Gong Dong: the Wall as a Founding Element of a New Modernity

This essay explores the main features of the work of the architect Gong Dong, founder of Vector Architects office in Beijing, who is one of the main protagonists of the so-called “Chinese avant-garde architecture”. The critical analysis of the Seashore Library in Beidaihe New District (2014-15) and Alila Yangshuo Hotel in Guilin (2013-17) highlights how the wall can be interpreted as the main element of a design culture, deeply linked to aspects of the local building tradition mediated by the architect’s western references. The wall is thus intended as an architectural device to channel natural light, create landscape views and contain corridors and stairs, as well as ornamental tool. A design approach that is indebted to the lesson by Kenneth Frampton on the compositional role assumed by constructive aspects in contemporary architecture.