Yunxi: A Restaurant That Dances with Water and Light

Shang Cai's Award-Winning Design Transforms Dining into an Immersive Experience

Shang Cai's inspiration for Yunxi came from the city of Chongqing, where the restaurant is located. The city is renowned for its beautiful rivers, which became the soul of the project. The designer created scenes of rain, water, cloud, and fog, distributed across different space regions, integrating and interacting with the water elements to create impressive spatial characteristics.

What sets Yunxi apart is its strong visual impact and the possibilities for spatial changes. The restaurant, often used by fashionistas for parties, required a design that could adapt to various events. Shang Cai interpreted the unique permeability and fluidity of water elements through the fusion of light and shadow, spatial modeling, materials, and color, resulting in a space that presents rich changes and unique visual effects.

The realization of Yunxi's design hinged on the use of light as a key design element. The designer built an interactive relationship between space, light, and shadow, endowing the static space with a strong sense of rhythm and visual impact. This was achieved through the creation of spatial hierarchy, visual impact, spatial theme features, and multi-purpose space functions.

Yunxi spans an interior area of 600 square meters with a floor height of 6 meters. It accommodates 150 table seats and two private rooms. The designer used an open design method in the main space, complemented by an intelligent lighting control system that can adjust colors arbitrarily, creating a colorful space atmosphere adaptable to various party scenes.

The design of Yunxi faced the challenge of expressing the sense of motion and light for water elements in a static space. Shang Cai overcame this by constructing theme devices such as cloud, rain, ice, and water, paired with an intelligently controlled dynamic light source and ambient light source. This formed an interaction between various reflective and transparent materials with different characteristics, vividly expressing effects such as the flowing of rain, the ethereality of mist and cloud, and shimmering water waves.

In conclusion, Yunxi is a testament to the power of innovative design in transforming spaces. Shang Cai's unique approach to incorporating water elements and light into the design not only creates a visually stunning space but also a dynamic and immersive dining experience. It's no wonder that this design has earned the prestigious Platinum A' Design Award, a recognition of world-class, exceptional, and highly innovative designs that advance the boundaries of art, science, design, and technology.