When commissioned to convert a ramshackle lane house in Shanghai into a three-unit apartment building, local firm Neri&Hu Design and Research Office tried to maintain the traditional character of the 1930s-era building, while giving it a contemporary edge.
Asian Fusion: East meets West—and past meets present—at the top of a historic Shanghai building, where a rustic Italian restaurant treats diners to a seasonal menu, amidst layers of time and richly applied materials.
Enter Mercato and your first impression is its rawness. The rough concrete, weathered steel, and exposed ductwork might seem out of place in Shanghai, a city where fine-dining interiors tend to be blingy.
While glittering new high-rises sprout everywhere in Shanghai, gems of Western-style architecture from the early 20th century can still be found throughout the city.
While it is the view that draws most visitors to the New Heights Restaurant, located on the top floor of the Renaissance-style Three on the Bund building in Shanghai, there is now one more reason to make a stop—a striking new bathroom design by Shanghai-based Neri & Hu Design and Research Office (NHDRO).
With China experiencing large-scale reconstruction throughout the country, a great deal of its historic architecture is being replaced by uniform rows of bland, new buildings.
Fast-disappearing, Shanghai’s nong tang (lane houses) combine European construction with Chinese notions of tightly packed residential life. From the street, these early-20th-century buildings present gabled facades — respectable and a bit staid. But once you walk through the door to the lane running between the houses, you encounter a messy world of clothes hanging out to dry, shutters flung open, people gossiping, and kids running around. Private space bleeds into the public realm, with some folks cooking in the shared lane and others bathing their children there. Neri & Hu Design and Research Office (NHDRO) tried to capture the spirit
Neri and Hu renovated and reskinned a five-story office building on a tree-lined street in the French Concession of Shanghai to create a new headquarters for their architecture firm and their retail furnishings company, Design Republic.