Shipyard 1862

A disused shipbuilding facility finds new life as a mixed-use community hub, while honoring a rare piece of the city’s industrial past.

Kengo Kuma & Associates converted a 1972 ship-manufacturing building in Shanghai into a new cultural complex called Shipyard 1862. The north façade faces the Huangpu River and was repaired in 2010 for the Shanghai World Expo, but by then the building was already long abandoned. “Lujiazui, Pudong used to be an industrial area that has been transformed into a financial and services district,” say partner-in-charge Javier Villar Ruiz and chief project manager Yutaka Terasaki about the area. “Shipyard 1862 is the only structure still belonging to that industrial past.”

“We chose to keep using the brick as the main materiality, but not in a nostalgic way,” Villar Ruiz and Terasaki say. To that end, the team created a new brick screen on the south façade, which is now the main entry, and pairs the bricks—suspended on stainless steel wires, and in front of new glazing—with the exposed structure left when an adjacent building was previously removed. “This new brick screen not only brings the views and lights that the new uses require, but allowed us to create a smooth gradation of transparency, going from complete solidity when in contact with the river brick façade and gradually becoming more transparent,” Villar Ruiz and Terasaki say.

When the firm won the commission, the building’s interior was a cavernous 656-foot-long, 145-foot-wide nave—large enough to build and repair a ship—that was filled with the industrial detritous of its previous life. The space has now been renovated to incorporate stores, restaurants, a theater, prefunction space, and a balcony, with floor plates inserted into the structure to accommodate the program. Throughout, old structure, including original steel girders and beams, remains exposed, and full-height atria at the main entries and along the length of the structure provide circulation and daylight (via skylights), but also remind visitors of the vastness of the original structure. The new spaces feature a simple materials palette of glass, metal, concrete, and brick, which were specifically selected to contrast with the existing: “New materials and old can get along well if carefully chosen, and confront each other with an appropriate sense of distance and respect,” Villar Ruiz and Terasaki say.

An 800-seat theater anchors the building's eastern end, and can accommodate a variety of performances. Two massive pipes were retained on either side of the space and now conceal a new air-conditioning system—another example of the blending of old and new.

“Throughout this area, endless buildings are lined up, all clad with shiny modern materials,” Villar Ruiz and Terasaki say. “The Shipyard 1862 is the only heritage left in this area of the city. It is indeed the only major renovation one can find there. We could not just ignore this; we wanted to respect the history held within.”

Project Credits
Project: Shipyard 1862, Shanghai
Client: CSSC Complex Property Co.
Architect: Kengo Kuma & Associates, Tokyo, Shanghai . Javier Villar Ruiz (partner-in-charge); Yutaka Terasaki (chief project manager); Qiu Tian, Rita Topa, Chen Wei-Chih, Shirley Woo, Hung Renjie, Sum-ying To, Stephy, Junki Wakuda (project team)
Local Architect: Shanghai Institute of Architectural Design & Research Co.
Structural/M/E/P/Curtainwall Engineer: Arup
Lighting Designer: Panasonic; Arup
Theater Consultant: China Poly Group Corp.
Retail Consultant: Life Style
Contractor: Shanghai Construction Group
Size: 9,000 square meters (96,875 square feet)
Cost: Withheld