TWIN RIBBONS

Twin Ribbons
HKRI TaiKooHui | West Nanjing Road | Shanghai | China

Twin Ribbons is an indoor installation in HKRI Taikoo Hui, a top-class business, retail & entertainment hub in Shanghai downtown, at the heart of the vibrant district of Jing’an.
The installation comprises 2 almost identical red ribbons that serve different purposes. Each section has a defined function intended for one type of user. which are carefully bent in order to create an artificial and continuous topographical profile providing activities such as seating features, swinging objects, sliding ramps, slopes and mini amphitheaters among others.

Taking advantage of the highest bends of the ribbons, green & blue functional boxes were plugged-in as add-on capsules with playful slopes within.
Both ribbons are confronted to each other, almost creating an infinite symbol, resulting with 2 different enclosed areas for EDUTAINMENT (education + entertainment). The green area is intended for educative workshops and performances, while the blue area is more focused on educative games and entertainment.

The project was designed as an indoor activation of the public space within the main atriums, generating a meeting & entertainment spot for social interactions at the heart of the retail space, visible from all the floors, encouraging the gathering and interaction of people.

The Twin Ribbons not only create an eye-catching cyclical platform as a challenging path to be traveled by jumping, climbing, sliding and crawling up and down. It also provides functional shapes to host different adult-related activities, such as speeches, workshops, performances, etc…

CREDITS:

Project Name: Twin Ribbons
Design: 100architects (Shanghai)
Design Team: Marcial Jesús, Javier González, Lara Broglio, Mónica Páez, Keith Gong,
Yevheniia Likhachova & Marie Anseaume.
Client: HKRI Taikoo Hui / Swire Properties
Area: 380 m2
Completion: June 2019
Location: HKRI TaiKoo Hui, West Nanjing Road, Shanghai, China
Photography: Brian Chua / Highlite Images

SHIPYARD

Shipyard
Shanghai | China

A Bold Tribute to the Past, Designed for the Present

Shipyard is a bold public space intervention developed by 100architects for the 2019 Shanghai Urban Space Art Season (SUSAS) international competition. The project aimed to artistically regenerate a section of the Yangpu Waterfront, a site historically used as a welding platform for shipbuilding, located along the banks of the Huangpu River.

Embracing the site’s rich industrial past, the design draws direct inspiration from shipyard aesthetics—specifically, the skeletal frame of a ship under construction. However, instead of steel and rust, the structure emerges in vibrant orange, transforming the memory of the ship into an expressive, contemporary installation filled with rhythm, color, and public energy.

The project serves two main purposes:
First, to activate a previously underutilized space by fostering social interaction and public life through seating, play, and gathering zones. Second, to preserve and reinterpret the site’s historical identity, offering a poetic homage to the former industrial glory of the riverfront.

A system of Corten steel ribs rises directly from the site’s original bronze grid, referencing the exposed frame of a ship mid-construction. These ribs shape the spatial narrative of the intervention, stretching from the bow to the stern, and organizing a variety of functional elements along the way—amphitheaters, seating, resting lounges, playful slides, and open gathering areas.

Vertical green cylindrical planters evoke the image of ship chimneys, while triangular shading structures resemble abstracted sails, giving both visual rhythm and environmental comfort to the space. The design also integrates lush planters and diverse seating typologies to enhance the space’s comfort and usability across all ages.

Everything is wrapped in a striking orange palette, deliberately contrasting with the industrial tones of the surroundings and injecting new life into the waterfront. This color choice enhances visibility and impact, ensuring the project stands out not only as a sculptural landmark but also as an open invitation to public engagement.

More than a simple urban installation, Shipyard becomes a vivid narrative—celebrating the cultural and architectural legacy of the Yangpu District while projecting it forward through art, play, and spatial poetry.

