Perspective - April 2018

Beijing’s CCTV headquarters has been taunted by locals as the Big Trousers for its singular shape, to the extent that people rarely refer to the building with its real name. Conceived by Dutch firm OMA, the building - love it or hate it - has become one of the most iconic symbols of the Chinese capital. Bear in mind that other architectural projects that were slammed on completion include Paris’s Eiffel tower, the Egyptian pyramids and Antoni Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia in Barcelona.
One of CCTV’s two lead architects, alongside OMA founder Rem Koolhaas, German Ole Scheeren now calls China his adopted home, and has just debuted another unusual take on an architectural typology, the Guardian Art Center, which I visited when it was unveiled officially this year. Sitting peacefully in Beijing’s Wangfujing neighborhood and dominated by imperial architecture, hutongs and courtyards, the structure is impressive but not intrusive. China seems ready for it, a design that would have been deemed radical in 2012 when CCTV was completed.
The nation’s speedy urbanisation has offered imaginative architects and interior designers fertile ground to play with, in ways that Perspective has been tracking. We’re proud to move that further forward by announcing that in 2018, Perspective will bring the prestigious A&D Trophy Awards to China. Led by a group of prominent judges from China and overseas, the programme aims to put the country’s design advances under the international spotlight. Whether you’re a global organisation master-planning architecture or a local studio designing interiors or products, we will judge you on your creativity.