GEO: Kongjian Yu - A Global Icon in Sustainable Landscape Design

Inspired by ancient irrigation systems

Chinese landscape architect Kongjian Yu, 61 years old, was born in paradise. That's how he describes it, nostalgically recalling his hometown of Dongyu in Zhejiang province, on the east coast of China. It was there, amidst rice fields and the lush meanders of the Wujiang River, that this son of a farmer, as he likes to remind people, developed his concept of the "sponge city" starting in 2003, after Beijing endured a series of catastrophic floods.

"In the 1980s," he explains, "the construction of dams and other 'gray infrastructure' disrupted the landscape of my childhood, forever altering the village's ancient irrigation network. The destruction of my own paradise convinced me that we needed a revolution." Essentially, a new way of building... inspired by ancient irrigation systems.

......

Source: https://www.geo.fr/environnement/kongjian-yu-le-createur-des-villes-eponges-220308