Hangzhou: A Living Gallery of Pritzker Laureates

The Soul of China, Reimagined

Wang Shu’s Poetic Resistance (2012 Laureate)

Begin your architectural pilgrimage at Wang Shu’s China Academy of Art’s Xiangshan Campus, where 700,000 recycled tiles clothe buildings that curl like mountain ridges. The 2012 laureate’s philosophy—”rebuilding contemporary China upon the ruins of its past”—resonates through his Fuchun Shan Guan , a museum complex mirroring misty Huang Gongwang landscapes, and Nanchang Street’s revival, where Ming Dynasty shopfronts now cradle artisan coffee roasteries. Don’t miss his radical Hangzhou National Archives (1 Wenrun Rd), where celadon-glazed screens cast jade-green shadows—a modern scholar’s garden for the digital age.

The Global Vanguard’s Love Letter to Jiangnan

British architect David Chipperfield (2023 laureate) distills Hangzhou’s duality into four acts: the minimalist poetry of Liangzhu Museum, where Neolithic jade motifs float above reflecting pools; the bamboo-shrouded privacy of Xixi Wetland Estate; and the crystalline Yixiang Tower—a prismatic counterpoint to Hangzhou’s soft skies.

At Tianmuli (398 Tianmu Rd), Renzo Piano’s (1998 laureate) “vertical village” buzzes with creatives sipping matcha lattes beneath rooftop olive groves—a Florentine piazza reimagined through Jiangnan sensibilities. Nearby, Tadao Ando’s (1995 laureate) Liangzhu Cultural Arts Center stands as a concrete haiku, its sharp angles framing theatrical shafts of light that dance across exposed aggregate walls.

Future Relics

Hangzhou’s architectural metamorphosis shows no signs of slowing. Herzog & de Meuron (2001 laureates) are sculpting a Grand Canal Museum resembling oxidized steel vessels, while Shigeru Ban’s (2014 laureate) K11 ART MALL (Under construction)—a glass origami soon to rise on Fuchun Rd—promises to refract the Qiantang River’s golden-hour glow.

Why Now?

From Liu Jiakun’s forthcoming Steel Park (2025 laureate) reclaiming industrial ruins near the Grand Canal to Norman Foster’s (1999 laureate) EIC Tower—a kinetic sculpture set to dominate the Qiantang River skyline—the city invites travelers to witness history being written in concrete, steel, and light.

Take Away

Skip the standard West Lake itinerary. Instead, book a suite at AMANFAYUN (a restored Tang Dynasty village by Jaya Ibrahim) and spend three days tracing this architectural constellation. Rent a bicycle to explore Wang Shu’s works, then let a teahouse hostess row you through Xixi Wetland’s waterways to Chipperfield’s hidden estates. As dusk falls, ascend Foster’s Apple Store (100 Pinghai Rd)—its glass cylinder glowing like a moon gate—to watch the city transform into a living catalog of 21st-century design genius.

In Hangzhou, every corner reveals why Marco Polo deemed it “the finest city in the world.” Only now, its splendor wears Pritzker-grade polish.