Dezeen Magazine: World Landscape of the Year 2015 Prize goes to Chinese Wetlands Park by Turenscape
World Architecture Festival 2015: a natural wetland park at the mouth of three rivers in China's Zhejiang Province has won the World Landscape of the Year prize.
Designed by Chinese landscape firm Turenscape, the 26-hectare Yanweizhou Park in Jinhua features flood-resistant topography, natural wildlife habitats, and a network of meandering pathways and bridges.
The aim of the project was to preserve the riparian landscape, but also to create a public attraction around the city's opera house.
A pedestrian bridge snakes across two of the 100-metre-wide rivers, creating ribbons of red and yellow that reference the local tradition of dragon dancing during the Spring Festival. The firm used a similar tactic on another park elsewhere in China.
A "cut-and-fill" strategy was used to balance earth along the embankment, creating a water-resilient
landscape. Other details include concentric paving bands of black and white, and oval-shaped planting areas and activity spaces.
The prize was awarded today as part of the World Architecture Festival in Singapore. The judges said it "uses bridges playfully to knit together communities on both sides of the river". They also praised they way it "made friends with floods in a highly sustainable manner".
Last year's World Landscape of the Year award went to Australian landscape firm Taylor Cullity Lethlean, which transformed an area of bushfire-damaged land to create a botanical garden displaying a collection of endangered trees and plants.
Dezeen is media partner for both the World Architecture Festival and Inside Festival, which concluded today at the Marina Bay Sands hotel and conference centre in Singapore.
