Design Concept
The company is based in Shanghai, China, and insists on recreating local traditional cultural values with an international perspective; it maintains a close integration of academic research and real-world practice, pursuing innovative design concepts; and it strives for the perfection of professional services and product quality, aiming to achieve world-leading standards in the field of design.
Company Beliefs
UrbanDATA regards customers as partners and respects the environmental context of each project, striving to uncover the uniqueness of its products. By bringing refined design and professional services with an international perspective, it provides customers with returns that exceed expectations. UrbanDATA views integrity as a vital asset of the company, which is also its core policy and belief.
Business field
UrbanDATA's design field is broad, with diverse types and business spread across the country. It has undertaken urban planning, urban design, and architectural design projects of various scales. Its works have repeatedly stood out in intense competition, receiving high praise from the industry and clients. Completed and ongoing projects include public buildings and residential communities of various sizes.
Dr.Shan — Company Founder and President
Dr. Shan holds a Master's degree in Urban Planning and Design from Tongji University and a PhD in Urban Design from Harvard University. She was awarded the John Meyer Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship, the highest academic award from Harvard University's Joint Center for Housing Studies in 2002-2003, making her the first Chinese recipient of this honor. She is also a recipient of the first Shanghai Outstanding Entrepreneurship Award for Overseas Chinese Professionals and a member of the Shanghai Expert Review Committee.
Dr. Shan stated: "Our team was fortunate to participate in the public space renovation project of the Shanghai Shipyard section of the Yangpu Riverside, encompassing nearly 1 kilometer of shoreline and the overall planning, architectural and landscape transformation of the EXPO Water Gate area, as well as the design of a 2.8 kilometer signage system along the south bank. The Shanghai Shipyard is a crucial node in the transformation of the Huangpu River waterfront, rich in historical and industrial cultural heritage. For over a century, the shipyard boasted the largest dockyard in the Far East, achieving many shipbuilding and repaire technologies that surpassed those of advanced countries. The entire factory area has recorded and witnessed the development history of the shipbuilding industry. The entire factory area has recorded and witnessed the development history of the shipbuilding industry in Shanghai and even china, holding immense historical significance.
Today, the Shanghai Shipyard section of the Yangpu Riverside has become one of Shanghai's most popular internet celebrity check-in spots. During the second China International Import Expo in 2019, President Xi Jinping visited the Yangpu Riverside section and, with the aid of video and multimedia presentations, listened to a briefing on the basic situation of the 45-kilometer public space integration project along the core area of the Huangpu River and the construction of the Yangpu Riverside public space.
Coincidentally, not only did President Xi visit the Yangpu Riverside, but in 2017, Han Zheng, then the Shanghai Party Secretary and current Vice Premier of China, also visited the Yangpu Riverside to inspect the Huangpu River waterfront public space integration project. Walking along the riverside boardwalk built on the site of the former Shanghai Shipyard's Puxi branch factory, Dr. Shan Wenhui, founder of the core design team, urbanDATA, explained to Vice Premier Han and his entourage how the design preserved the shipyard's century-old industrial heritage and presented it to the public in an accessible and aesthetically pleasing manner.
As the birthplace of modern industry in Shanghai, the Yangpu Riverside in the 1930s saw over 300 industrial enterprises along its 5.5-kilometer waterfront, encompassing textiles, shipbuilding, papermaking, pharmaceuticals, soap making, and tobacco, creating many "firsts" for Chinese industry: China's first modern waterworks, China's first gas plant, the largest thermal power plant in the Far East, and the largest shipyard in the Far East, etc. With the passage of time, the Yangpu Riverside, described by UNESCO experts as the "world's largest remaining riverside industrial zone," has transitioned from a production-oriented shoreline to a lifestyle-oriented one. Designers ingeniously transformed the riverside industrial heritage into artistic features enriching the city's public spaces. President Xi Jinping pointed out that culture is the soul of a city, an important symbol of its connotation, quality, and characteristics. We must properly handle the relationship between protection and development, allowing people to remember history and their hometown, strengthening cultural confidence, and enhancing national sentiment.