CREDITS:

Project Name: Shipyard Plaza
Design: 100architects (Shanghai)
Design Team: Marcial Jesús, Javier González, Mónica Páez, Lara Broglio, Gong Xun, Marie Anseaume, Cosima Jiang.
Client: Shanghai Urban Space Art Season 2019
Area: 924 m2
Completion: August 2019
Location: Shanghai, China

TWIN WAVES

Twin Waves
HKRI TaiKoo Hui | West Nanjing Road | Shanghai | China

Twin Waves is an indoor installation in HKRI Taikoo Hui, a top-class business, retail & entertainment hub in Shanghai downtown, at the heart of the vibrant district of Jing’an. The installation comprises 2 almost identical entertaining waves as bent platforms that create 2 artificial hills which provide different activities on both of their respective sides. The 2 waves serve different purposes. Each has a defined purpose intended for one type of user.

One wave offers the possibility of climbing up and sliding down into a monochromatic ball pit, while the other wave includes an amphitheater for small events and performances or social gatherings on one face of the hill, and a sliding slope on the other face. Both waves are designed with functional graphics on their surfaces, adding playability to the platforms, equipping them with a Chinese Checker, a mini version of the popular floor game Twister, and the traditional yet fun Hopscotch.

The waves create a sort of tunnel underneath, which was used to introduce some lounge/chill-out areas for youngsters, filled with bean bags on the floor.
The project was designed as an indoor activation of the public space within a double-height space, generating a meeting & entertainment spot for social interactions at the heart of the retail space, visible from the upper floor, encouraging the gathering and interaction of people.

Twin Waves not only create an eye-catching platform as challenging hills to be climbed up & slid down. It also provides functional shapes to host different adult-related activities, such as speeches, workshops, performances, etc…

CREDITS:

Project Name: Twin Waves
Design: 100architects (Shanghai)
Design Team: Marcial Jesús, Javier González, Lara Broglio, Mónica Páez, Keith Gong,
Yevheniia Likhachova & Marie Anseaume.
Client: HKRI Taikoo Hui / Swire Properties
Area: 530 m2
Completion: June 2019
Location: HKRI TaiKoo Hui, West Nanjing Road, Shanghai, China
Photography: Brian Chua / Highlite Images

KIDS 3rd HOME

Kids 3rd Home
Super Brand Mall | Lujiazui | Shanghai | China

Kids 3rd Home is an interior renovation designed to beautify a scarcely used space within the iconic “Super Brand Mall” of Lujiazui in Pudong (Shanghai), oriented to foster entertainment & social interactions among kids and families in the 2nd floor of the Mall.

Super Brand Mall is one of the most iconic and well-known commercial spaces in Shanghai and China, with almost 20 years of existence, and it’s in a process of renovation to keep up to date.

100 Architects was commissioned with the mission of intervening a wide and large circulation area of 1,800 m2 in between tenants oriented to kids & families.

In order to turn it into a vibrant and eye-catching space to stay and interact with other customers, which would offer an entertaining experience linked to the normal course of the commercial activity.

The entire proposal derives from the position of the 9 columns that invade the big space, which become 9 epicenters of different colors and activities.

Born from those 9 columns, a colorful painted scape on the floor was designed by stripes of colors and shapes, organizing the rest of the empty space, defining circulation areas, resting spaces, playing areas and spaces for pop-up stores.

The injection of basic vivid colors, patterns and shapes allowed us to visually enhance the space, making it more appealing to visitors and customers, deviating more pedestrian circulation towards the given area.
The 9 columns are retro-illuminated enhancing their presence as landmark elements within the space.

The ceiling, which is treated as an exposed ceiling, is also retro-illuminated only over the columns, featuring special illuminated spaces together with the columns.

The rest of the exposed ceiling features a system of custom-made lightboxes with basic fun shapes related to the design language from the rest of the space.

A simple yet effective beautification exercise crowned with huge habitable letters forming the word KIDS on both ends of the circulation space. The huge letters act as eye-catching attractors since they are visible from far and different floors, becoming entrance landmarks to the new space.

