OMA's design for the International Conference and Exchange Center (IFEC) in Shenzhen, China, is the winner of a design competition with seven international architecture firms. The building combines large scale conference facilities with a 400-room hotel and public program. Located at the waterfront of Qianhai, the New District in the Pearl River Delta, IFEC will form a beacon for the ships sailing along the 21st century maritime silk road.

The project, led by OMA Partner and Director of projects in Asia Chris van Duijn, will combine large scale conference facilities with a 400-room hotel and public program. Located at the waterfront of Qianhai, the New District in the Pearl River Delta, IFEC will form a beacon for the ships sailing along the 21st century maritime silk road.
 

Description of project by OMA

The complex functions as a connector between Qianhai’s future main public transport hub and a waterfront park, which links the various Qianhai districts through a shared public and cultural program. OMA’s design for IFEC comprises of three distinct volumes: the conference center is shaped into stepped volumes with terraces facing the park. The hotel, towering over the conference center, is a three-dimensional polyhedron and the third volume contains hotel amenities and public program and is oriented to the center of the business district.

A large urban atrium brings public domain to the heart of the complex, with a foyer for both the conference center and the hotel. The urban atrium can be separately programmed for cultural events, strengthening the relation between the professional domain and public life in Qianhai.

IFEC will be the fourth OMA building currently developed in Shenzhen. The competition entry was a collaboration between OMA and CCDI. OMA’s design team is led by Chris van Duijn together with project architect Kellen Huang.

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OMA and CCDI. OMA’s design team is led by Chris van Duijn together with project architect Kellen Huang.
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Authority of Qianhai Shenzhen-Hong Kong Modern Service Industry Cooperation Zone
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Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) is an international practice operating within the traditional boundaries of architecture and urbanism. AMO, a research and design studio, applies architectural thinking to domains beyond. OMA is led by eight partners – Rem Koolhaas, Reinier de Graaf, Ellen van Loon, Shohei Shigematsu, Iyad Alsaka, Chris van Duijn, Jason Long, and Managing Partner-Architect David Gianotten – and maintains offices in Rotterdam, New York, Hong Kong, Doha, and Australia. OMA-designed buildings currently under construction are the renovation of Kaufhaus des Westens (KaDeWe) in Berlin, The Factory in Manchester, Hangzhou Prism, the CMG Times Center in Shenzhen and the Simone Veil Bridge in Bordeaux.

OMA’s completed projects include Taipei Performing Arts Centre (2022), Audrey Irmas Pavilion in Los Angeles (2020), Norra Tornen in Stockholm (2020), Axel Springer Campus in Berlin (2020), MEETT Toulouse Exhibition and Convention Centre (2020), Galleria in Gwanggyo (2020), WA Museum Boola Bardip (2020), nhow RAI Hotel in Amsterdam (2020), a new building for Brighton College (2020), and Potato Head Studios in Bali (2020). Earlier buildings include Fondazione Prada in Milan (2018), Garage Museum of Contemporary Art in Moscow (2015), De Rotterdam (2013), CCTV Headquarters in Beijing (2012), Casa da Música in Porto (2005), and the Seattle Central Library (2004).

AMO often works in parallel with OMA's clients to fertilize architecture with intelligence from this array of disciplines. This is the case with Prada: AMO's research into identity, in-store technology, and new possibilities of content-production in fashion helped generate OMA's architectural designs for new Prada epicenter stores in New York and Los Angeles. In 2004, AMO was commissioned by the European Union to study its visual communication, and designed a colored "barcode" flag, combining the flags of all member states, which was used during the Austrian presidency of the EU. AMO has worked with Universal Studios, Amsterdam's Schiphol airport, Heineken, Ikea, Condé Nast, Harvard University and the Hermitage. It has produced Countryside: The Future, a research exhibited at Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York; exhibitions at the Venice Architecture Biennale, including Public Works (2012), Cronocaos (2010), and The Gulf (2006); and for Fondazione Prada, including When Attitudes Become Form (2012) and Serial and Portable Classics (2015). AMO, with Harvard University, was responsible for the research and curation of the 14th Venice Architecture Biennale and its publication Elements. Other notable projects are Roadmap 2050, a plan for a Europe-wide renewable energy grid; Project Japan, a 720-page book on the Metabolism architecture movement (Taschen, 2010); and the educational program of Strelka Institute in Moscow.

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Chris van Duijn joined OMA in 2000 and is based in Rotterdam. He has been involved in many of OMA’s most renowned projects including Universal Studios in Los Angeles, the Prada stores in New York and Los Angeles (2001), Casa da Musica in Porto (2005) and the CCTV Headquarters in Beijing (2012). Recently completed projects include Fondazione Prada in Milan (2015) and the Garage Museum of Contemporary in Moscow (2015).

In addition to large-scale and complex projects, he has worked on interiors and small-scale projects including private houses, product design, and temporary structures such as the Prada Transformer in Seoul (2009).

Currently he is overseeing the design of the Axel Springer Campus in Berlin and the Jean Jacques Bosc Bridge in Bordeaux, the construction of the Parc des Expositions in Toulouse and the Bibliothèque Multimédia à Vocation Régionale in Caen, as well as product development projects.

Chris holds a Master of Architecture from the Technical University of Delft.
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