Architects: Wutopia Lab
Area: 1726 m²
Year: 2021
Photographs: CreatAR Images
Design Consultants: Office ZHU
Construction Team: Taizhou Huangyan Municipal Garden Construction Development Co. Ltd., Xingwei International Home Furnishing Co. Ltd., Zhangjiagang Yujia Metal Decoration Co. Ltd.
Chief Architect: Ting Yu
Design Manager: Shengrui Pu
Pre-Project Architect: Zhuoer Wang
Post Project Architect: Shengrui Pu
Design Team: Begoña Masia, Junzhu Song, Yaping Wu, Jiajun Wang, Lei Wang, Yunfeng Dai, Minmin Zhang, Jianv Guo, Xiaoyan Wu, Xue’en Chang, Ye Lu, Wensui Zhang, Dong Meng, Yawei Jing
Project Architect Assistant: Kejie Mi
Lighting Consultant: Chloe Zhang, Mingjie Cai
Client: Shanghai Century Cloud Culture Development Co., Ltd
Construction Drawing Development: Shanghai c-yuspace Design Co. Ltd., Shanghai Zhiye Architectural Design Consulting Co. Ltd.
City: Taizhou
Country: China
Duoyun Bookstore in Huangyan, designed by Wutopia Lab, integrates metaphors of clouds and traditional architectural forms. The design wraps the cluttered commercial façades in a continuous white perforated aluminum panel, creating a cloud-like presence along the riverside, enhancing the visual serenity and hiding the bookstore. Situated in Buildings 1 and 3 on the Yongning River, the project introduces a courtyard as a focal point, turning it into the main entrance. The bookstore spaces are organized like traditional pavilions and courtyards, with each area representing different functional zones such as reading, exhibitions, and social spaces. Color plays a key role, with each main functional area symbolized by a “cloud” color, connecting the design to local culture and history. The interior features pyramids and labyrinths, with bookshelves and furniture creating a maze-like experience. Innovative materials, like recycled marine plastic furniture and local car glass technology, blend dream and reality, making the bookstore a mythic “cloud” space where reading becomes a journey through abstract yet familiar landscapes.
The design began with a mood inspired by the tranquility and pleasantness of the city, qualities that are rare in Shanghai. The designer envisioned a cloud, calm and slowly rising over the river, capturing the sophisticated and pure beauty of clouds. Instead of modifying the cluttered commercial façades with cosmetic changes, the decision was made to wrap them in a continuous white perforated aluminum panel wall. This white façade creates a layered cloud effect along the riverside, concealing the bookstore. The aluminum wall serves as both a façade and a potential courtyard enclosure, adding a serene visual simplicity. The idea was to create a serene environment where readers feel as though they are surrounded by a cloud rising over the riverside.
The academy is located in Buildings 1 and 3 of a four-building complex along the Yongning River. Building 1 consists of two connected structures on the first floor, and the public space includes a basement patio and an evacuation stairwell, resulting in scattered and unfocused focal points. Traditionally, “shuyuan” (academies) are formed by a group of ordered buildings. Viewing Buildings 1 and 3 as part of a traditional pavilion group, it becomes clear that the ensemble lacks a courtyard as a central focal point. To organize these scattered elements, creating a courtyard was a natural solution, providing a central space to bring coherence and focus to the layout.
A square courtyard was planned in the open space between Buildings 1 and 3. However, this yard was initially hidden behind a fence separating Buildings 1 and 2, which belonged to other properties. The courtyard was reimagined as a front yard, making it the official entrance of the bookstore. The first area introduced is the lifestyle book section, and on the east side near the water is a coffee pavilion. A staircase was designed from the coffee pavilion to the second floor, functioning as a display terrace for reproductions of rare books, integrating circulation with exhibition. The second floor of the coffee area is envisioned as a future urban parlor room, adding another layer of function to the space.
An interior aisle was added on the west side of Building 1. The first floor houses the bookstore, starting with a unique Duoyun shelving area (kiosk) at the entrance, which leads north into the main bookstore display hall. Past the cashier’s desk, visitors move into the reading area (dwelling), designed along the aisle, and continue into the creative area (house).
Above the cultural and creative area is an exhibition space (museum), while the upper level of the bookstore features a stepped lecture area (room). The second floors of the buildings are interconnected by roof terraces, which include various platforms: a children’s play area, a mirror terrace, a discussion terrace with a fire pit, and a labyrinth terrace that serves as an extension of the coffee space.
The use of pavilion and courtyard typologies in the design connects the architectural function with traditional garden structures, making it easier for a broad audience to appreciate the integration of buildings into a coherent new courtyard space. This approach led to the creation of Baiyunting and its three side gardens—the front garden, south garden, and west garden—which visually unite Buildings 1 and 3 into a continuous complex. This design reinterprets a group of scattered commercial buildings, crafting a new visual and spatial narrative rooted in historical forms.
