Located in Fuzhou, the capital of Fujian province, located in southeastern China stands The Refuge of Relics - Fuzhou Tea House projected by the Chinese architecture studio Neri & Hu Design and Research Office.

The project takes as a reference the temple of Jinshan, which represents the roots of Fuzhou, the study seeks that the project refers to the roots of the city at a time when growth and rapid development have modified the traditional culture.
The Relics Shelter - Tea House projected by Neri & Hu Design and Research Office, conceives the Relics Shelter as an urban element that refers to ancient roots while conceiving the Tea House as a house on a rock.

Inside, there is a mixture of contrasts between the different elements that make up the complex. Regarding the materials, the tea house rises on a compacted concrete base, which refers to the traditional houses of the area, while the central piece of the tea house is composed of a wooden structure. Belonging to a high-ranking Qing Dynasty, the relic was moved from Anhui to Fuzhou and is now part of one of the main habitable parts of the new teahouse.
 

Description of project by Neri & Hu Design and Research Office

The project draws inspiration from imagery uniquely associated with Fuzhou: the Jinshan Temple. This is a rare example of a temple structure built in the middle of a river in China. John Thomson was one of the first photographers ever to travel to the country and provided Western audiences with some of the first glimpses into the Far East. In the album Foochow and the River Min, which documented his legendary journey up the Min River, Thomson captured the ancient structure in its original state resting serenely above a floating rock in 1871. This would become a lasting image unmistakably identified with the city of Fuzhou.

Conceived as an urban artefact and drawing from the historical roots of the city of Fuzhou, the Relic Shelter internalizes a piece of distinct heritage at a time when rapid new development has eroded traditional culture and identity. The client’s brief posed the unique challenge of creating an enclosure for a Chinese artefact – the wooden structure of a high-ranking Qing dynasty official’s residence, replete with ornamental carvings and intricate joinery. Relocated from Anhui to its new home in Fuzhou, the Hui-style structure is enshrined as the inhabitable centrepiece of a new teahouse.

Envisioned as a house atop a rock, the teahouse is elevated above a rammed concrete base, while its sweeping copper roof echoes the roofline of the enclosed architectural relic. Its core material, rammed concrete, is a modern homage to the traditional earthen dwellings of the region, emphasizing a raw monumentality. Visitors are presented with two images of the building upon approach: the upright silhouette of the form, and its mirrored reflection duplicated in the surrounding pool of water.

A series of contrasts plays out among elements that are bright and dark, light and heavy, coarse and refined, as visitors enter the grand hall where the structure of the ancient residence is situated. Sky wells penetrate the roof, bringing natural light into the depths of the enclosure and illuminating the priceless artefact on display. Only upon reaching the mezzanine does the structural configuration of the building begin to reveal itself. The hovering metal roof is lifted 50 cm off the solid base by copper-clad trusses to introduce a sliver of continuous illumination around its periphery. Wrapping itself around the historical wooden structure, the mezzanine space allows visitors to appreciate intricate carpentry details at eye level.

The basement level includes a secondary arrival lobby housing a rotunda, a sunken courtyard and tasting rooms. At the top of the rotunda, a carved oculus capped by glass is submerged beneath the pool in the courtyard above. It filters the sun through a thin film of water, creating a mesmerizing play of reflections.

