The Youth Activity Center, Old Garment Factory

Renovation

BEIJING, CHINA
Architects: Moguang Studio, REDe Architects
Area: 5400 m²
Year: 2020

Background
As urban planning develops in Beijing, urban renewal gradually spreads from the center to
the suburban Beizhuang Town. The project site was originally a garment manufacturing
factory covering an area of 5,000 sqm in Beizhuang Town. The original layout of factory
buildings has been reatined, and renovated it into a youth activity center which comprises
youth education camps along with classroom, restaurant, conference room, and
accommodations. The site is divided into two courtyards. The northern one is featured by a
large one-story single-span factory building with a bent structure. In the southern one there
are small red brick buildings with timber trusses and brick bearing walls. Considering the
structural characteristics of the original fabrics, we concentrated the education camps,
conference rooms and restaurants in the northern area, and accommodations in the
southern
Master Planning
The old plant mainly consisted of two sections. The north area accommodated a one-storey
single-span workshop with a bent structure, while the south zone was composed of red
brick buildings that featured wooden roof trusses and brick bearing walls, including a
warehouse, a canteen and dormitories. Based on the scales and structural characteristics of
the existing buildings, a children's discovery center is set, a multifunctional hall, restaurant
and other functions that require large-span space in the north zone, while the south area
was repurposed into accommodations.

How to reactivate such an old industrial site without rich heritage and distinctive spatial
features? In response to various limitations and functional demands, different renovation
strategies were adopted for the 12 single buildings. As opposed to setting a unified style for
those buildings, Emphasis has been put on the relationship between individual buildings,
the whole architectural complex and its surroundings. The site is surrounded by factories
and mountains. During renovation, friendly spatial scales were created, and inserted a
series of structures such as walkway, corridor, small square and transitional yard to link the
north zone' activity space with accommodations in the south area and to produce
continuous, three-dimensional landscape experiences.

Children's Playground
Abstract geometric components were applied to landscape design, to create a surreal
setting for children, who are encouraged to explore possibilities of geometric shapes,
conceive stories of adventure, play and have fun in various ways.
The existing pavement in the north courtyard was covered by hard concrete bricks. Circular
slope and a steel-grid is embedded on platform into the courtyard, to build a large
entertainment installation. It connects the camp area and the restaurant's rooftop terrace on
west and east sides, while allowing kids to run and play at different heights. The platform
provides shade for the lawn and activities beneath, which helps strengthen a dramatic
feeling. Given the site's atmosphere and textures of building facades, we chose recycled
red bricks and concrete bricks as main paving materials, which are complemented by a
rubber running track, together producing playful spaces where kids can run and jump freely.

In order to liberate children's perception and imagination, conventional forms were

abandoned, are conceived as the circular walkway's structures and the spatial design.
Slanting columns were chosen to support the suspended walkway, forming an undulating
pattern that resembles "sine waves" in mathematics. Besides, the double-helix structure of
the circle is endowed with a precise proportional relationship. In this way, the space offers
alternating experiences, either dynamic or static. Moreover, the fire reservoir outlet at the
middle of the lawn was designed into a wedge-shaped optical pavilion, which blends the
blue sky into the lawn area. The building facades are embellished with geometric color
blocks and lines, with a view to evoking kids' imagination and stimulating them to interact
and explore the distinctive venue. We hope this place can help strengthen kids' sensory
perception of nature. As running and playing on the rooftop, they're embraced by sky and
mountains nearby.
The existing south courtyard was paved with asphalt, with wild artemisia vigorously growing
from cracks on the ground. To avoid adding artificial landscape too "consciously", plant
clusters are scattered that naturally grow at staggering heights to build a garden. We
selected perennial plants that are common in Northern China to present changing scenes
throughout the year. We wish the garden can help children to discover the authentic beauty
of nature, observe varying states of plants, either swaying in the wind, embracing sunshine
or withering... The trampoline in the garden is like a "black hole", attracting both adults and
kids.

Between the north and south courtyards, we made use of the existing height difference to
create a flowing waterscape, where a capsule-like pavilion was inserted to connect
accommodations, restaurant and the north courtyard. It's like a gentle pause in the spatial
rhythm. Considering the striking geometric forms and monotonous texture of surrounding
buildings, we created a "threshold zone" to integrate into the environment. The pavilion
floats on the water surface, and its perforated metal screens on two sides reveal moire
patterns when viewed from a certain distance. The view becomes blurred, presenting
ethereal and dynamic visual effects. The perforated metal panels sometimes filter light and
brighten the space, and sometimes refract, distort the light.

The Youth Activity Center in the North District

The northern most original brick and reinforced concrete building on the site had few
openings, resulting in poor lighting, which did not meet the requirements for contemporary
use. Therefore, we removed the original building in the north and placed a row of entrance
lobby, which is a single-sided cantilevered structure in the shape of umbrella ribs. It eases
the pressure of the mass of the 70-meter-long and 7-meter-high factory building on the
street entrance, as well as people's experience of transition from the north square to the
Youth Activity Center. The interior of the lobby is made up of seven inscribing semi-circular
glass boxes, which function as the main entrance to the Youth Activity Center, the cafe area
and the concept store of creative items, like continuous small settlements. We transformed
a series of phenomena such as optical transparency, reflection and refraction into spatial
experiences of physics. The continuous glass surface reflects the surrounding environment,
making the structure lighter, and extending the view to other dimensions.

The potential of the internal space of the Youth Activity Center is explored by restructuring
the relationship between the exhibition space and the exhibits, with attempts to create a
sense of borderlessness for games. The 7-meter clear height of the original factory space is
divided into active and quiet functions according to floor levels, allowing children to enjoy
physical games in a circular circulation on the ground floor. At the end of the mezzanine is
set up an area for longer activities of creative and intellectual games and teaching. In order
to enable children to interact with the space during their activities, we have taken the
landscape staircase as the central stage in the layout of the exhibition items, and arranged
the steel ramp and the curved staircase along the longitudinal direction of the factory space.
The design has made good use of the gap at the bottom of the staircase and created a
three-dimensional gaming area with a slide, where a free path brings out the possibility of
various sports. For the partition of the exhibition items, free-form surfaces are used to
encourage expansion and interaction between the body and the space. The curved mesh
wall and the net across different floors allow children to crawl among the gaps.
Hostel Reception Hall in the South District
The original structural system of the southern building complex, with a north-south layout,
was a brick load-bearing wall and wooden truss roof. The original function was dormitory
and canteen. Based on the original building structure and layout, we added a water supply
and drainage system, and improved the thermal performance in the buildings, which were
converted into guestrooms.
The structural columns were transformed and steel components of the abandoned carport
into the porch of the main entrance to the hostel, and retained the existing cracked asphalt
ground at the entrance of the site. It is from these cracks that we look forward to grass and
flowers budding in spring.
Guestrooms in the South District
In order to echo the textures and scales of the existing buildings within the site, fair-faced
brick walls have been used to separate the internal space. For the external courtyard walls
and paving between each guestroom, fair-faced red bricks, all of which are recycled from
nearby demolished villages, are also employed. From the hostel's main entrance to the
guestroom area, low walls are used, courtyards and vegetation to create a discrete but
continuous path for outdoor experience, where privacy and publicness are subtly connected
and distinguished.

Concluding Remarks
The renovated Old Garment Factory in Miyun, Beijing accommodates our visions and
expectations for children's growth everyday. The main actors of the new space are the
people and families who come here. Their interaction with the buildings evokes the potential
of life in the new space. This is the conversion's vitality that moves people. The diverse and
open spatial structure allows for more possibilities for subsequent use, which always
evolves with time.