Guangzhou Garden, Chelsea Flower Show 2020

Working with Grant Associates and Biotecture, we were appointed to engineer the ‘cleansing lung’ to feature as part of  the Guangzhou Garden at RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2020.  A project inspired by a study tour of Guangzhou ‘city between mountain and water’ and its environmental city planning based on holistic landscape stewardship.

The Guangzhou Garden does not look to replicate, but is based on a philosophy reconnecting people and nature in a mutually beneficial relationship. The garden components include a woodland dell, natural pool , bamboo laminated grid shell structures and sustainable planting typologies to provide the narrative ‘‘The Ecological Civilization’’.

With a focus on environmental planning and landscape stewardship the garden will highlight how the health and wellbeing of people and the natural world can be sustained through integrated environmental systems. The dell (lung) cleanses air, the pool (kidney) cleanses water and the structures (heart) provide social space for humans and homes for nature. Plants were to help clean the air, water and soils but also have high wildlife value. The structures were to be constructed of Phyllostachys edulis, one of the fastest renewable resources.