CRL Kunshan City Crossing
Reimagining an outdated shopping center for a modern consumer
Location
Kunshan, Jiangsu
Project Size
153,960 SM
Building Types
Retail Center, Office, Street Retail
Client
CRLand
The original Kunshan shopping center required innovation to adapt to the new and rapid development of the transforming marketplace. The original structure offered 63,000 square meter of mall, 20,000 square meter of street retail and 50,000 square meter of office building that required updating. LINK Design Group integrated existing architecture with a clear retail strategy to offer transformation to a building that was outdated and non-maximized for the burgeoning area – updating the street retail layout and implementing an elevation redesign for the entire project.
The overall exterior design language utilizes shifted massing and material patterns incorporated with LED lights to highlight a rhythmic sense of movement. LINK rebuilt the scale and atmosphere for the outdoor shopping street. The exterior gets lightened up and increases the retail allure by expanding the area of glass façade to allow for more opportunity to display and advertise businesses within. LINK introduces small and focused changes in design – the addition of embedded LED-lighting, green walls and recessed storefronts – to the façade. By limiting changes to the overall building massing in focused areas, LINK saved on demolition and construction cost.
The original structure connected street retail through a series of bridges – LINK targeted the central building as a focal point and intersection, creating covered outdoor area that connect the rest of the street retail with walkways and a grand staircase.
Gathering spaces were added to bridge the outdoors through amenity areas – outdoor dining zones for food and beverage stores, a collection of covered seating and resting places on the grand stairs looking out to a public plaza.
LINK reimagined the outdoor space to invite visitors indoors, encouraging commerce. An existing outdoor restaurant bar in/on the plaza is refreshed with landscaping and lighting design. Both here and among seating areas, LINK connects upper and lower floors through a series of floor openings creating vertical connections.