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Architects
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Neri&Hu Design and Research Office.- Lyndon Neri, Rossana Hu.
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Project team
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Partners-in-charge.- Lyndon Neri, Rossana Hu. Senior designer-in-charge.- Scott Hsu. Design team.- Jorik Bais, Yinan Li, Kathy Hu, Fong Huang, James Beadnall, Ivana Li, Jesper Evertsson, Du Shangfang, Bingmiao Li, Evelyn Jiang, Junho Jeon, Ath Supornchai, Haiou Xin, July Huang, Becky Zhang, Greg Wu.
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Collaborators
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Architecture design.- Neri&Hu Design and Research Office. Interior design.- Neri&Hu Design and Research Office. FF&E design.- Design Republic.
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Client
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Contractor
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General Contractor.- Mingzhu Construction Engineering Group Co., Ltd.
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Area
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1,800 sqm.
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Dates
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Year of Completion.- 2021.
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Data Set
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Architectural – Materials.- Rammed Concrete, Copper, Stainless Steel, Stone, Clear Glass, Stucco, Wood, Carrara Marble, Terrazzo, Red Sandstone, Plaster. Architectural – Fixtures & Fittings, Equipment, Sockets & Switches.- Grohe, Duravit. Decorative Lighting, Specified.- Stellar Works, Parachilna, Classicon, Michael Anastassiades, Tom Dixon, Artemide, Louis Poulsen. Interiors – Furniture, Specified.- De La Espada, &Tradition, Stellar Works, Herman Miller, e15, Classicon, Fritz Hansen, Carl Hansen, Neri & Hu Custom. Interiors – Accessories.- Neri & Hu Custom. Interiors – Fabrics.- Kvadrat.
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Location
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Fuzhou, Fujian Province, China.
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Photography
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Neri&Hu Design and Research Office, founded in 2006 by partners Lyndon Neri and Rossana Hu, Neri&Hu Design and Research Office is an inter-disciplinary architectural design practice based in Shanghai, China. The practice’s burgeoning global portfolio includes commissions ranging from master planning and architecture to interior design, installation, furniture, product, branding and graphic works. Currently working on projects in many countries, Neri&Hu is composed of multi-cultural staff who speak over 30 different languages.  The team's diversity reinforces a core vision for the practice: to respond to a global worldview, incorporating overlapping design disciplines for a new architectural paradigm.

Neri&Hu’s location is purposeful. With Shanghai considered a new global frontier, Neri&Hu is in the immediate center of this contemporary chaos. The city’s cultural, urban, and historic contexts function as a point of departure for design inquiries that span across a wide spectrum of scales. Furthermore, Neri&Hu has expanded the conventional boundaries of practice to include complementary disciplines. A critical probing into the specificities of program, site, function, and history is essential to the creation of rigorous work. Based on research, Neri&Hu anchors its ethos on the dynamic interaction of experience, detail, material, form, and light rather than conforming to a formulaic style.

Lyndon Neri, Honorary FAIA, co-founded Neri&Hu Design and Research Office with Rossana Hu in 2006, an inter-disciplinary architectural design practice based in Shanghai. Neri received his Master of Architecture at Harvard Graduate School of Design and his Bachelor of Arts in Architecture at the University of California, Berkeley. Alongside his design practice, Neri has been deeply committed to architectural education and has taught and lectured at numerous universities. He was appointed as Visiting Faculty at Princeton University School of Architecture for the spring semesters of 2024 and 2025. Neri was appointed the Howard Friedman Visiting Professor of Practice at the University of California, Berkeley in 2023, the Design Critic in 2023 and the John C. Portman Design Critic in Architecture in 2019 and 2021 at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, the Eero Saarinen Visiting Professor in 2022 and Norman R. Foster Visiting Professor Chair in 2018 at the Yale School of Architecture. Neri co-authored and edited Persistence of Vision: Shanghai Architects in Dialogue, published by MCCM Creations in 2007. In 2017, his first monograph, Neri&Hu Design and Research Office, was published by Park Books. In 2021, the second monograph, Thresholds: Space, Time and Practice, was published by Thames & Hudson, and the Chinese edition was translated and published in 2023 by Guangxi Normal University Press. Neri was elevated to Honorary Fellow of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) in 2025.

Rossana Hu co-founded Neri&Hu Design and Research Office with Lyndon Neri in 2006, an inter-disciplinary architectural design practice based in Shanghai. Hu received her Master of Architecture and Urban Planning at Princeton University and her Bachelor of Arts in Architecture at the University of California, Berkeley, with a minor in music.

Alongside her design practice, Hu has been deeply committed to architectural education and has taught and lectured at numerous universities. Hu was appointed the Howard Friedman Visiting Professor of Practice at the University of California, Berkeley in 2023, the Design Critic in 2023 and the John C. Portman Design Critic in Architecture in 2019 and 2021 at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, the Eero Saarinen Visiting Professor in 2022 and Norman R. Foster Visiting Professor Chair in 2018 at the Yale School of Architecture. Hu was appointed as Chair of the Department of Architecture at Tongji University in 2021 and Chair of the Department of Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania Weitzman School of Design, effective spring semester 2024.

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Published on: July 7, 2021
Cite:
metalocus, ALMUDENA PERLAZA
"In touch with the past. The Relic Shelter - Fuzhou Teahouse by Neri&Hu Design and Research Office" METALOCUS. Accessed
<https://www.metalocus.es/en/news/touch-past-relic-shelter-fuzhou-teahouse-nerihu-design-and-research-office> ISSN 1139-6415
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