CREDITS:

Project Name: Kids 3rd Home
Design: 100architects (Shanghai)
Design Team: Marcial Jesús, Javier González, Marta Pinheiro, Lara Broglio, Mónica Páez, Keith Gong.
Client: Super Brand Mall.
Area: 1800 m2
Completion: July 2019
Location: 168 Lujiazui W Rd, Lujiazui, Pudong, Shanghai, China
Photography: Amey Kandalgaonkar

THE DUNES

The Dunes
Unleashing the Wonder of ‘The Dunes’: Where Art, Play, and Nature Unite in a Captivating Oasis.

Introducing “The Dunes” – a captivating endeavor to elevate the public realm of Dubai Creek Harbour, set to enchant residents and visitors alike with an array of stimulating experiences. As part of our Creek Play project, “The Dunes” embraces the essence of UAE’s natural landscape, departing from the conventional skyline concept to immerse visitors in a world inspired by the region’s majestic dunes.

At the picturesque Creek Island Marina, 100 Architects was entrusted with the task of crafting an outdoor masterpiece that would redefine leisure and entertainment. The result: a dynamic and permanent intervention at the end of a 350 meters long waterfront promenade.

“The Dunes” stand tall at the end of this pedestrian promenade, a striking landmark adorned with captivating artworks and endless allure. Drawing inspiration from the awe-inspiring desert dunes, this design captures simplicity and effectiveness, with gentle hills and domes beckoning children to climb and slide, fostering endless laughter and delight.

Envision a breathtaking composition that seamlessly blends with the natural colors of the UAE landscape, an artistic marvel that harmoniously complements its surroundings. For the little adventurers, tunnels await, inviting them to embark on thrilling journeys through the dunes, while hanging balls add an exciting element of play as they swing to their hearts’ content.

But the enchantment doesn’t fade with the setting sun. “The Dunes” boasts captivating lighting that casts a magical glow, transforming the night experience into a wonderland of lights and shadows.

Join us in celebrating “The Dunes” – an extraordinary fusion of artistry, nature, and joy that awaits you at Dubai Creek Harbour. Be prepared to unlock a world of adventure, where the spirit of the UAE’s dunes comes alive, leaving lasting memories and a smile on the faces of all who wander through this exceptional oasis of fun and fascination.

CREDITS:

Project Name: The Dunes
Design: 100architects (Shanghai)
Design Team:Marcial Jesús, Javier González, Marta Pinheiro, Lara Broglio, Mónica Páez, Keith Gong.
Production: Hong Yang Advertising (Shanghai) + 100architects (Shanghai)
Client: Emaar Properties
Location: Dubai Creek Harbor, Dubai, UAE
Area: 400 linear meters of waterfront
Completion: December 2018

PIXELAND

PIXELAND
Mianyang | Sichuan Province | China

PIXELAND is a public space project comprising a combination of different outdoor facilities in a single space, such as landscape features, playscape features for kids and leisure features for adults. The project is inspired by the digital concept of pixels. While a pixel is the smallest independent sample of an image with its own RGB or CMYK color information, it is the combination of numerous pixels what results in any given digital image.

Pixeland Video 1 | Official Video | 100 Channel

Transferring this idea to the spatial organization strategy of the project, we thought of creating a multifunctional public space by the addition and combination of smaller independent functional pixels.

While each of the pixels has its own function and characteristics and could be read as an independent entity, the combination of all of them results in a very eye-catching and playful general multifunctional public space.

©Amey Kandalgaonkar

The main pixel used in the core of the project is a perfect square of 5 x 5 m., as the minimum space to host functions suitable for a group of people, while as we get closer to the borders, smaller pixels of 2,5 x 2,5 m. and 1,25 x 1,25 m. are introduced as a modular approach to solve the accesses, the pedestrian circulation and the landscape in the border.

Every pixel is a component with a different function on it. Thus, the functional pixels are positioned in different combinations in order to generate a hyper-stimulating hardscape of leisure activities.

©Amey Kandalgaonkar

Surrounded by small pixels of greenery as a border solution to provide privacy and safety confining the playscape, the plaza is also equipped with lounge resting areas, picnic areas with seats & tables, seating box structures to provide shadow, sunken communal benches, sloped lawns to lay down and small amphitheaters for gatherings.

