Interview with Ling Chen

My mother gave birth to me in Shanghai when she was on a business trip. Then I came back to Beijing with my grandmother to live with my parents when I was one and a half years old.Four people of three generations were packed in a 15-square-meter single dormitory allocated by my parents. My grandmother and I shared a single bed widened by wooden boards. The first private space belonged to me was a drawer in the upper right corner of the desk. Starting from carefully laying out my drawers over and over again, the dream of designing a comfortable home gradually emerges. My dream now is to design a beautiful city in the future.

It is a simple but important design skill to go to the project site and walk around. In Paris, you walk around looking at your house and your neighbor's house from different angles and figuring out the right material and location for each element on the facade. In China's new cities, you often have to endure the heat, boredom, obstacles and so on during walking, which will surely influence your progress, these experiences can let you think about how to make a real change in the city's design. It is important to do it from the perspective of pedestrians, not from the perspective of UAVs.

The happiest time is when my works are fully used. When you're here and in it, you really feel like you're working with people to create a work together. You are often one of the users, or you can try to be a user, not just as an architect.

I kept running a marathon every year while studying in Paris, running well doesn’t mean running fast, it means doesn’t get tired after running 42 kilometers, the body has adapted to a certain rhythm and wants to continue running. Architectural design is a bit like long-distance running, a bit more persistent than others often gets you harvest which seems to be impossible.

When studying in Wuhan, I experienced the life of having breakfast on street and just using a mat as the bed to sleep. What I see in Paris is a spectacular urban axis similar to that of Beijing. Reading these different cities formed my own views on design. Humans are preparing to migrate to the space, and what are the similarities and differences between a city in space and a city on Earth? Don't make the Earth Cities into those primary bases in space. This is the most important work now and in the future.

What designers need most is the spirit of criticism. Drawing machine does not need them.

Always focus on the real users, standing on the users’ perspective, which is a bit like acting, but try not to go beyond it. Try to think farther than your customers, so things are easier to move forward.

The projects in progress are reviewed every day. In order to do this, the key technique is to simplify the design so that it can be recited and the whole design can be made clear with a sketch. Not only ask do it yourself, but also everyone in the team.

Up to fashion, try to lead fashion and stick to your own thinking.

A good city is suitable for walking; a good building grows out of the street.

Find a "perfect grid" with 90% of the time and effort, and the design is over. The rest is to fill in the work, and life drama starts to be staged. These doesn’t need to be deliberately designed.

"Walkable city" is our biggest design project, the biggest perfect grid. It is the ideal Earth City and space city model. The earth is also a part of space.

Le Corbusier was once my favorite, but I hate him the most right now: I was deeply obsessed by his design, but then I found out that the earth city was completely screwed up by those designs which are not unsuitable for walking. I would like to talk with Jane Jacobs about what the owners' committee should pay attention to.

Paris was once my favorite, but after going to New York, I felt that Manhattan is good too. Whether it is a relic of the Middle Ages or the real feel of an old colony, it is a wonderful example of the city on Earth. Thinking about design led me to give up driving and riding a car in my offline life, I go back to the street so that I can feel my body more truly.

The essence of the design is to arrange a mechanism of communication and cooperation, including Party A, Party B, Party C, Party D…..

A good design should give users room for recreation. A good job is to give young people more opportunities.

The process of participating in the awards is memory and learning experience. I look forward to winning the prize, to encouraging myself and the team.

My mother gave birth to me in Shanghai when she was on a business trip. Then I came back to Beijing with my grandmother to live with my parents when I was one and a half years old. Four people of three generations were packed in a 15 square meter single dormitory allocated by my parents. My grandmother and I shared a single bed widened by wooden boards. The first private space belonged to me was a drawer in the upper right corner of the desk. Starting from carefully laying out my drawers over and over again, the dream of designing a comfortable home gradually emerges. My dream now is to design a beautiful city in the future. That’s why I wanted to be a designer.

It was definitely my freewill, being a designer is like a dream come true and to give me possibility to create more dreams.

I am an architect and I design architectural/urban projects the most. I prefer to design urban/city projects and I would love to have as many as possible.

I don’t really think I am a legend, I am still learning day by day. However, I would love to give some advice to young designers, follow the fashion, try to lead fashion and stick to your own thinking.

What I consider first is if it will make a contribution to the city and a good design should give users room for recreation.

A good design will make contributions to the whole human society and of course everyone should invest in it.

