Green China II: NAX goes East

Network for Architecture Exchange NAX, with support of the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU),  led a delegation of German urban professionals to Beijing and Shanghai end of October 2018 to investigate the topic of ‘Cautious Urban Renewal’. The learning journey designed and hosted by CONSTELLATIONS was composed of a wide range of activities.

A Sino-German exchange in the format of a workshop was held jointly with dena, ICLEI and CSUS, inviting their Chinese partner cities: Xiangyang Old Town, Tianjin, Daqiu Village and Yuhua District in Shjijiazhuang.

The intention of this peer learning session was to share practices from both Germany and China and exchange on possible ways to redevelop urban areas in a sensitive manner.

With these three Chinese concrete urban redevelopment projects at hand, teams of Sino-German professionals studied the cases, worked on the  cultural, social and environmental aspects and provided suggestions.

The workshop was an opportunity for the cities to gather new ideas, get recommendations and gather best practices presented by both Chinese and German experts.  Over lunch, all participants had the opportunity to visit the Genesis landmark redevelopment and learn about their approach to building a community.

Other program points included visits of the FenestrationBAU fair, g the HouseVision exhibition in Beijing, fieldtrips in Bejing (Dashilar urban renewal) and Shanghai (800SHOW creative park) as well as a and a roundtable at Tongji University.

After a full day of sharing, inspiring and discussion all participants expressed their wish to continue the new collaboration in more dept and invited NAX and their participants to further exchange one-by-one in the Chinese Cities. We are looking forward to further exchange in Xiangyang, Tianjin and Shijiazhuang in the future..