In 2024, the Flickering Peak, designed by Wutopia Lab, was completed in Coffee Village, Wanning, Hainan. The Sun River Art Centre, covered with a semi-transparent white Ferrari membrane composed of three perforation rates, was built on the site of a coffee plantation developed by returned overseas Chinese from Indonesia. With its dramatic visual expressions during day and night, it has become a cultural landmark symbolising miracles and hope in the local area.
The client was dissatisfied with the previous design of the art centre. After the previous architect ran out of ideas, they approached the design studio to create a design that balances substance and visual appeal. The constraints were that the basement had already been constructed, so the design team could not alter the beam and slab structure types. The new building could not exceed the original structural load or go beyond the original building control lines.
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- Photo credit: Guowei Liu
As the client wanted to bring in water into the landscape, the design team decided to turn the original three buildings directly into three mountains in the area, and create an artificial sea in front of one of the mountains. This design symbolises the potential for miracles and offers a brighter vision for the future.
Among the three buildings in the original plan, the east and west auxiliary buildings serve as reception and office areas, while the central main building is the core of the art centre. The east and west auxiliary buildings are the secondary mountains, and the main building is the primary mountain. The sea is created in front of the main mountain. Walking along the boardwalk on the sea, one enters the main mountain’s lobby. The sea also flows into the lobby like a tide. Inside the lobby, there are two routes to climb the mountain.
One route heads east, first entering the coffee reception area, passing through the open negotiating area, reaching the second-floor overseas Chinese exhibition area, and then arriving at the outdoor seating area. Here, a sky bridge connects to the secondary mountain, and then an outdoor staircase leads to the third-floor multi-functional hall’s external platform. Another route climbs the large steps to the mezzanine, then to the second floor, or takes the elevator directly to the third floor. After passing through the multi-functional hall, this route merges with the first one at the platform, and both continue up the outdoor stairs to the roof, where a hidden small coffee garden offers a panoramic view of the entire town.
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- Photo credit: Guowei Liu
The climbing route interweaves indoor and outdoor spaces, turning the original box-shaped main building into an abstract layered mountain. The lobby is made spacious by removing one column through reinforcing the main beams in specific areas. Once the mountain construction plot is established clearly, all the detailed texts will develop and refine according to this.
The terraced main building, combined with the auxiliary buildings based on their functions, is visually inconsistent and can easily be overshadowed by the cluster of buildings developed in the background. I decided to make an addition by covering each of the three buildings with a semi-transparent shell. These three shells can break free from the functional facades of the three buildings and independently shape abstracted mountain peaks. This ultimately achieves the effect of highlighting through subtraction in a complex background.
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- Photo credit: Guowei Liu
The shell, detached from the building’s climatic boundary, forms a new visual boundary. The space between the two boundaries becomes a genuinely shaded grey space. I have always been highly interested in experimenting with separating the visual boundary from the climatic boundary. This is actually based on practical experiences in traditional Chinese architecture.
Due to structural load restrictions, lightweight membranes were used instead of the commonly used perforated aluminium panels. Ferrari membranes with three different perforation rates gradually increase in transparency from bottom to top, forming a translucent visual boundary resembling mountain peaks. Under the scorching sunlight of Hainan, this creates a flickering effect on the roof, which is the origin of the name “flickering.”
The cave and arched lobby, the mountain path and outdoor stairs, the sun and glass round windows, the entrance and skylight, the membrane structure and tree shade, the water channel and landscaping, the sea and pool, the beach and ground, the cliff and platform—all these natural elements, after being abstracted, combine with architectural components to form a set of intertextual texts, creating a super intertextual relationship between the art center and the mountain. Through interpreting these texts, one can discover history, myths, memories, nature, symbols, riddles, and even the architectural language model.
During the day, the white Flickering Peak reflects in the white pool, naturally acquiring a sense of sanctity. Gemini architects are fascinated by the transformation of this immediate sanctity. Lighting designers were invited to create the other side of sanctity in twilight—materiality, temporary materiality. The translucent Flickering Peak transforms into a mountain of lights in different colours, symbolising different yet rich desires.
However, inside the main mountain’s lobby, there will be a highly saturated lighting design. Under a blue background, the red sun shines, and at this moment, it is the resurrection of Rothko. At this moment, behind the ever-changing materiality seen from outside, an immediate sanctity different from pure white is born.
Architecture is a specific event created by a specific group of people for a specific reason, at a specific time, in a specific place. Through tools like oral narration, text, painting, photography, printing, video recording, and the internet, it intervenes in society, intertwining the interpretations and misinterpretations of the author and readers, influencing and rewriting cultural habits at certain levels of society. In this sense, architecture is media.
