartment and observation deck, and the total GFA above grade is around 350,000 sqm. The key challenge is that client always wants shorter design time. As we know, super tall towers are demanding in the best and available building technology and requiring decent amount of time and efforts to coordinate among different professionals. We are proud of always meeting client’s need and get the job done right. We are also proud of our success rate, as the majority of our clients admire and enjoy our designs and are incredibly satisfied with the outcome of our work.” Moving forward, WoWA has a bright future ahead as it seeks to continue creating truly unforgettable buildings that will stand the test of time, as Shih-I concludes. “Recently our HZ Steel project recently won the 2018 MIPIM/ Architectural Review Future Projects award, Regeneration & Master Planning category. This is a great encouragement to us. The HZ steel project is about the revitalization of an old steel factory site. This master plan is focus on bringing new cultural and entertainment industries, such as Sino French Design Campus Zone, (The creativity Hub), and Puy Du Fou Amusement park to replace the original iron engine of the region. At the same time, we will reconnect the canal system to create continuous green “Emerald Necklace”, and water front is designed to host memorable and lively public space for people who live and work there. Our goal is to create a new community rich in diversity and new possibilities for this old “rusted” site and make it a “memorable PLACE”. This will continue to be our goal for all of our projects as we look towards an exciting future. “Overall, we are very confident in our design team’s talent and grateful for our client who trust us. We believe we will continue to bring excellent and elegant design for our client and increase the real estate value significantly, at the same time, our projects are practical, reasonable, and buildable. Our ability to solve complex design problems will continue to lead us.” WoWA Most Innovative Architectural Design Firm 2018 – China & Award for Excellence in Large Scale Commercial Developments 2018 WoWA is a team of experienced commercial architects with landmark mixed-use complex and super tall towers built all over the world. We invited Shih-I Chou to talk us through the firm and the work it undertakes. S AR180060 Company: WoWA Contact: Shih-I Chou Address: 1977 Jinshajiang Road, #16, Suite 902, Shanghai, 200333, China Phone: 86-13918254369 Web Address: www.wowa-archi.com