A major challenge for the shipyard project was how to preserve and inherit the uniqueness of its historical and cultural heritage while showcasing modernity and technology through innovative design, creating a new type of urban waterfront space that is popular with citizens. In the overall reshaping of the public space, we prioritized the structural protection of the original texture of the factory site. The design team conducted in-depth on-site investigations and visited the new factory area relocated to Chongming Island to study shipbuilding and repair processes. Through systematically sorting out the historical context of the shipyard, we held numerous discussions with the owner and historical witnesses and former employees, meticulously studied the site's characteristics, preserved and excavated the industrial heritage features, and used contemporary advanced spatial design methods to integrate the project into the city's open space system. Based on inheritance and protection, we created a distinctive shipyard riverside public space.
Beyond the extraction of historical and industrial cultural characteristics, another feature of the shipyard project lies in its successful transformation of the former industrial waterfront into a humanistic waterfront. Our main design concept was to create a city scene that is people-oriented and enhances the public space experience. Through research on human-scale dimensions, we transformed the former massive industrial layout into a comfortable and pleasant living layout, allowing people to interact with the architecture and landscape environment. We focused on creating a public space that is artistic, entertaining, educational, and demonstrative, building a city waterfront that integrates leisure, fitness, sightseeing, and communication functions.
Words from the Designers
The Yangpu Binjiang Shipyard section, creatively designed with a combination of traditional and modern industrial styles, recreates the enthusiastic and energetic wharf operations of the shipyard's century-long industrial era, making it a unique open-air shipbuilding museum. Planting ornamental grasses in the transition and isolation zones can create a good forest-grass transition effect: naturally connecting the water and land as one, harmoniously blending the rigid industrial lines with the soft natural scenery.
Motor Coffee Shop
Along the Yangpu Riverside section lies Motor Coffee Shop, a unique space with a captivating atmosphere that draws numerous visitors. This is a coffee shop with a story. It was once a secluded and dilapidated two-story building, a former auxiliary power room for a shipyard. Boldly incorporating the remaining motor—now a relic—it was transformed into a themed coffee shop.
Inside the coffee shop, facing the transparent floor-to-ceiling windows, you can watch the Huangpu River flow towards the sea. Enjoy a cup of aromatic coffee beside the motor that has witnessed over 80 years of China's shipbuilding history. The concrete exterior, steel staircase, and wire mesh railings—all the coffee shop's features echo its "soul"—the motor, showcasing a strong industrial style in every detail. The aluminum alloy glass windows are flush with the exterior wall, creating a simple and unpretentious aesthetic. From sunrise to nightfall, the stunning views of the Huangpu River unfold before you, bringing peace of mind to those who come to enjoy a coffee.
The building provides the public space with different levels, offering diverse spatial experiences. Each platform offers a unique perspective: on the second-floor platform, the expansive waterfront and the century-old shipyard's operation lines are visible; from the third-floor platform, amidst the sounds of waves and ships, the highest point of Shanghai across the river comes into view. Spending leisure time in this coffee shop feels incredibly artistic; any worries will drift away with the wind, flowing eastward with the river.
Chuanpai Square
“Setting sail, riding the wind and waves.” A ship's bow, sails billowing, rises majestically from the ground, seemingly striving towards the distant horizon. Beneath the glass floor, lies a long-dormant ship-building platform (chuanpai). Here, visitors can clearly see the historical remnants while simultaneously feeling the confidence and courage of a journey towards the future.
Chuanpai refers to a wharf-like structure built of wood or metal on the shore, used for building and repairing ships. These are typically sloped, excavated structures. The Ruirong Shipyard, established in 1900, excavated its dry dock in 1903 and installed the latest equipment. The riverbank has been repeatedly eroded by the forces of nature, and the shoreline has shifted countless times throughout history. The chuanpai has silently witnessed the glory and achievements of this industrial civilization.