©Amey Kandalgaonkar

Besides the leisure features, Pixeland also counts with a wide range of playful features scattered around, culminated with a voxelated Horse-themed playground in the middle of the plaza, for the joy and entertainment of the younger visitors.

The checkered plaza has been developed in a multilevel way, providing an interesting artificial topography growing in height towards the center, where the voxelated horse is strategically placed on the top.

©Amey Kandalgaonkar

Pixeland Video 2 | Official Video | 100 Channel

CREDITS:

Project Name: Pixeland
Design: 100architects (Shanghai)
Design Team: Marcial Jesús, Javier González, Stefanie Schramel,
Marta Pinheiro, Lara Broglio, Mónica Páez
Client: Dongyuan Dichan
Area: 1,560 m2
Completion: January 2019
Location: Mianyang, Sichuan Province, China
Photography: Amey Kandalgaonkar

ORANGE PHONE BOOTH

ORANGE PHONE BOOTHS
YuYuan Lu | Shanghai | China

The Phone Booths is a public space intervention powered by MINI China through its platform Urban Matters, which curates and creates design solutions that tackle urban challenges confronting China’s creative class. MINI China, in collaboration with Changning District Government, Anomaly & Assbook, commissioned us the design and production for revamping old phone booths in Yuyuan Road, a very historic road of Shanghai.

Official Video | 100 Chanel
Orange phonebooths Video

The main objective was to explore the possibilities of revamping such old relics to become of relevant public use in this contemporary time, as they already were in a past time.

Every major city in the world has a network of public phone booths on most streets, which was crucial to the running of the city, however a couple of decades phonebooths throughout the world became obsolete. In a lot of places, they had even become urban trash bins or even worst, public toilets.

How could old public phone booths serve to other public purposes in this era of smartphones?.
What other functions, rather than making a call, are relevant in the current contemporary public realm?

These thoughts have motivated many creative people around the world to look for solutions to turn those urban relics into something more useful to the current society and its lifestyle.

We were hired to rethink the role of those urban objects in our contemporary city with the current needs and conditions of the real potential users of today. after analyzing the booths, the answer was clear. We had to turn them into urban mini capsules that facilitate interaction among people.

See, in the past, they did not only offer a phone to make calls, they also provided shelter for the person using it, a roof, an enclosed space, a sense of privacy. That intrinsic ability to generate a space is what we were mostly interested in and wanted to replicate in a contemporary way.

With the only difference of the current times in which we live in we seem to be all over-inter-connected, therefore we decided to modernize the way the space is set. Instead of enclosed and isolated, we opened the booths to the pedestrian sidewalks, turning them into public furniture, stablishing a dialog with the rest of the public realm, and creating a controversial & contrasting look.

Our design created 3 different prototypes that facilitate interactions in different ways. To achieve that, we mainly kept the basic old metal structures, in order to keep a major resemblance to its past, only just repainted in matt black to have a more bad ass look.
By removing just the front part facing the sidewalk we would end up with a limited empty box to insert an instant function within its frame.

The “instant functions” were done in a striking matt orange color, looking for a strong contrast of colors between the preexisting structure and the new function.

The other 3 sides of the booth were also modified, introducing LED diffusive light boxes behind all their glasses, in order to make the entire booth glow at night, becoming a human scale urban landmark on Yuyuan Road.

Free wifi connection, free USB charging sockets, sitting arrangement, newspaper rack, coffee table, reading lights at night and a emergency public phone are among the new features of this revamp phone booths.

Finally, the extreme makeover provided the phonebooths with a very cool and contemporary looking bringing back those old relics with new functions and possibilities.

The 5 phonebooths units are distributed in the sidewalk along 900meters and will be permanently open to the public as a new typology of functional open urban objects to be enjoyed by the pedestrian in the historical road Yuyuan lu, Shanghai, China.

