“Taste of Art”  Space is located at the intersection of Middle Huaihai Road and Yuqing Road, within the Hengshan Road-Fuxing Road Historical and Cultural Landscape Area.It is a street-level store in a historical building, adjacent to the former residence of Soong Ching Ling, and only one way away from the Wukang Building, a century-old historical building in Shanghai. It is located at the intersection of Wukang Road, Xingguo Road, Huaihai Road, Tianping Road and Yuqing Road.The Wukang Building across the space was designed by Laszlo.Hudec in 1924.Shaped like a ship, this 30° angled French-style corridor building with a total floor area of 9,275 square meters represents the inclusive side of Shanghai culture. As a part of Shanghai's fine-tuned renewal, it underwent facade and infrastructure renewal in 2019, and its street surroundings have also seen overall interface enhancements in recent years. With a unique urban location, the Wukang Building is surrounded by various living Spaces, cultural landmarks, etc., such as the scene called "Street Ballet" by Jane Jacobs, and the "Taste of Art" among them.

Linking Time and Space
The “Taste of Art” Space is connected to the stores along the street through the exterior corridor of the building, where people walk through or stop to view the Wukang Building on the opposite side of the street.The Space fits the moving crowd into the frame of the view along with the building.

In the interior design, the designers intended to create an imaginative space that would serve as a place for art lovers, where artistic exchanges could take place naturally. The interesting nature of the content creates a “fold” in the otherwise homogenous length of time and enhances the visitor's experience of the time.

The entrance under the corridor is not prominent. The designer chooses to use the contrast between future and modern, primitive and natural elements into the spatial design language, to create a place where people want to “explore”.The entrance adopts W-shaped modern folding door, changing the traditional way of opening the door, and graffiti characters are used on the glass door to create an unexpected visual effect and highlight the entrance form.

Laws of Spatial Attraction
Space has its own laws of attraction. In response to the brand's positioning for young groups, the design boldly breaks through the practice of doing traditional art space. The design should have both a heavy sense of historical memory and an avant-garde sci-fi sense of the future, blending the contrast between trendy aesthetics and future civilization.

The Taste of Art was originally an intensive space that needed to accommodate art displays, a tea bar, events and other functions, and the designer tried to find a pleasant balance between art and trends.The folded roof is treated with inverted molding to present concave forms of varying sizes and radii, and a hole is made in the wall of the bar as an interface with the dining area, and the overall use of lighting makes it seem as if you are in the universe.

The roof is difficult and time-consuming to handle. The roof structure is modeled using grg, digitally distorted to generate the model, and assembled and designed on-site to ensure the accuracy in the preset design while being able to flexibly and efficiently cope with the deviations of the on-site environment.The bar styling borrows from the hull of a ship, echoing the original name of the Wukang Building of the Normandy Apartments, and the whole body is wrapped with acrylic light boxes, and the structural columns that were originally in the space are wrapped as light columns, emitting gradient light.

Combined Art Space
As the space requires complex functions, the interior furnishings are integrated with the interior design to meet the needs of storage exhibitions, occasional art exchange activities, and daily business operations. The table can be separated or combined; the table tops are slightly different in shape, while together they form a complete geometric long table.The Folding Single Chair hides the support frame, but in fact, the interior is made up of welded steel plates, which are then finished with a sheet cover, where the support of the chair is wrapped under a flexible sheet.

There are 5 displays on each side of the showcase to show electronic images of the artwork.The cabinet adopts a diversified structure to draw out and combine, providing space for more storage and display methods. At the same time it has hidden mystery. When you gently press the cabinet, it can unfold the cabinet board and instantly become a single chair, and be designed with a bracket to pull out and easy to place the tea drink. Although the visitors are gathered because of the art, they may have more communication opportunities because of the new and interesting things, which is precisely the designer's consideration of the brand's superimposed commercial and emotional value.

The Long Tail Effect of Design Power
Psychologist Garnet Scherzer once said, “The point of communication is not only to convey information, but more importantly to create an emotional bond.”

The kernel of space, however, is not limited to the expression of imagination.Taste of Art” gathers a group of renowned artists, both inside and outside the country, as well as a group of young contemporary artists. At the same time, it is open to welcome all kinds of visitors, so that the space and the city, the art and the public can interact with each other on a deeper level.

Nowadays, art is no longer the background color of society, but more directly affects urban renewal, lifestyle and business contexts. DCDSAA Design creates “Taste of Art” , which is in sync with the breath of urban development and expects a long-tail effect to occur.When art is no longer confined to the shelf and complements the urban context, its vitality can be fully released.

Although in the traffic-dominated era, images bring intuitive visual impact as well as replicable modes of operation,however, in the dimension of prolonged time, in the iterative process of urban renewal of old buildings or sites, visual communication will eventually be replaced by scenic deep experiences. The core of experience is culture, and art is the branch of culture. What kind of link will be created between this art and culture space and the city in the future? “Taste of Art” is responding to urban issues with spatial scene experiences.

Team:
Project owner: Art Taste
Design firm: DCDSAA Yodogawa Architects
Architect in charge: Wang Hao
Design team: Yuan Zhengliang, Tang Chao, Xu Daming
Construction unit: Shanghai Dianchuan Architectural Design Co., Ltd.
Lighting design: dcdsaa lighting
Project photography: Wu Qingshan
Content Planning: Unexpected Culture

Material Used:
Main materials: steel plate, wood veneer, glass, metal, texture paint