Dry Fountain Plaza
The design team preserved a significant number of the shipyard's industrial components and equipment. They restored and maintained the awning of the Welding Plaza, transformed a shipbuilding crane into a lighthouse with lighting effects that simulate a heartbeat and pulse, and repurposed crane components into seating areas with tree planters, creating shaded spaces for rest.
The concrete surfaces and steel rail structures of the welding platform were protected with fresh paint, transforming them into innovative displays of industrial heritage. The main design feature of the Dry Fountain Plaza retains the original water troughs used during operations, integrating them with mechanical valves from the site to create a set of dry fountain installations that combine water features with mechanical sculptures.
This approach to historical and cultural preservation brings future generations a space rich in playfulness, artistry, and entertainment.
Dock Gate
The dock ruins section can be called an "open-air gallery in motion." The dock passage connecting to the marina has become a crucial transitional node along the riverside shipyard wharf. Glass partitions separate the river from the shore while bridging nature and culture, making the riverside's transitions more fluid.
This passage, where industrial heritage perfectly blends with modern aesthetics, was originally a dilapidated dock channel. The platform once used for ship operations had been abandoned, its iron gate plates rusted and weathered by a century of river currents. Standing at the original site, one could only see desolation and bleakness.
The designers boldly reimagined the space, replacing traditional railings with stitched-glass barriers. The transparent glass ensures safety while allowing people to feel closer to nature and the river. Scattered throughout, the pathways paved with sleepers, gravel, and weathering steel grids exude a strong sense of industrial history. Gazing into the distance, the skyline, skyscrapers, and river unfold before your eyes, creating a refreshing and uplifting experience.
Dock Pillar Plaza
Anchored by the surviving half-wall of the historic factory building, the landscape seamlessly connects to the ginkgo grove and miscanthus flower beds at the entrance of the Ship Row Sculpture Plaza. Alongside the elongated sleeper benches, several sets of mechanically rotating wheels are displayed in open-air exhibitions.
Visitors strolling through the area can gaze into the distance at the silhouettes of buildings bathed in sunset hues near the riverside Welding Plaza by the City Theater. Or they might pause to rest on the sleeper benches, where the river breeze rustles through low-growing feather grass and fountain grass.
The unobstructed view frames the rolling river currents and the orderly rows of modern skyscrapers across the Huangpu River, creating under the azure sky what might be the most breathtaking urban skyline vantage point.
Hundred Grasses Garden
Stretching over one kilometer from the waterworks to the Expo Water Gate, the Hundred Grasses Garden infuses the post-industrial riverside leisure space with profound artistic charm.
A diverse plant community creates natural barriers and undulating terrain, featuring:
- Ornamental Grasses: Miscanthus sinensis 'Gracillimus', variegated miscanthus, fountain grass, pampas grass
- Architectural Varieties: Arundo donax var. versicolor, Mexican feather grass, Japanese blood grass
- Textural Accents: Purple majesty millet, needle grass, palm sedge
These vertical plantings interact with flowering perennials like agapanthus, catmint, gaura, and blue fescue, creating rhythmic waves of texture. Their fuzzy, soft, and voluminous forms fill garden voids while softening rigid paving edges—offering sensory experiences distinct from trees and shrubs.
Riverside Mural Wall
The urban open-air theater and performance plaza creatively repurpose preserved welding tracks and lighting systems into distinctive paved surfaces. Adjacent to the floodwall, reinforced remnant walls serve as canvases for four monumental murals depicting the shipyard's riverside legacy.
Following design principles of authenticity, reinterpretation, integration, and activation, the artworks visualize the shipyard's:
- Industrial Past - Historic shipbuilding operations
- Transformative Present - Adaptive reuse process
- Reimagined Future - Community revitalization
- Ecological Vision - Riverfront symbiosis
This trilogy of murals transforms infrastructure into an immersive timeline, where steel tracks underfoot synchronize with overhead lighting to frame the narrative. The result is a dynamic visual chronicle of urban renewal - simultaneously preserving memory while catalyzing new experiences.