CREDITS:

Project Name: Orange Phone booths
Design: 100architects (Shanghai)
Design Team: Marcial Jesus & Javier Gonzalez (100architects)
Production: Hong Yang Advertising (Shanghai) + 100architects (Shanghai)
Client: MINI China / Anomaly Shanghai
Location: Yuyuan Road, Changning District, Shanghai, China
Area: 5 units in a 950 meters long street
Completion: December2018

THE CHAIN EFFECT

The Chain Effect
Yuyuan Road | Shanghai | China

The Chain Effect is a public space intervention within the framework of Shanghai’s Urban Design Festival hosted in 2017, and powered by MINI China through its platform Urban Matters, which curates and creates design solutions that tackle urban challenges confronting China’s creative class.

The Urban Design Festival is an ongoing event in Shanghai aiming to identify urban issues derived from modern daily lifestyle, and seeking to create interesting design solutions to solve them.

The “modern urban issue” to be tackled by the collaborative duet Anomaly + 100 Architects was to improve the pedestrian circulation in old neighborhoods of the city, where sidewalks are narrow and usually massively occupied by bicycles and scooters parked on them, and where zebra crossings are congested with people.

The first issue to be tackled was the bicycle parking congestion due to the proliferation of bicycles from the booming bike-sharing companies like Mobike or Ofo in Shanghai and China in general, which has created a new problem in the narrow sidewalks of the city, hindering the circulation of pedestrians.

Inspired by the chain of a bicycle, we came up with a simple yet creative graphic that would indicate the users the positions to park the bikes and also suggest in which angle they should be parked, optimizing the accommodation of more bikes in certain areas and freeing up 0,5 meters of sidewalk for a more comfortable pedestrian circulation.

The second issue to be solved was the motorbike parking congestion due as well to a rising proliferation of food delivery companies and online shopping delivery companies. Another modern problem that overcrowds not only the sidewalks, but also the traffic on the streets.

For this second exercise, we designed another simple graphic inspired in the commonly yet unbelievably packed delivery motorbike drivers usually spotted in the streets of Shanghai. The different stacked boxes become the right parking slots for the delivery drivers to park their motorbikes in a specific location and in an organized manner.

And the third and last tackled issue was the overcrowded zebra crossings in narrow streets, which in peak rush hours are very difficult to cross without bumping into other people crossing in the opposite direction.

To help organizing the pedestrian circulation over those zebra crossings we came up with a very simple yet extremely effective modification of the crossing’s white lines themselves, from straight to zig-zag lines, which created a pointing arrow shape, giving pedestrians a directional hint, splitting the circulation in two directions in order to avoid bumping into other people.

We are very glad this simple yet smart design was awarded with one of the most sought-after design awards in the world, the Red Dot Design Award 2018 in the category of Environmental Graphics.
After the prototype was received positively in the Changning District of Shanghai, more districts and municipal areas of Shanghai have begun to implement it.

CREDITS:

Project Name: The Chain Effect
Design: Anomaly (Shanghai) + 100architects (Shanghai)
Design Team: Ellie See (Anomaly Shanghai) + Marcial Jesus & Javier Gonzalez (100architects)
Creative Direction: Elvis Chau (Anomaly Shanghai)
Account Management: Nickel Lui (Anomaly Shanghai)
Production: Hong Yang Advertising (Shanghai) + 100architects (Shanghai)
Client: MINI China
Location: Yuyuan Road, Changning District, Shanghai, China
Area: 950 m2
Completion: November 2017
Awards: Red Dot Design Award 2018 (Environmental Graphics)

PAINT DROP

Paint Drop
LifeHub | Daning Road | Shanghai, China

It is a public space intervention that was designed to join two separate blocks of a retail street that is going under renovation. The project is located in the heart of Shanghai, in a retail street in Daning Road. The concept that inspired the project was a surreal imaginative event: someone dropped a bucket of painting on the streets, splashing all around with colors.

