HZS: Winner of World Design Awards 2025. The project site is located in the core business district of Yongtai South Road, Pingcheng District, Datong City. It connects to the Datong Ancient City Cultural Zone in the north, adjoins the city’s ring road to the south, merges with the Yongtai South Road commercial axis to the west, and draws on the ecological resources of Mingtang Park to the east—forming a convergence of historical heritage, commercial vitality, and ecological assets. The design follows the concept of “urban weaving”， stitching together diverse scenes to create a spatial vessel for dialogue between past and present.

The project adopts a three-dimensional functional organization model: three underground levels are systematically developed, with B1 planned for commercial functions to unlock underground value, while B2–B3 integrate parking and equipment systems in a compact manner. Above ground, 19 floors vertically layer commercial spaces, hotel facilities, and serviced apartments, shaping a high-efficiency paradigm of land use. Through complementary functions and interconnected circulation, the development realizes the spatial expression of a “one-stop” urban lifestyle container.

Design inspiration draws from Datong’s mountain-encircled topography and the Silk Road civilization of the Northern Wei dynasty, with the spatial narrative defined as “Green Valley in the Clouds · New Rhythms of the Silk Road”, The 1,600 m² commercial plaza serves as the city’s living room, where setback strategies enhance the visibility and display of retail. The main entrance visualizes the interior green valley, translating the theme of “green infiltration.” Inside, the commercial street takes Mingtang Park as its ecological source, forming a three-dimensional ecological network through elevated platforms, terraced greenery, and aerial corridors—seamlessly linking park, architecture, and community. The inner courtyard introduces an all-season “flower house” oxygen bar, paired with transformable market installations to activate public life. Three sunken courtyards leverage site elevation to create jungle-like enclaves, where ferns and mist systems shape immersive eco-retail exploration points. The overall architectural form draws on the stratified textures of the Yungang Grottoes and the flowing imagery of camel caravans. Street-facing edges adopt folded outdoor terraces and semi-level platforms to soften the building’s mass. The façade employs parametric timber structures to form horizontal cloud-pattern rhythms, symbolizing the local aesthetic of “pavilions in the clouds”. Retail units are embedded with modular cultural IP installations (such as interactive light-and-shadow walls inspired by Northern Wei motifs), creating an experiential scene of “commercial performance”, Inter-level escalators and staggered atriums break conventional floor separation, generating a “cloud-climbing ladder” spatial journey that naturally guides foot traffic down to the B1 retail level. Green technologies—including photovoltaic curtain walls, a ground-source heat pump system, and rainwater recycling devices—constitute the project’s sustainable core, echoing the vision of a “Green Valley in the Clouds”.

Project Details:-
Firm
HZS

Architect
Xue Song, Sun Shijun

Project Name
Datong South Ring Road Commercial Project

Project Category
Commercial (Concept)

Team
Wang Yu, Yu Chengyang, Liu Sixian, Cui Ninghui, Zhou Yuyan

Project Location
Datong City

Country
China

Photography ©Credit
HZS

HZS is an multi-disciplinary design firm striving to provide “integrated” services of planning architecture and landscape design to our clients.

Founded for several years, HZS always concentrates on comprehensive design with

seamless joint of planning, architecture and landscape and ensures that all design can be perfectly constructed.

HZS has about 800 employees worldwide and our core design team includes dozens of registered planners, architects and landscape designers home and abroad.