11architecture creates playful sculptural benches for community space in China

Participating in the recent gentrification program of the Yutian village in Shenzhen, China, 11architecture has designed a set of five unique sculptural benches.

Set to be placed in three separate regional pocket spaces, the pieces aim to improve the local community space, giving it a fresh, open character.

Each of the five scultpural benches by 11architecture was given an abstract form, consisting of a ‘body’ and ‘legs’. The resulting elements look like some kind of animal, inviting people -particularly children- to sit astride them, hug them or lie on top of them. The body piece was made out of a metal pipe with a diameter of 330mm, making this ‘animal’ chunky, but good for hugging.

The benches were put together with ready-made metal products commonly seen in the construction industry, and only the process of cutting and welding was needed, in order to complete them. In this way, it was made possible to produce the pieces with a limited budget. After the assemblage, they were galvanized and coated with the automotive paint looking blight and smooth. We came up with two-color-scheme to decorate each bench. The line created by the edge between two colors ran on the body surface; it ran where it could best present the unique form of the bench.

Project info:

Name: Community space in Yutian village

Architecture office: 11architecture

Design team: Fujimori Ryo, Xie Jing, Xu Senmao, He Yijun, Luo Minggang

Location: Yutian, Shenzhen, China

Contractor: Zhou Quan

Structural engineer: Liu Chang