UDG builds a chapel in Sanya celebrating the natural landscape
We all realise that mother nature and spirituality are closely related, and in reality many religious traditions have always recognised that truly shielding nature is only achievable if we recognise the metaphysical and religious dimension of the entire world.
Without a doubt, sites of worship may well usually be observed in panoramic positions exactly where the devoted are encouraged to interact with nature, as is the circumstance of Poly Shallow Sea in Sanya, on Yazhou Bay on the South China Sea. The Yanzhou Bay neighborhood is surrounded by panoramic spots such as Fairyland and South Mountain, and constructed on a wonderful web page by the sea with wonderful sunset sights. The spot has motivated the development of a regional cultural brand, “Legendary Yazhou, Intimate Paradise”. This is the background behind Dysis Chapel of Poly Shallow Sea, an integral portion of a wider-ranging approach for improvement of the spot, combining nearby cultural aspects with the superb sources of the place’s pure landscape.
Appointed by Poly (Hainan) Tourism Enhancement, the Chinese studio Shanghai United Design Group or UDG made a development in a single of these inspiring areas, consisting of a triangular volume reaching up to the sky and a rotating circle on the ground, symbol of eternal daily life and of God. All while staying away from all formal references to the symbolism of Christianity, these types of as the cross, in order to supply a location of worship for everyone, intended to be the “chapel of a like-themed cultural city employed to host weddings, and a popular desired destination for lovers.”
In accordance to the architects, the basic but convincing triangular composition of the challenge “pierces the sky with potent spirituality, like an eternal monument in between the sea and sky. Sunset light-weight shines as a result of the central hole of the construction, materialising the perception of time. The rotating unit orients in the direction of the situation of the setting sunshine all calendar year round, vividly implying that the minute is eternity.”
The circle is divided into two swimming pools of distinctive heights, with a type of curtain of h2o among them. Curved ramps on possibly aspect of the swimming pools open up up a look at of the sky and the sea by way of the gaps in the h2o courtyard partitions, the place the gurgling of the drinking water symbolises the dialogue in between time, place and men and women. Shade gets to be a important element of the chapel, and light-weight enters via slender gaps, revealing the extensive, mysterious world of tides, sea breezes, solar, moon and stars.
1st of all, UDG built the chapel to body the sunset on Valentine’s Day, February 14, which was to be the only working day of the calendar year in which the opening in the chapel was aligned with the placing sun. But why limit these an encounter to a single day? The architects added a rotating system to the remaining strategy to permit the chapel to be turned to align it with the solar.
The remaining outcome is a sacred making that picks up on the critical symbols of the cultural background of the human race to place customers in harmony with the normal spectacle of the solar environment in excess of the sea and recreate our lost harmony with mother nature.
Christiane Bürklein
Project: Shanghai United Structure Group Co., Ltd (www.udg.com.cn)

Landscape Style: GVL Global Group

Interior Design and style: Appreciate Design and style

Site: Yazhou Bay, Yacheng District, Sanya, Hainan

Yr: 2020

Pictures: Shen Zhonghai