Often straddling a world of unbelievability and a sense of rootedness, MAD Architects’ designs have always pushed the envelopes of design possibilities. In 2004, after his stint with Pritzker Prize-winning Zaha Hadid, Ma Yansong founded MAD Architects in Beijing. Having expanded with offices in Los Angeles and Rome, the firm’s work embodies emotion and attempts to harmonise technology and Nature. Their projects don’t shy away from challenging the existing norms and in most cases rewriting the very definition of what a building should be or look like.
Ma Yansong is often critical of other typical architectural buildings in China that blindly copies the Western glass architecture lacking the soul of Chinese cities or culture. He draws inspiration from the flowing forms of clouds, mountains, and other natural elements for his buildings. He claims his buildings are not futuristic, but traditional in their core design approach. Ma also believes that the rate of development and urbanisation in Chinese cities is so aggressive that architects hardly have time to retrospect or understand the deep-rooted Chinese architectural legacy. There is only the mad rush to complete building commissions by inviting foreign architects and importing Western architectural elements with little concern for integrating Chinese Philosophy, art or rich culture into them.
Inceptive Design Projects
Absolute Towers, Canada
The Absolute Towers project started in 2005, and it immediately catapulted MAD Architects into the international architectural limelight. Nicknamed the ‘Marilyn Monroe’ towers for their voluptuous curvy forms, the two towers stand out starkly from the other cold, industrial aesthetic of the modern urban architecture of Mississauga town in Canada. The project explored a bold vision of curvaceous balconies with a twisting appearance offering grand panoramic views of the emerging town. The effect was magical as each apartment had a unique floor layout for the balcony offering a certain exclusivity to the residents. The services in the core were still space-efficient and orthogonal. MAD Architects smartly married the whimsical form of the exterior with this regular functional core that accommodates the necessary services.
Ordos Museum
The MAD Architects’ emphasis on buildings envisaged as emerging from the ground, disguising themselves as mountain or huge rock is no more evident than in the Ordos Museum in Inner Mongolia. The project, completed in 2011, looks like a huge rock perched on top of a small hill that seems to balance on its own and one gets a feeling that a gentle push might tip it over. With a façade made of polished Aluminium panel, it beautifully reflects the everchanging desert light. The white interiors of the museum also emphasise a seamless organic movement.
Harbin Opera House
Another landmark project that exemplifies the visionary future by MAD Architects includes the 2015 Harbin Opera House which appears organically woven into the natural landscape in the form of smooth-flowing water, directly referencing Harbin’s Songhua River nearby. Within this sculptural mass, the Main theatre with 1,600 people capacity and a small theatre that can house an intimate patron of 400 gently rises above the landscape revealing the curvy crystalline glass wall of the grand lobby. The visual drama and magic continue into the white interior lobby space and lead to the warm inviting core of the Grand Theatre and the stage wrapped in Manchurian Ashwood. In winter, where it snows in Harbin, the effect is magnified when the entire building complex appears to melt into the snowy landscape and fog.
Shifts in Narratives
Although the bulk of MAD Architects’ projects are based in China, the criticism they face is that the same influence of traditional Chinese architecture is applied even for projects outside of it. Although one can argue that the influence of nature is everywhere, the identical design narrative for all projects ironically seems more forced than organic. Nowhere is this more evidently seen in their yet-to-be-completed Lucas Museum of Narrative Art in Los Angeles.
Lucas Museum of Narrative Art
Founded by filmmaker George Lucas the museum imagines having collections in different mediums of cinema, digital art and illustrations and features sculptural forms projecting out of the ground, connected by more sinewy fluid elements. In true MAD Architects fashion, it distinctly stands out from the more traditional rectilinear buildings around it. The Museum building likens itself to a spaceship that seems to have landed with little regard for the context and urban fabric.
Gardenhouse
Just as one wonders if the immediate context and the effects of gentrification are ever considered in the design process of MAD Architects, they came out with the project Gardenhouse, just 9 miles from the Lucas Museum. Probably the only completed project that seems to eschew the heavy-bio-inspired forms in the exterior, this mixed-use project with 18 dwelling units and commercial space, is neatly integrated into the urban fabric of the city. Only the central courtyard in the project has that typical fluid shape and anyone passing by will find it hard to believe that the architects of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art designed this project. The irregularly shaped housing units radiating outward have a gabled roof and the façade does not give any hint. These dwelling units are also adorned with a green wall of native-drought-tolerant plants and vines in keeping with their nature-inspired design theme. The scale of this project is also much more grounded than other gigantic projects.
Although the under-construction projects have the MAD Architects’ distinct affinity to free-flowing shapes, it will be interesting to watch their design journey in other cities like Rome, where stricter rules are laid down for constructing in and around historic heritage structures.