Regarding metaphors and symbols, the architecture emphasizes the concept of colorful clouds as a guiding theme. The clouds are distilled into simple symbols used throughout the design, such as doorways, logos, and user interfaces, with white clouds visually connecting all the building’s background spaces to represent the “Shanghai of the clouds.” The use of color is central to this theme: orange, derived from Huangyan’s famous oranges, represents the region and is prominently featured at the entrance and coffee area. The transition from white to orange clouds allows for the creation of a narrative around five auspicious colors. The bookstore incorporates green in the cultural and creative area, aligning with the classic Duoyun Bookstore color, as blue holds special significance in the local Taizhou area and is avoided as a primary hue. Instead, green represents the cyan cloud. Crimson marks the red cloud in the speech area on the second floor, while pink and purple symbolize the purple cloud in the exhibition space. These five colors define the main functional areas, deepening the metaphor of clouds. The concept of the five colored clouds replaces traditional architectural typologies, serving as a prominent statement that connects function, Shanghai, Huangyan, cultural references, history, and locality. This approach enriches the metaphorical depth of the clouds and legitimizes their symbolic use throughout the design. As a result, a “myth” of reading within the clouds is created, blending narrative, symbolism, and space into a cohesive experience.
The visual focus of the space was inspired by a photograph of the Pyramid of Oranges by artist Roelof Louw, created in 1967, which the project architect used as a reference. This inspiration led to the creation of an orange pyramid-shaped book table in the foyer, resembling more of a Ziggurat, which serves as a dominant visual element. A larger green pyramid book table is featured as the centerpiece of the shelving area, adding a distinct attitude to the kiosk space. A triangle from the pyramid design was repurposed into a translucent acrylic cashier’s desk, which acts as the main visual focal point in the bookstore’s hall. The connection between the color orange and Huangyan aligns closely with the theme of the artist’s installation, “Soul of City,” which was featured in the Duoyun Bookstore in Huangyan.
The fascination with complex spatial organization to manipulate the experience of time, whether perceived as fast or slow, has always intrigued the designer. Labyrinths, combined with strategic lighting, serve as an ideal architectural form to achieve this. In the bookstore, the bookshelves and furniture act as walls of a maze, with transparent and translucent surfaces blurring the light and creating a sense of disorientation and curiosity. This effect can make time feel as though it slows down. In the coffee area, the orange-colored furniture mimics ripples, enhancing this temporal experience. Sitting on a sofa on the raised platform by the window, the view of the river unfolds like a scroll, reminiscent of Chinese landscape paintings, evoking the same emotions felt when first standing by the river. However, due to additional structural secondary beams under the roof panels, it wasn’t possible to install a skylight above the cashier to seamlessly blend the water and sky, and instead, a luminous canopy was used—a slight compromise that meant missing out on one more light effect.
To enhance the disorienting maze-like experience, corrugated aluminum panels were used on the ceiling to mimic the rippling water of the Yongning River. Furthermore, the roof deck of the cashier area was turned into a mirror to reflect the sky, creating a visual connection between water and sky on both sides of the floor, establishing a place where direction and time seem to blur.
The bookstore’s courtyard reflects an exploration of the essence behind traditional garden forms. With full creative control granted by the owner, the designer crafted a garden that aligns with a personal vision for the site. Unnecessary structures and facilities from the original site were removed, while existing trees and plants were preserved and slightly modified, including adjustments to the fire stairwell and smoke extraction courtyard to comply with code. The courtyard was envisioned as a water surface, with three groups of trees representing green islands, embodying the traditional Chinese garden motif of a pond with three hills. This design choice captures the spirit of a serene, contemplative space that echoes classic Chinese landscape paintings.
The arrangement of trees in the courtyard draws inspiration from the compositions of Ni Zan, a revered painter admired by the designer. While the use of white stones and greenery might evoke images of Japanese dry landscape gardens, the inspiration actually comes from Qiu Ying’s “Garden Views,” which depict Chinese dry landscapes. In one fragment, a vibrant rosebush stands against a wide, sparkling white stone ground, presented in a simple and sparse manner. The painting’s courtyard is enclosed by a bamboo curtain; similarly, the designer enclosed the space with translucent white perforated aluminum panels. This allows light to filter through, sprinkling the courtyard with dappled patterns that mimic rain, adding a dynamic quality to the space. The courtyard diverges from traditional garden forms, instead expressing a Chinese cultural affinity for creating vibrant earthly paradises, like the legendary Peach Blossom Garden, even in densely populated areas. It serves as a contemporary interpretation of this dreamlike escape.
The white aluminum walls of White Cloud Court do not entirely obscure the old buildings, allowing glimpses of the past to subtly peek through. In most areas, the courtyard envelops visitors in a near-complete dreamlike world, yet traces of reality linger, fostering a sense of magical realism where the boundary between the familiar and the unfamiliar blurs. This blend of dream and reality was an unexpected but welcome outcome, enhancing the space with a surreal yet tangible quality that resonates with both the historical and the contemporary.
Surprises: In the White Cloud Court, readers will discover two cloud-shaped stools, one white and one blue, crafted from plastic recycled from marine debris. Leveraging Huangyan’s reputation as the capital of molds, the plastic was shaped using specially made molds. This choice reflects the designer’s commitment to environmental sustainability, inspired by his daughter’s education on environmental protection and the belief that architects should incorporate eco-friendly practices into their designs.
There is also a blue glass house accessible via a spiral staircase in the café. Daylight filters through, creating a stunning purple hue where the orange staircase meets the roof. At the press of a switch, the blue glass turns clear, revealing the view of the Yongning River. This innovative glass, developed by a local company in Huangyan for automotive use, is being applied to architecture for the first time. The same glass is also used in the lecture area. The designer envisioned this scene as one where, in spring, sitting on the steps, the blue fades, and cherry blossoms bloom like clouds at one’s feet—a serene and beautiful image.
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Project Location
Address: Taizhou, Zhejiang, China
Location is for general reference and may represent a city or country, not necessarily a precise address.
