Changzhou Stadium Tower

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RESEARCH BACKGROUND: Changzhou Stadium Tower in one of a number of research projects that flowed from Monacella and Douglas' invited work with Australian Urban Systems (AUS), an 'industry cluster' set up in 2005 by Victorian State Government and the Department of Industry, Innovation and Regional Development in partnership with a wide range of industry experts working on urbanisation. The AUS initiative was part of a cooperative agreement between Jiangsu Province China and the Victorian Government. The local government of Chanzhou commissioned this research to design a building that would unite disparate zones (a precinct devoted to housing, another to entertainment and large-scale public facilities). RESEARCH CONTRIBUTION: Changzhou Stadium Tower is a porous threshold between the adjacent sporting complexes and residential neighbourhoods. Organized by a series of implicit, connective threads and physical voids, the site produces a series of indoor-outdoor plazas at the street level, making for a continuously open and active ground plane from the street corner through the site and to the stadium. Two voids grow vertically and outward from the centre of the site and organize natural lighting and ventilation in the residential tower and office spaces while simultaneously giving form to the building through a series of ruled surface geometries. The innovative design integrates public and private spaces, woven together at a range of scales to reconstruct the city block, and begin to stitch together two different precincts to provide new opportunities for community engagement. RESEARCH SIGNIFICANCE: The researchers were invited to join AUS. Aside from this peer review, the launch of Changzhou Stadium Tower received television and print media coverage in Changzhou. The tower contributes to urban planning by demonstrating how existing issues in the city fabric may be addressed through a architectural intervention that operates at the scale of the city.