Reweaving Shiyi: A Case Study of Riverside Passage by Atelier Deshaus

Modernity has had an impact on the conceptualisation of architecture in China that is not entirely dissimilar to developments in architecture in the European context from the late eighteenth century onwards. According to Alberto Perez-Gomez and Dalibor Vesely, there was a development toward rationalisation that can be theorised as a split from a poetic building tradition. Similarly, several contemporary Chinese architects have argued that the over-artificial and functional city leads to the loss of meaning in contemporary Chinese cities formerly framed by architecture situated in a poetic building tradition. With the surge of modern studies of yijing (意境, artistic conception) in China and the introduction of Western debates on the ‘poetic’ since the 1980s, the term shiyi (诗意), generally translated as ‘poetic’ or ‘poeticalness’, has been frequently employed by contemporary Chinese architects to refers to their architectural creations. Atelier Deshaus (AD), for example, an acclaimed contemporary private architectural design studio, is known for the integration of the Chinese shiyi tradition with modern rationality. Yet, AD also draw inspiration from Western theories of the ‘poetic,’ such as Martin Heidegger’s idea that all dwelling is poetic and Kenneth Frampton’s notion of the poetics of construction. Within this context, this paper aims to explore the distinctive influences of the Chinese shiyi tradition and Western ‘poetic’ thought on architectural design, with a particular focus on the case study of AD’s Riverside Passage project, built in 2019 in Shanghai. The research demonstrates that the integration of the shiyi tradition assists AD in countering the increasing homogeneity of urban environments and in reviving a poetic approach to architectural design. This approach is systemic and considered with the ecologies of architectural design, as shiyi, characterised by openness and suggestiveness, places focus on the dynamic relations between and coexistence of architecture, individuals and their living surroundings.