Experience in Motion by Studio DOTCOF

This showroom is in a three-story brick building built in 1992 within Yanfeng Auto Trim System Company’s Anting plant in Shanghai, China. The client wanted to add a showroom on the ground floor to display its automotive interior and exterior products to customers; the second and third floors were reserved for office functions. In conjunction with Yanfeng’s brand slogan, “Experience in Motion”, Studio DOTCOF hopes to create a scenery-in-motion experience in this architectural space renovation project.

The west wall of the building was closed with hollow concrete blocks, and a water feature has been installed along with the “Experience in Motion” logo, creating the landscape element of the road’s end. In the afternoon, sunlight from the west is filtered through the hollowed-out brick wall, creating changing light and shadow patterns in the interior. Trees and lawns of the site are maximised in the interior with strategic placements and generous window openings.

The unfavourable factors around the site, such as the parking lot on the north side and vehicles pathway on the northeast side, were shielded by sealing the windows and by other means. The skylight on the second floor of the original building was reopened, and the floor slab between the first and second floors was removed so that sunlight is absorbed through the skylight into the ground-floor exhibition hall.

In the interior, the goal is to create a continuous space with a sense of movement. This space is designed as a wedge, with one large end and one small end, and the sense of spatial perspective is enhanced. Walking through it, one feels a trend of continuity and flow. 

Visitors flow is guided by a half-height sloping wall, through the hollowed-out brick wall and light from the skylight, and then back southward through a dark ramp into the inner courtyard. The flow continues southward along the inner courtyard space to the dark gallery, where it turns several times before reaching the south gallery. There, the space is once again bright, with long horizontal windows eventually drawing the south lawn and sunlight inside. People finish their visit there and can choose to stay longer in the conference hall, meeting room, or outdoor terrace area.

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