Changing China: luxury living is now about being green and respecting the planet
Clubhouse. Swimming pool. Water garden. Meditation area. Landscape architects find developers, buyers and tenants eager for nature elements in housing estates
In 20 years working on projects in China, landscape architect Scott Slaney has noticed what he describes as “the arc of change”.
True, there is still an overwhelming number of housing developments in densely populated cities designed to accommodate as many people as possible, the buildings themselves “lined up like little soldiers”, he says.
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But then there are the other developments where the opposite is true, where a development has sizeable garden areas, and where, says Slaney, designers are “exploring every possible way to introduce green”.
Slaney is principal of San Francisco-based landscape architecture firm Terrain Studio, founded by Minhui Li, a graduate of the Beijing Forestry University. Terrain is working on, among other projects, the Huangpu River East Bank Conceptual Master Plan in Shanghai, which Slaney describes as a “living waterfront”.
Essentially, he said, the notion is to “create a beautiful natural landscape that people live within”.
While colossal construction projects continue across China, a number of international landscaping practices have found developers of multi-family housing in the country are thinking more about how to integrate elements of nature into spaces, be they grass-filled courtyards, sparkling fountains or meditation gardens.
