Globally renowned design practice UNStudio has released a stunning album of images that showcase the dynamic curves of Hangzhou's recently completed Raffles City development. The mixed-use development by Singapore-based CapitaLand, one of Asia's largest real estate companies, creates a new landmark in Qianjiang New Town along the city's nascent central business district, forming a striking blend of 24/7 functions across two streamlined towers rising from a common podium and landscaped plaza.

Raffles City Hangzhou, image by Seth Powers via UNStudio

The eighth Raffles City development in China was designed as a vertical neighbourhood and transit hub, consisting of a pair of 60-storey, 250-metre-tall skyscrapers that contain residences, offices, and a hotel, all crowned by a rooftop helipad. The 116,000-square-metre, six-storey podium houses an abundance of retail, restaurants, leisure facilities, and parking with direct underground access to the metro.

An aerial view demonstrates the figure-of-eight pattern, image by Jin Xing via UNStudio

Ben van Berkel, founder and principal architect of UNStudio, said Raffles City Hangzhou is quickly becoming a "point of confluence, a hub for business conduct and a new destination for visitors and residents alike." The all-in-one complex combines working, living, and leisure in a "highly sustainable environment."

Shimmering columns support a suspended podium, image by Seth Powers via UNStudio

UNStudio's design for the towering pair sought inspiration from the local landscape. Mimicking the movement of the Qiantang River, a wave-like pattern forms the basis for the sculptural massing. The concentric waves increase in their intensity with the building's rise, beginning at the base with a careful rhythm, and growing more acute along the vertical axis.

The scaly facade of Raffles City Hangzhou, image by Hufton+Crow via UNStudio

Visually, the footprint is organized as two diagonal and intersecting figure-of-eights. Rising from opposite corners, the towers employ an 'urban facade' that frames the urban corner of the property, and a horizontally articulated 'landscape facade' that reaches the inner courtyards at the podium level. The podium is clad in hundreds of aluminum tiles, while the towers are enveloped in an outer layer of rotated, vertical solar shading fins placed atop the curtain wall system.

Inside the skylit commercial podium, image by Seth Powers via UNStudio

The complex is located diagonally from the civic centre and borders the city park that connects the UNESCO heritage-listed West Lake to the Qiantang River. Hangzhou is the capital of Zhejiang province and is within a 50-minute high-speed train ride of Shanghai. The city has become an economic powerhouse in its own right due to a burgeoning tech sector.

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