INUCE • DIRK U. MOENCH – HUAXIANG CHRISTIAN CHURCH COMMUNITY CENTRE
Designer | Dirk U. Moench | |
Location | Flower Lane Nr. 7, Gulou District, Fuzhou City, Fujian Province, China | |
Design Team |
Project Architect: Dirk U. Moench |
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Anno | 2019 | |
Photo credits |
All photos credited to “INUCE — SHIKAI” |
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Foto esterni
Descrizione del progetto
HUAXIANG CHRISTIAN CENTRE – The Rise of China’s Urban Christians
Fuzhou, China, 2015 — 2018
A CHRISTIAN MINORITY IN A TYPICAL CHINESE CITY
Since its construction in 1938 Huaxiang Church became witness to radical transformations: From decades of deterioration to unprecedented urban growth; from complete suppression of religion to a ten-fold growth in the number of Christians. Today, it finds itself in a maze of high-rises. In need for additional space, its congregation decided to build a new church with community centre functions adjacent to the old monument.
IN EYE OF THE STORM
The conditions imposed on the project were extraordinary: Firstly, the spatial requirements conflicted with the heritage-authority’s height and GFA restrictions. Secondly, the site’s isolated character — enclosed by an uncommunicative set of buildings high and low, modern and traditional, Eastern and Western — demanded an innovative approach regarding the relationship to the surrounding.
EXPRESSING A COMMUNITY’S CHANGED SELF — PERCEPTION
Our design harmonizes such imbalances by adopting the role of a “mediator”: Subtly folding its contours the volume is visually scaled down into fragments, allowing it to relate in proportion and silhouette to church and surrounding, thus evoking the impression of organically grown skylines. The façade is finished in a traditional pebble-dash technique — a counterstatement to the curtain-walls encircling it. The roofs are conceived as elevated amphitheatres for open-air services and have become popular scenic spots also to the public, offering unobstructed views onto the old town. The community centre therefore embodies a change in the congregation’s self-perception, from a protective minority that hid in seclusion, to a community that now wants to reach out and invite to join.
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