Official Video | 100 Chanel
Oaint Drop Video

Paint Drop is a creative public space intervention designed to create a visual link between the main plaza and a newly open retail space, to firstly make the new space noticeable, and secondly attract customers dragging them through a color splash corridor.

It is composed of 8 catenary arches that spread across a pedestrian intersection in a commercial district in Shanghai. Every time the arches touche the ground, a small seating feature is created.

Life Hub @ Daning, a 250,000 sqm mixed-use development with 110,000 sqm shopping mall, is one of the hottest commercial areas in Shanghai, due to its condition of the open-air retail street.

As the installation was intended to call the attention of pedestrians and drag them to the desired area, it had to be both, eye-catching & permeable allowing pedestrian circulation through it.
To comply with both requests, a tunnel of splashing color paint was proposed as theme.

The solution consisted of a system of 8 catenary arches linked to each other spreading along the intended path, rendered as paint dropping on the floor from above. As the paint arches reach the floor, a splash of color occurs, leaving a functional trace in the form of seating features and resting areas accompanied by immersive floor graphics to enhance the experience.

The 8 arches from the colorful tunnel were equipped with an interactive lighting system. Movement sensors were placed at the bases of the arches, which would activate flexible LED strips of light embedded in the arches every time a person would pass by.

During the summer period, the vortex of color became one of the hotspots of Life Hub @ Daning’s open-air retail street, gathering kids and adults alike, and successfully increasing the pedestrian circulation at the desired spot.

CREDITS:

Project Name:Design: 100architects (Shanghai)
Design Team: Marcial Jesus, Javier Gonzalez, Anshuman Roy
Production: Hong Yang Advertising
Client: Life Hub @ Daning, (Chongbang Group)
Location: Daning Road, Jing’An District, Shanghai, China
Area: 650 m2
Completion: June 2018
Photographer: Amey Kandalgaonkar

OLYMPIA

Olympia
LifeHub | Daning Road | Shanghai, China

It is a public space intervention in a commercial district in the heart of Shanghai. It is located on the intersection of two new open pedestrian streets at Daning Road. This project is a gathering of urban artifacts for different group ages. It is composed of playing objects as well as seating and shading features.

This public space design aims to attract pedestrian and passersby through its exciting colorful landscape and topography. It’s morphology allows the user to play, to jump, to climb and many more things. On the other hand, the project counts with seating features and a red “object plaza” with an umbrella and a lounge area for the pedestrian to take a break from the extreme summer heat.

Olympia official movie | 100A Channel

Olympia is a playscape inspired in sports due to the celebration of the FIFA World Cup during the same period. Designed to attract customers and enhance the World Cup experience.

Olympia was strategically located at the intersection of 2 newly renovated pedestrian streets in the commercial district called Life Hub @ Daning. Life Hub @ Daning, a 250,000 sqm mixed use development, is one of the hottest commercial areas in Shanghai, due to its condition of open-air retail street.

The intersection had been recently turned into pedestrian road and therefore a public space project was commissioned to 100 Architects in order to promote it and re-activate the area after the renovation works.

Scheduled to be open to public in July 2018, it was coinciding with the FIFA World Cup celebrated in Russia at the same time, which was reason enough to inspire the installation in sports. Not only football though, the installation was actually composed of 2 sports: Football & Tennis.

The two surreal pitches would collide creating a world of colors and playful shapes, slopes, tunnels and bubbles at the service of children’s entertainment. Both areas were surrounded by a running track, to enhance the multisport narrative and to add fun features to the playscape.

A red object plaza was added right adjacent to the playscape, designed as a lounge platform for adults to rest and take a break while watching their kids having fun. It has a huge umbrella that protects the user from the summer sun.

The INNOVATIVE playscape by itself turned the new pedestrian streets into an attractive eye catching and busy “SPACE”. A space where the passersby could bring their kids and families, spending some quality time interacting with other kids and families, as well as reactivating the pedestrian circulation at that spot.

During the summer period, the newly renovated pedestrian intersection became one of the hotspots of Life Hub @ Daning’s open-air retail street, gathering kids and adults alike.