Gold Landscape Planning and Garden Design · 2023
River Cloud Outdoor Landscape
by Shang Cai
- A' Design Award 2023 Gold Winner in Landscape Planning and Garden Design
- Awarded April 15, 2023
- CLIENT: Shougang Real Estate
- Estimated Number of Design Views: 60,678
- Verification code 84E4F40CE5 · Verify this award
About River Cloud Outdoor Landscape
River Cloud is a large outdoor art installation created for a landscape setting in Yubei, Chongqing, China. The installation is 8 meters high and 30 meters wide, and it stands on a rooftop at the top of a cliff facing a river. More than 50,000 polygonal metal frames of different sizes are connected to form a curved cloud shape. Openings in the surface allow views of the mountain and the river below. A shallow pool and a smoke device are placed around the work. Numerically controlled light sources give the cloud form changing color and texture at night.
River Cloud Outdoor Landscape by Shang Cai exemplifies a profound achievement in contemporary landscape architecture, positioning itself at the intersection of Eastern contemplative garden traditions and Western sculptural intervention practices that have shaped environmental design since the mid-twentieth century. The installation demonstrates remarkable technical sophistication in its central sculptural element—a sweeping, cloud-like form constructed from what appears to be thousands of interconnected geometric metal frames, creating a structure that manages to appear simultaneously massive and weightless, permanent and ephemeral. This technical accomplishment speaks to advanced fabrication methods and deep understanding of how aggregated modular elements can generate complex organic forms from simple repeated units, a principle explored by architects and artists working with parametric design and emergent complexity. The compositional arrangement reveals sophisticated spatial thinking: the sculptural mass positioned against the infinity-edge reflecting pool creates a doubled visual field that transforms the landscape into a meditation on presence and reflection, substance and image. The inclusion of a single living tree—its spring foliage providing the only warm chromatic accent against the prevailing cool silvers and grays—establishes a poetic dialogue between the designed and the grown, suggesting that the metallic cloud-form might be understood as a translation of natural phenomena into architectural language. The work appears to engage with themes of impermanence and permanence, capturing in rigid metal the fleeting forms of clouds and mist that traditionally symbolize transience in aesthetic traditions across cultures. The atmospheric conditions captured in this image—the soft diffused light, the distant hills dissolving into haze, the perfect stillness of the water—suggest the design was conceived with careful attention to how environmental conditions would complete the artistic experience. One might consider how this installation invites visitors to contemplate the boundaries between nature and artifice, finding in their dissolution not loss but expansion of what landscape design might achieve.
Press Kit
- Unique Properties
- It is a large-scale outdoor design case of an art installation. It is 8 meters high, 30 meters wide and 6 meters deep, located on the roof at the top of the cliff facing the river.
It is demanding to express the image and connotation of the high-end real estate project named after "cloud". With lines, colors, and shapes, the designer creates a cloud form in line with the Oriental aesthetic. Through the interaction of clouds, water, and smoke in the environment, a beautiful space is created. - Dimensions & Packaging
- Specification: 8 meters high, 30 meters wide, and depth of meters
Surrounding: Pool/green area of 2,000 square meters - Tags
- Cloud, Spatial installation, Landscape, Lighting
- Production Technology
- More than 50,000 polygonal metal frames of different sizes are connected to each other to create a curved cloud shape. Through the holes in the clouds, one can see the opposite mountain view and the river view at the foot.
The designer arranges a thin pool and a smoke device in the environment of the cloud device, creating Oriental beauty and a sense of advance through the interaction of cloud, water and smoke. - Design Challenge
- Clouds have varied colors and shape characteristics, and it is very challenging to represent cloud symbols in architectural form.
As a long-term outdoor installation, the designer chose a large number of different sizes of stainless-steel frames to combine and used hard materials to express the curve characteristics of the clouds.
At the same time, through the use of a number of point-like numerical control light sources, the device at night presents a dynamic effect of light and shadow flow and a crystal clear overall image.
The whole device is simple in material, stable in structure, and easy to maintain. It is a successful attempt to express the cloud symbol. - Project Duration
- Date of Design Start: 2022.07
Date of Completion: 2022.12
Address: Yubei, Chongqing, China - Operation Flow
- In this case, the designer used a variety of interactive relationships to create an ethereal, elegant, and Zen space environment.
The interaction between the sky and the thin water allows the cloud-shaped installation to merge with the sky and the surrounding greenery.
The interaction between the main device and the environmental smoke device makes the cloud-shaped device produce a floating dynamic.
The interaction between the NC light source and the ambient light allows the device to present different textures and color changes in different light environments. - Research
- 1. The cloud form that represented by the metal frame structure.
2. Numerical control lighting to create space device color, texture.
3. The interaction of cloud, water and smoke creates Oriental beauty and a sense of high class.
4. Enhanced commercial value with a space device. - Inspiration
- "Cloud" has special aesthetic value and symbolic significance in the East.
In eastern culture, "cloud" contains a spiritual realm of randomness, freedom, harmony, and detachment. And the pursuit of natural nature is regarded as a high spiritual realm.
With lines, colors, and shapes to create a cloud image that can be widely accepted and understood. Viewers perceive the spatial morphological meaning and thoughts of the ever-changing cloud symbols through form, color, and light under the context. - Image Credits
- Alan Tan
- Patents
- Copyrights belong to Chong Qing Shen Sheng Space Aesthetics.
Colors of River Cloud Outdoor Landscape
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