It is a simple but important design skill to go to the project site and walk around. In Paris, you walk around looking at your house and your neighbor's house from different angles and figuring out the right material and location for each element on the facade.
In China's new cities, you often have to endure the heat, boredom, obstacles and so on during walking, which will surely influence your progress, these experiences can let you think about how to make a real change in the city's design. It is important to do it from the perspective of pedestrians, not from the perspective of UAVs.

Well….I never think about it, maybe I was born to be a designer and it was meant to be.

Design is like putting everything together in one thing, you get what you see, you hear and what you think about together as a whole to make a little world for everyone to enjoy.

There shouldn’t be any limitation or rules about it, every designer has a unique way to present their own work.

Maybe a city in Space.

To make contributions to the city and thus it can help create a better society.

Either works, trends might set the design as some designers might willingly follow what is popular at the moment. However, a good design could also set the trend as a good design type should be spread.

I would like to talk with Jane Jacobs about what the owners' committee should pay attention to.

The process of participating in the awards is memory and learning experience. I didn’t mean to become famous, just want to encourage myself and the team.

Yes it was. My mother gave birth to me in Shanghai when she was on a business trip. Then I came back to Beijing with my grandmother to live with my parents when I was one and a half years old.Four people of three generations were packed in a 15-square-meter single dormitory allocated by my parents. My grandmother and I shared a single bed widened by wooden boards. The first private space belonged to me was a drawer in the upper right corner of the desk. Starting from carefully laying out my drawers over and over again, the dream of designing a comfortable home gradually emerges. My dream now is to design a beautiful city in the future.

Just to remember we created an ideal city model called the Walkable City and I love it so much.

WSP Architects is an international comprehensive design firm. WSP was founded in Munich, Germany in 1996. Thanks to the steady development in these years, WSP has established offices in Munich, Beijing, Shanghai, Hefei with over 100 planners, architects, landscape architects and interior designers. It has become one of the leading design institutes in the industry, holding rich management experiences for large-scaled projects and maintaining partnerships with many successful clients.All four principal architects and landscape designers——Mr. Wu Gang, Ms. Zhang Ying, Mr. Chen Ling and Mr. Knud Rossen possess European education background and practice experience. Directed by these talents, WSP has been well recognized by the public and the professionals of its creativity, its advanced design concept and its exploratory spirit which are well displayed in their urban planning and design, high quality residential, city complex, industrial/ office park, hospitality, cultural, landscape and interior design projects.The core advantage of WSP comes from its multi-disciplinary, multi-cultural and multi-national group of principal designers and its design team. Based on this advantage, WSP has buWilt up a work model that allows experts of various disciplines, engineers, manufacturers as well as clients to join force to work for the best quality. This unique work method and process ensure the flourish of ideas, the innovation of the designs and the final success of every project.

It means everything to me.

Generally I am interested in every aspect of design, but as for my personal interest – I love urban design the most.

Every design I made is like my kid to me, it’s hard to tell which my favorite is.

Urban/City design

I feel full of energy when doing my design.

I am more than excited to see it is realized.

Design is a bit like long-distance running, a bit more persistent than others often gets you harvest which seems to be impossible. That’s how a designer become successful.

What I consider first is if it will make a contribution to the city and a good design should give users room for recreation.

It is important to do design from the perspective of pedestrians, not from the perspective of UAVs. A designer should always focus on the real users and stand on the users’ perspective

I live in Beijing right now and there are full of cultural heritages of this ancient city/country which surely affects my design, but it is hard to say the pros and cons, everyone has the unique opinion.

The projects in progress are reviewed every day. In order to do this, the key technique is to simplify the design so that it can be recited and the whole design can be made clear with a sketch. Not only ask do it yourself, but also everyone in the team.

Follow the fashion, try to lead fashion and stick to your own thinking.

Always think about the cities and the users first.

Find a "perfect grid" with 90% of the time and effort, and the design is over. The rest is to fill in the work, and life drama starts to be staged. These doesn’t need to be deliberately designed.

It depends on the project.

BIDU Inc. , Vanke, Infineon, LEGEND HOLDINGS, Hangzhou Normal university………

I enjoy city/urban design most.When studying in Wuhan, I experienced the life of having breakfast on street and just using a mat as the bed to sleep. What I see in Paris is a spectacular urban axis similar to that of Beijing. Reading these different cities formed my own views on design. Humans are preparing to migrate to the space, and what are the similarities and differences between a city in space and a city on Earth? Don't make the Earth Cities into those primary bases in space. This is the most important work now and in the future.

You are always welcomed to find me through our website/wechat account or by emailing pr@wsp.com.cn.