Lilong Arcade

Community Center for Archtic

Lilong Arcade thoughtfully blends traditional arcade architecture with modern design, creating accessible, versatile spaces tailored to community engagement. By carefully respecting historical context, the project enhances urban experiences and promotes social interactions, adaptability, cultural preservation, and vibrant public life within a contemporary urban setting.

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Lilong Arcade by Jiahua xu

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Community Center by Jiahua xu

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Jiahua xu Lilong Arcade

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Jiahua xu Community Center

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Unique Properties

"Lilong Arcade" embraces the concept of integrating public spaces with historical features while meeting modern needs. Flexible layouts maximize space usage, blending fixed and mobile areas to accommodate diverse community needs. The facade design marries historical elements with modern materials, maintaining harmony with the surrounding architecture while creating a welcoming, vibrant environment that supports public engagement.

Tags

community, social, civic, activity, wellness, urban, historic district, flexibility

Production Technology

Since the reconstruction cannot break through the existing building 3D boundary, the original building height is reused in accordance with the principle of economy and practicality. The small column span shallow beam are used to achieve span of 4.5-6 meters. An atrium is set inside the building to enhance the lighting while eliminating the sense of space cramped. The visual corridor perpendicular to Main Road naturally extends to the depths of the base, leading the direction of the axis network system.

Design Challenge

Since the reconstruction cannot break through the three-dimensional boundary, the building height cannot be greatly increased. As for the problem of insufficient building height (about 3.5 meters), the small column span shallow beam and partial height treatment are used to achieve: the conventional column span is 4.5-6 meters, and the local span is increased to enhance the permeability of the space.

Project Duration

The project started in April 2024 in Shanghai and finished in August 2024

Operation Flow

To fully realize the functionality of various spaces in the limited space, a combination of fixed space + flexible space is adopt. That is, in addition to the spaces that rely on equipment such as the service center, community canteen, ect, most of the activities and learning places are optimized into flex spaces through operation. This not only helps the space allocation within the project, but also helps promote the fair and efficient allocation of public resources.

Research

The project is located in Changning District, Shanghai, with a profound cultural heritage of foreign culture and local traditions. The facade of the project building adopts a modern eclectic arcade form, which pays tribute to the traditional style. The arcade not only gives the building a timeless beauty, but also increases the transparency by providing a gray space for citizens to interact. The exterior wall of the building adopts light-colored bricks to be unified with the surrounding style, the floor-to-ceiling glass windows fill the interior space with natural light, enhancing the openness and transparency of the building.

Inspiration

The design concept of "Lilong Arcade" aims to adopt the "arcade", an architectural motif with publicness and sharing, to integrate historical features while showing the contemporaryity, making the building a natural extension of the walkable street system. The project revolves around the principles of serving the people, adapting to local conditions, and flexible adaptation, creating a rich and high-quality service and activity space for citizens in the limited existing space.

Project Overview

Lilong Arcade Community Center has been a Bronze winner in the Architecture, Building and Structure Design award category in the year 2024 organized by the prestigious A' Design Award & Competition. The Bronze A' Design Award is given to outstanding designs that showcase a high degree of creativity and practicality. It recognizes the dedication and skill of designers who produce work that stands out for its thoughtful development and innovative use of materials and technology. These designs are acknowledged for their professional execution and potential to influence industry standards positively. Winning this award highlights the designer's ability to blend form and function effectively, offering solutions that enhance people's lives and wellbeing.

Image Credits

For design images and photos please credit Jiahua xu.

Bronze Recognition

Jiahua xu was recognized with the coveted Bronze A' Design Award in 2025, a testament to excellence of their work Lilong Arcade Community Center.

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