On the 70th anniversary of the anti-fascist, when the leader echelon of the multi-plane formation flew over the sky of Tiananmen Square, the people of the world on the other side of the earth could not only watch China's magnificent transformation in front of the TV screen, but all the countries with which they had established diplomatic relations also hoped to build a platform for common prosperity in the exchanges between the two countries through various channels.
The United Arab Emirates, a country that solidified and changed in the wind and sand, has been inextricably linked to the ancient Chinese civilization since the Han and Tang envoys opened the Silk Road. The merchant envoys of the old Silk Road brought the tradition of heterogeneous architecture to China, and the new "Belt and Road" development strategy made its long-term inclusiveness and integration more comprehensive.
It is based on this historical background and the environment of the times that architect Li Yingwu followed the urban development of the UAE, from Abu Dhabi to Dubai Metropolis, and finally returned to the old city of bastakiya, embarking on a pilgrimage journey about culture and architecture. He hopes to find the intersection of multiple cultures in the human process in the form of walking, and to explore the inevitable journey of Chinese civilization to the future of the world in the broad sense of the Silk Road cultural architecture.
The luxury of piety – the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in the United Arab Emirates
The Zayed Grand Mosque, one of the places that Impressed Lee most during his walk in Abu Dhabi, was built to commemorate Sheikh Abu Dhabi, the first president of the UAE after the founding of the UAE in 1972, at a total cost of US$5.5 billion and took 13 years to complete. The wonderful stone carvings here are all from the craftsmanship of Chinese craftsmen, cutting, inlaying, stitching, and combining with stone to produce a wonderful visual effect.
"The design of the entire temple fully reflects the Islamic style and belongs to the classical design itself, not the modern design. Its architects and raw materials come from various countries, and it is a temple built with the help of international resources. Although its history is only ten years, creations such as carpets, glass, and stone pillars all have a strong folk art atmosphere, and the craftsmanship is indeed very exquisite. Li Yingwu recalled.
The pattern of the building also left a beautiful impression on him. Although the animal pattern is inherited from the Persian tradition, it can be reborn and produce a new look; the plant pattern, mainly inheriting the tradition of the Eastern Romans, has finally integrated a splendid Islamic pattern after thousands of hammers; the geometric pattern is a categorically original thing, due to the combination of the polylines without beginning and end, the turn of the moment constitutes a special form; and the text pattern, used in a certain part of the building, is mostly the verses of the Qur'an.
But no matter how the form changes, its core is to show the UAE's national characteristics and historical sites in front of the world, which coincides with the mentality of Li Yingwu and OAD when designing hotels. Architecture is not only the place of all human activities, the embodiment of functionality, but also the mother of all plastic arts, is the sublimation of aesthetics, architecture is a symbolic system of symbols, is a regional display, just like oad in the Xishuangbanna resort complex first thought of how to retain culture, not novel, but in a sense, this is also an innovation.
The pearl of the scattered desert - the Emirates Desert Hotel
At night, Li Yingwu stayed at the uae's most distinctive bab ai shams (desert hotel), which is said to have been specially paved for it, and a desalinated seawater diversion project was built, with a total investment of 5 billion dirhams (10 billion yuan), which is a lot of money.
"The building's golden façade should be made of local materials, built with traditional yellow sand to form part of the dunes. The interior and exterior of the entire hotel are uniform colors, which seems very ordinary, but the layout is very stylish, like a kind of low-key luxury. Li Yingwu recalled.
Checking in during the winter of the 2015 Chinese New Year, The Desert Hotel has curated a number of programs to allow foreign visitors to experience the traditional charm of exotic cultures. A variety of belly dancers, rich and delicious barbecue dinners, a tube of shisha on the open-air bar, as well as slow lights and bustling crowds, and the most emblematic of the festive atmosphere is the fireworks lit on the desert night sky, so that the proud Chinese can't help but sigh the UAE's importance to the culture of the motherland.
Fragmented urban space
"Dubai has the tallest buildings in the world, the supertall buildings with the most diverse shapes, the world's largest and most prosperous shopping malls... But here, there is no most beautiful city in the world. Beautiful cities are similar, and cities that are not beautiful are different. This is Li Yingwu's first impression of Dubai.
Unlike many people looking up to super cities, Li Yingwu sees more of a spatial scale. The planning of low-rise villa areas interspersed with skyscrapers and supertall buildings, but the two are completely devoid of connection in space, makes him elusive.
"The original intention of the design is to help city dwellers live in an orderly manner, but if the building is separated from people, it will create chaos, and I prefer a city with a large number of multi-storey buildings suitable for people to live, which will inspire my love of life." We tend to create cities as we wish, but it is difficult to find a reasonable objective model, and the results are becoming more and more extreme, which is a very terrible problem. Li Yingwu said.
The tranquility of the downtown edge
Unlike the city, Dubai's Old Town is another experience of traditional culture. Each of the old houses here is made of white coral stone and earth, which is said to be a good way to block the scorching temperature in the desert, and in the past when air conditioning was not yet invented, the inhabitants of the desert area cooled the room by the wind flowing in from the wind tower. The architecture of the Old Town embodies the wisdom of arab ancestors, and it also flutters a message of struggle in industrial development.
"There are not many old streets preserved, only for tourists to visit, but I think the traditional buildings here are very charming, the overall color is very uniform, the streets are scattered with galleries and cafes, this combination will give people a sense of comfort and tranquility, but unfortunately, this is not seen in the new urban development." Li Yingwu felt some regret for the lack of Old Street.
epilogue
The world is flat, the future business model is the same, the open ideal and the system are the same, even including what to eat, there is almost no difference in what is used, but people's inner needs for experience are not the same. The glass curtain wall of the tall building makes it difficult to distinguish the different temperaments between the cities, and it is thin and powerless to rely on the bustling tourist attractions as a reproduction of history. Architects of an era should understand that even if history subtly changes the appearance of the city, it has never been able to rewrite the ancient civilization that has been rooted here for thousands of years.
(Some of the pictures in the article were taken by Li Yingwu himself)