A building site, which used to be home to a famous Chinese bicycle factory, found in Xingtai city centre – three hour’s south of Beijing, was going to be turned into 4000 luxury apartments spread over 50 tower blocks, a landmark hotel and a shopping centre and I was going to be their architect.
The developers were keen on our ideas and welcomed our proposals for turning their vision of upmarket homes, in a down at heel location into “concrete” reality.We would design the gardens, access paths and underground car park and turn their dreams, based on this model from….…this large hole into…….the Palace of Versailles!Or, as it was going to be called, Xingtai’s First Sky City ( 天 一 使, Tian Yi Cheng – much better).And I was going to be the face of “International Lifestyle” displayed on advertising hoardings across south Hebei province.
Construction began in 2009 and was completed soon after. A few (thousand) apartments are still available for viewing.
