The XIO LIFT Pavilion for 2024 Guangzhou Design Week / PMT Partners

REFACE

Floating City

In the early 1880s the elevator meets the steel frame. able to support the newly discovered territories without itself taking up space.
Through the mutual reinforcement of these two breakthroughs, any given site can now be multiplied ad infinitum to produce the proliferation of floor space called Skyscraper.

—— 《Delirious new York 》

Hypercube

The elevator, the core of modern high-rise buildings, is the carrier of urban wonders that break through gravity and grow upwards. It is an indispensable yet hidden and overlooked architectural element. It has transformed modern cities into stacked villages, with “land” arranged in a grid array, creating a brand-new urban form and also standardizing people’s lives in high-rise residences.

Thus, this space for showcasing elevator products is based on these connections and contradictions, metaphorically representing the characteristics of elevators and their relationship with modern urban life.

Suspended Cube

“Suspension” is an important feature of elevators, which is often overlooked in daily life. In fact, we have unknowingly entered a “suspended” life.

Therefore, the exhibition hall wraps and supports the interior with a transparent steel structure skin, allowing a suspended volume to protrude, creating the most intuitive sense of suspension. This volume, known as the “Suspended Cube”, serves multiple functions such as exhibition, meeting, and events.

The Continuous Monument

Module Façade

The transparent skin is a light steel structure composed of cubic modules with a side length of 1.2 meters. The support rods and tension rods extending along the spatial diagonal lines jointly address the partial load of the cantilevered volume inside.

Modular production is the characteristic of the era of automated production. The complex systems of modern industry also stem from this modular logic. It is precisely this inspiration that the facade of the exhibition hall starts from basic unit bodies, for the convenience and efficiency of modular assembly within a limited time.

Continuous squares

Moreover, these continuous squares, like monuments, float in the air. They are structures, skins, like well shafts, like buildings, like the squares referred to in the ” Columbarium Habitabile “, like dazzling diamonds. They are the phantoms of urban monuments.

Continuous surface

Under the skin of the module, there is a solid space with both ends “turned up”. The “lifted” ground connects different elevations. Within the 5.5-meter height limit of the space, it forms a continuous surface that links different functional spaces such as the reception hall, meeting space, small theater, and product exhibition gallery.

Cantilever and buttresses

The maximum overhang distance of the suspended volume is 5 meters. Meanwhile, the exhibition hall structure cannot be connected to the ground in any way. Therefore, all the structural loads of the suspended volume must be independently completed by the system formed by the outer skin and the ground beam.

This skin structure, mainly composed of 40X40mm square-section light steel, has another important function as a buttress system. It supports the skin frame and the suspended volume, and also creates a form for the internal exhibition gallery.

Transparent corridor

Transparency is another important expression, as it can bring a sense of lightness. This is to achieve the “suspension” of the volume in the structure while enriching the design concept from more aspects.

Transparency is from the inside out. The skin not only presents the suspended volume inside in appearance but also provides a light and transparent corridor space for internal tours, which serves as a display area for elevator control panel products.

The diagonal braces formed by the spatial diagonals not only support the suspended volume but also create a continuous rhombic cut surface within the internal corridor. Each rhombic surface corresponds to a product display stand, forming a product display gallery integrated with lighting.

Cubic Sunrise

Regarding the main color of space, the “suspended cube” is rendered in a gradient of orange-yellow, which seeps through the facade. In the initial sample tests, the sunlight seemed to be contained in a cube, thus giving rise to the concept of “cubic sunrise”.

Temple

In the inner space, a meeting space, a small theater that can accommodate 50 people, a 5.5 meters-height hall for dynamic display of two exquisite elevator products, and a display volume that can accommodate four carriages are required.

The different functions are divided by a floating “surface” that moves up and down according to different height requirements. This temple-like space, in different section segments, respectively regulates different user behaviors.

The Contrast of the temple

The proportion of the entire exhibition hall’s floor plan boundary is exactly the same as the length-to-width ratio of the Parthenon on the Acropolis of Athens. Although it was not intentionally imitated at the beginning of design, when compared later, an interesting contrast was formed.

In fact, the past temples housed deities, while the present one housed products. Here, elevator products are finally given the names of gods. Indeed, they are the creators of modern urban miracles.

Core-tube

As a main component of modern buildings, elevators have brought about the concept of “core-tube”, giving rise to modern urban space mainly composed of skyscraper. From multiple perspectives, elevators can also be regarded as the core of modern urban architecture.

Therefore, as an exhibition hall for elevator products, the core tube’s image is like that of a shrine of temple, serving as the core of the space. The exquisite cabin product, featuring leather craftsmanship, metal details, and an elegant control panel consistent with that of a high-end sports car, is placed within this cube that resembles a monument.

To facilitate the display of the elevator products, dynamic light boxes are added to simulate the light effects of sunrise and sunset in gaps between the elevator shafts, echoing the exterior “Cubic Sunrise”.