Architecture is a window, open to the world
Among local boutique hotels, Songtsam can be said to be a milestone.
It took 22 years to connect the Yunnan-Tibet Route and the Shangri-La Loop with 13 hotels and 2 tent camps, giving travelers a "home" in China's most untouched and independent natural secrets.
MISS has been there twice, and the line-style travel experience is really special and authentic enough.
Songtsen Nanga Bawa Mountain Residence
The number one hero behind this is Pema Dorjee, the founder of Songtseng, who laid the tone of the Tibetan folk house that gave Songtsam its soul.
However, MISS would like to introduce you to another - architect Qi Shanshan. In the past five years, all the new hotels in Songtsam have been created by her, and each one is amazing.
This Hangzhou girl has a "hanging" life: she was awarded the status of "Centennial Scholar" of Columbia University, won the only special researcher place at Harvard GSD every year to study and practice at Renzo Piano's firm, and after returning to China, she continued her studies under Master Wang Shu.
At the same time, she is also an "old Tibet", and she has followed her father into Tibet every year since she was a child, so when she wrote Songzan, she was like a fish in water.
Songtsam comes to the ancient mountain residence
Songtsen Pomilinka
She has successively operated more than ten hotels such as Laigu Mountain Residence, Bomi Linka and Nanga Bawa Mountain Residence, which use breathing design to make the building retreat from nature and give the space temperature, so that guests have a more appropriate experience.
A new generation of more systematic and differentiated Songtsam aesthetics is growing.
When the newest Songtsam Hotel, Pu'er Green Valley, has been breathing in an oasis for four months, I finally have the opportunity to talk to Qi Shanshan again.
01
Pu'er Green Valley, breathing
This meeting with Qi Shanshan was at her home in Hangzhou, and as soon as she entered the door, she was bumped by her big smile.
Loose and soft color-block sweaters, tight yoga pants, simple but casual dress, exude comfort from the inside out. "Feel free to drink from your favorite cup, no restrictions." At a glance, I found that there were many different cups on the table at the door, and cute dolls were hidden inside. It turned out that Qi Shan Shan was so girly.
Sitting in front of the canvas, Qi Shanshan also opened the chatterbox. "Every Songtsam is a special story, and so is Pu'er Green Valley."
Pu'er Green Valley is the latest hotel in Songtseng, located in the North Wetland Park of Simao District, Pu'er City, with a pure white façade and a wide and gentle coffee-colored eaves, infinitely close to nature.
A thousand years ago, this was the starting point of the Yunnan Tibet Tea Horse Road, and a thousand years later, it is an important stop on the crossing line of the Songtsam Tea Horse Road, which is both a retrospective and a continuation.
Although the altitude of 1300 meters is the lowest hotel project in the Songtsam series, it is not a lot of challenges. The first hurdle is transformation.
The hotel, formerly known as the expert building of the Yunnan Coffee Trading Center, has a small and small room inside, which is undoubtedly very unsuitable for travel. In order to return looseness and tension to the space, Qishan Shan tailors a renovation plan for each room.
Bringing rooms together is basic, but it's more important to get guests to have the right experience in different rooms.
Staying in room 104 is like sleeping in a botanical garden.
Ficus banyan flora grows in front of the balcony, hydrangeas and orchids bloom in the garden, and the sunlight shines through the gaps in the leaves, which is comfortable but not hot.
Thanks to the uninterrupted pattern, people can glimpse this green at any time when they are in the house. And the large area of open floor-to-ceiling doors makes embracing nature come more painfully.
You can lie in bed and take a nap, or sit by the window and drink a pot of pu-erh. The kettle on the coffee table can control the temperature, and there is still hot tea even after sitting for a long time.
If you feel slightly hot, don't rush to turn on the air conditioner, open the doors and windows widely, let the humid air flow, and gently shake a fan to dispel irritability.
Staying in Suite 403 is a completely different view and experience. But if it is a suite, there is an internal window between the bedroom and the living room, which is actually more like an intimate neighborhood.
The wetland park is close at hand, and the city is far away, with the same open glass windows, installed into multiple landscapes, and the view is smooth and far-reaching.
The bed facing the view allows you to wake up to the daylight. Even sitting in front of the dressing table, you will not miss a moment of scenery.
Pu'er Green Valley is like the heart of a wetland park, resonating with nature and breathing together.
As Qi Shanshan said, designing Songtsam is to maximize the perception of space into the hotel. Every scene of a guest living in her room has already played out in her mind countless times.
So living in Songtsam, design is never the protagonist, living comfortably and blending in with nature. And when such a hotel appears, it can also naturally activate a world and dialogue with the surrounding environment.
02
From the ancient glacier to Nanga Bawa
"Make the building disappear" is the only answer
When we talk about Songtsam, we rarely talk about architecture, design, let alone the designers behind it.
We have repeatedly mentioned its unbeatable location and homely atmosphere. The hotel is like a supporting role, disappearing into the vast world.
And this is exactly what Qishan Shan has been pursuing to "make architecture disappear". "Nature is so beautiful, why should people who come here pay attention to a building."
