OPPO, China’s largest smartphone company, will soon have a new headquarters space courtesy of Bjarke Ingels Group. The new OPPO R&D Headquarters will be located in the heart of Yuhang District, Hangzhou, between a natural lake, an urban center, and a 10,000-sm park. The OPPO R&D Headquarters tower, also known as O-Tower, will include 1.7 million sf of office space and 732,000 sf of retail space. It will act as a new landmark and gateway to the Future Sci-Tech City and Hangzhou itself.
O-Tower’s design translates a traditional office slab with the perfect depth for access to daylight into a cylindrical courtyard building that is compact but also provides large, contiguous floor area. The southern edge of the building will be pushed down to the ground to minimize the external surge area of the more solar exposed facade while maximizing views out from the inward facade, which is self-shaded from solar gain by the geometry of the tower. The facade will be wrapped with adaptive facade louvers that are oriented according to sun angles and building geometry to reduce solar gain by up to 52%.
A series of triple-height void spaces and interconnected terraces under the sloping O roof will provide casual and physical connectivity between floors as well as biophilic social spaces and shortcuts for all OPPO staff.
A publicly accessible courtyard will rest at the heart of O-Tower and become an urban living room for the city. The courtyard will transition from a mineral hardscape at the center into a lush, green landscape as it extends out toward the waterfront. The space will provide fresh air, retain water, and support a biodiverse public realm that connects to the daily life of the city.
The ground floor will be open with an interconnected public space that leads visitors and staff through lobbies, exhibition spaces, or out to the park. The first three floors will be reserved for public programming and include exhibition space, conference centers, a canteen, and an incubator for external workshops. On the upper floors, a dedicated OPPO canteen as well as executive and VIP lounges will overlook Hangzhou’s wetlands alongside the triple-height interconnected atria under the O-ring facade. All of the building’s floors will integrate workspaces with biophilia and social spaces.
Flexible floor plates will range from spacious and large floors suitable for R&D departments and social projects to smaller, more traditional floors for administration and executive functions.
The design for the O-Tower has been developed by BIG in collaboration with ZIAD (Local Design Institute), Co-Create Golden Technique Project Management (Client Project Managers), RBS (Structural Engineers), RFR (Façade Consultants), WSP (Traffic, MEP, VT Consultant), BPI (Lighting designer), Savills (Programming consultant), TFP (Foodservice planner), and UAD (Traffic evaluation agency).
Related Stories
| Oct 31, 2014
Dubai plans world’s next tallest towers
Emaar Properties has unveiled plans for a new project containing two towers that will top the charts in height, making them the world’s tallest towers once completed.
| Oct 15, 2014
Final touches make 432 Park Avenue tower second tallest in New York City
Concrete has been poured for the final floors of the residential high-rise at 432 Park Avenue in New York City, making it the city’s second-tallest building and the tallest residential tower in the Western Hemisphere.
| Oct 6, 2014
Moshe Safdie: Skyscrapers lead to erosion of urban connectivity
The 76-year-old architect sees skyscrapers and the privatization of public space to be the most problematic parts of modern city design.
| Sep 23, 2014
Cloud-shaped skyscraper complex wins Shenzhen Bay Super City design competition
Forget the cubist, clinical, glass and concrete jungle of today's financial districts. Shenzhen's new plan features a complex of cloud-shaped skyscrapers connected to one another with sloping bridges.
| Sep 15, 2014
Argentina reveals plans for Latin America’s tallest structure
Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner announces the winning design by MRA+A Álvarez | Bernabó | Sabatini for the capital's new miexed use tower.
| Sep 5, 2014
First Look: Zaha Hadid's Grace on Coronation towers in Australia
Zaha Hadid's latest project in Australia is a complex of three, tapered residential high-rises that have expansive grounds to provide the surrounding community unobstructed views and access to the town's waterfront.
| Aug 19, 2014
Goettsch Partners unveils design for mega mixed-use development in Shenzhen [slideshow]
The overall design concept is of a complex of textured buildings that would differentiate from the surrounding blue-glass buildings of Shenzhen.
| Aug 18, 2014
SPARK’s newly unveiled mixed-use development references China's flowing hillscape
Architecture firm SPARK recently finished a design for a new development in Shenzhen. The 770,700 square-foot mixed-use structure's design mimics the hilly landscape of the site's locale.
| Jul 17, 2014
A new, vibrant waterfront for the capital
Plans to improve Washington D.C.'s Potomac River waterfront by Maine Ave. have been discussed for years. Finally, The Wharf has started its first phase of construction.
| Jul 17, 2014
A high-rise with outdoor, vertical community space? It's possible! [slideshow]
Danish design firm C.F. Møller has developed a novel way to increase community space without compromising privacy or indoor space.