Wooden Orchids | Biomimicry | Scoop.it

"The Orchid, a source of life and symbol of sustainability and fecundity, is the inspiration for the shopping mall ‘Wooden Orchids’ designed by architect Vincent Callebaut. On the southern shore of the Yangtze river in China, Wooden Orchids is designed as an innovative solution to the main socio-economic problem – the rural exodus into super cities which causes undue stress on city resources. The project aims to create a new eco-responsible shopping and rich cultural experience, while maintaining it as a tourist destination that combines passive bioclimatic principles and renewable energy technology to assure 70 per cent energy saving.

Based on biomimicry, the architecture of the shopping hub is directly inspired by the petals of an orchid flower and designed as repetition of a basic designed module. The site is divided into two lots, each in proportions of the golden section 1:1.618. The natural order of Fibonacci numbers, observed everywhere in nature, has been adopted to develop the hierarchy and flow of spaces and places, representing the right balance between solid and void, between shadow and light."

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