So, when she built the ancient mountain residence at an altitude of 4,200 meters, she let the building live in a corner, embedded in the mountain, and only a small head poked out.
In order to give way to nature, she chose to hide the building, and when she hid the building, she also hid the difficult behind-the-scenes story.
Cold, lack of oxygen, lack of resources... Every challenge the hotel faced when it was built was enough to bring the project to death. But Qi Shanshan did not flinch, and she cleverly chose the method of pre-making modules to deal with it.
Each module was pre-fabricated in Shanghai, transported along National Highway 318 to Ranwu, and then combined by blind crane based on the minimum unit module of 3x6x3.3 meters, and finally completed the entire building.
"Because of concerns that some bridges and tunnels in Yunnan and Tibet have height restrictions, trucks equipped with modules may not be able to pass. When I took the 318 Yunnan Tibet Line, I measured the height of all the caves and tunnels in the forward and reverse direction. That is, every time we reached a hole, I jumped out of the car and ran to the middle of National Highway 318 to measure and record the actual height. In fact, the architect also included surveying road holes and tunnels. Talking about this experience, Qi Shanshan is still vividly remembered, and the hard work at that time is not seen in the relaxed tone. She seems to have been full of energy.
The ancient mountain residence that was born was therefore named a miracle and became a destination for countless people.
With the hotel, Qishan Mountain lights up people's yearning and desire to explore this land.
The same is true of the Nanga Bawa Mountain House, which opened in 2021.
Facing the sacred mountain Nanga Bawa Peak, Qishan Mountain chose crimson to respond to this solemnity. The materials used to build are simple, mainly natural stone and wood, and all the stones are sourced from Songtsam's site in Darling to protect the local environment.
The hotel is backed by mountains and forests, facing the sacred mountain, and when the fog clears, it blends in with its surroundings and disappears.
But back indoors, no one will not be impressed.
Each window becomes a painting, and the four seasons flow in front of the window and in the vase, and if it is March, it must be a peach blossom.
Hot tea has already been brewed on the table, so just hide your body in the warm leather sofa and quietly feel the beauty of being surrounded by snowy mountains. The occasional voice of the waiter talking in Tibetan was heard in my ears, and it was as comfortable as if I were at home.
And when you return to your room, the fire on the stove is lit, the soft bed is made, and you change into a pair of mille-soled shoes, which is the beginning of the local integration.
It is never the external design that can reach the heart, but the power of the core. When the building is hidden and loses its external advantages, it can be seen from the inside.
Qi Shanshan and Songtsam have such courage.
03
Strong and confident, sober and fearless
Life without limits is enjoyable
When looking back at Qi Shan Shan's growth trajectory, it is not difficult to find that her courage today has traces to follow.
Studying abroad at the age of 14, without the Internet, without a mobile phone, attending a strict boarding school, bravely facing everything in life alone.
Instead of suppressing her nature, the step-by-step life made her more determined to be herself. Therefore, she rejected her family's suggestion to study medicine and chose Columbia. After graduating as a "Centennial Scholar" at Columbia University, he was admitted to Harvard, and obtained the only special researcher place at Harvard GSD every year, and went to the firm of architect Renzo Piano to learn and practice.
The way of the genius girl, so dazzling. If there is an answer to such excellence, it is that she has always worked hard awakely and fearlessly.
"At Harvard, I was going for the only distinguished research spot." She is outspoken and frank and cute.
After returning to China, Qi Shan Shan's projects were mainly homestays and boutique hotels, which gave her the greatest possibility compared to the established sense of hotel design. "It's not big, but it's very visible, there's a lot of things to experiment with, and it allows me to redefine how to live."
Regardless of design, work, or style, her preference is always unlimited.
So in Heshun Ancient Town in Yunnan, she built the "lying" Anzhiruo Mountain.
The building has no façade and crawls on the hillside, extending upwards along the hill, open and breathing.
Children can run happily up the stairs, and the old people can walk up the hill. More like a public area in the mountains than an accommodation space, it welcomes everyone.
After designing many homestays and winning many awards, Qi Shanshan also came to the public's eyes, was labeled as a "Harvard female architect", and inevitably talked about gender topics.
Qi Shanshan is much more comfortable about this, "Gender does not need to be a limitation. Women can be architects, they can be brave, and there are not so many rules ”
As she did "vanishing architecture," neither architecture nor architect matters, let alone gender.
In Qi Shanshan's body, we see a strong and confident female figure. Her petite body has unlimited energy and possibilities, and her series of Matsuzan, Anno Wakaku, Suji and Hitatsu are each a prologue. In the future, there will also be the opening of new projects such as Songtsam Pasonso and Anzhiruo Lintao.
This year, the Bund Design Hotel Award awarded the "Best Breakthrough Designer" to Qi Shanshan Mountain.
We always pay attention to the growth of the younger generation of architects and designers. It is undeniable that women have always been rare in this field, and this award was awarded to Qi Shanshan because of her breakthrough architectural practice, but also because of her unique charm as a minority. Looking forward to this architectural window of Qishan Mountain taking us to a broader landscape and world.