From Jan.10-12 of 2015,invited by the president of Belarus, Xi Jinpin launched the three days visiting in Minsk.This visit is the first time for China highest leader to land Belarus after 14 years and Xi Jinpin stayed in the Beijing Hotel Minsk designed by Chinese construction designers.This project is an important friendship project between China and Belarus also the important carrier of cultural integration and inheritance between the two countries with unique cultural and historical significance.This building,the interior decoration and the hotel furniture were designed by BIAD.Here we invite the main designer of this building to explain the design concept for the building and high end hotel furniture inside.

Minsk Beijing Hotel

Minsk Beijing Hotel is located in the capital city of Belarus ,which is important friendship project between China and Belarus.The project is the important carrier of cultural integration and and inheritance between the two countries with unique cultural and historical significance.This is the unique characteristic of this project.Under this background, how to reflect the characteristic of different culture and integrate them highly to complete a high quality architectural works is the biggest challenge in the design.

The Analysis of Belarus Culture

The project features the different culture ,so the study on the culture is the key link of the design.The study is divided into two aspects.

1. The research and understanding of Belarus culture.

In terms of the physiographic condition,Belarus is an inland country located in the western part of the eastern Europe with temperate continental climate.Its natural environment is very good and the national forest coverage rate is very high with the reputation of ‘Country Of Ten Thousand Lakes’.Minsk is the political,economic ,cultural center with the typical city structure of European cities.It was damaged seriously in World War Two,today’s building were basically built after the war.The project is located in the Minsk Lenin administration district and is in the park area between Lenin street and Red Army Street.It is 900 meter away from the city center.This block is surrounded by the river with a lot of green trees.The environment is very peaceful and beautiful with unique geographical conditions.

In terms of history,religion and education, Belarus people is one branch of east Slavic tribes with the belief of Eastern Orthodoxy.Influenced by the national tradition and religion,the white color is the favorite color in the culture of Belarus.They take white as the symbol of purity and cleanness.In addition,the Belarus people’s environmental awareness is very strong and the state also attaches great importance to the the protection of natural ecology.Each tree is record in file and not allowed to be felled privately.

2. Belarus’s knowledge about Chinese culture

Belarus keeps traditional good friendship.In the national museum of Belarus,Chinese painting,porcelain,brocade and other artworks.Also there is special introduction about Chinese traditional architecture.Also you can find the stature of Qi Baishi,the master of Chinese painting.The construction of Beijing Hotel plays a important role in promoting the Belarus people’s further understanding of Chinese culture.So in terms of the angle of treating the project design,the feeling and understanding of Belarus people should be paid more attention.

On the whole,Belarus impresses people with lush towering white birch forest,graceful ballet and Orthodox Church with white wall and golden roof with a peaceful ambience.Under such environment, Beijing Hotel should integrate into the city as beautiful as a painting with a calm and graceful gesture.So the project the project design should not only reflect the Chinese culture but also express the respect to Belarus culture.In the meanwhile,the protection of ecological environment should be attached great importance and the climate adaptability should also be reflected

Cultural Expression

Owing to the the unique cultural significance of this project,how to reflect and express the cultural attribute is the key.First,in terms of the overall positioning,according to its excellent natural environment,the project is positioned as city garden hotel to to echo the beautiful city environment.Second, in terms of the design style,typical Chinese style is not adopted while through abstracting the feature elements of Chinese and Belarus culture,the style should be recreated based on the regional climate.Ultimately the elegant and magnificent modern style is reflected and the mutual cultural recognition is taken into account.Third,The difference of culture and region should be fully respected and used to create the unique customer experience for the hotel.Fourth, in the terms of expression of architecture style,the unity of the inner space and external styling is pursed.

The Architectural Space and Appearance Design

The most unique advantage of this project is the uniqueness of foreign culture and the advantage of natural landscape resources,therefore,in terms of the overall layout,the two features should be full used and dug.

The Overall Layout

First, in terms the uniqueness of of foreign culture,we should look for the common features of Chinese and Belarus buildings on the overall layout,that means,controlling the overall layout of the architecture by axis and the space sequence sense should be emphasized.In terms of the overall layout, the layout like windmill is adopted.The two axes of north and south,east and west are unfolded through architectural function.Taking the concept of ‘Enclosure’ of Chinese traditional courtyard as the starting point,the overall layout integrates the architecture and the natural environment of the land.The architecture is limited to 3-7 floors and the size should be harmonious with the local city size.The plan layout is divided into public area(lobby, restaurant,gym and banquet and so on),guestroom,ball room,support service office,computer room and garage and so on.

Second,the excavation to natural landscape is strengthened .On one hand,it is reflected in maximizing the use of natural landscape resources to improve the quality of the project.On the other hand,protection of the natural landscape resources is also an important link in the design,which is also the reflection of respecting local cultural concepts.

In terms of the overall layout,at the north side of the building facing the main road,the main entrance of this building and banquet space and other public function area settles.Through the north side,the noisy environment is filtered.At the south side facing the river,the guestroom,restaurant and other private space are arranged,where the privacy and environment quality are important.The zoning of public and privacy is very clear.The building group seems the extending arms containing the natural environment in a board mind and fully embodying the traditional concept of ‘tolerance’.At the same time,the building body concentrates as possible as it can and for the main body of this building, the area with less tree should be used as much as possible to maximize the protection of the original ecological environment.The trees that need to be felled or transplanted are specially arranged.As for the landscape design,restoring the original landscape should be taken as the starting point and the original landscape should be use as much as possible.Large-scale man made carving will not be carried out.

As for the landscape design, in view of the land for this project,the central courtyard forms the core of whole area and the main landscape that the lobby ,Chinese restaurant,spa face.In the courtyard,waterfall,people and other forms and materials outline the exquisite scenery.Homocentric square and interlude shape the hollow and continuous model reflecting the cultural communication between Belarus and China.In the area facing the river, there are the blue stone road and natural grass slope and so on,which construct the transition space between the nature and building.

The luxury hotel has a distributed layout along the Svislach River with different height of buildings.The guestroom and rooms with main function all face the forest and the river.These landscapes are fully used.The main entrance is 4.2meter high, the standard height.The lowest height is ±0.000m to the forest level,which ensures the main guest room has the the landscape of the river.The computer rooms concentrate under the entrance square.

The lobby is the most important area for the hotel to greet the customers.To maximize the use of the natural landscape,the lobby is in the second floor of the building,inside which boundless pool extends to outdoor landscape which shortens the distance between the guests and the nature and creates elegant and tranquil space.The Chinese style stature in the lobby shows the cultural characteristic of this hotel.

Owing to the historical and cultural reason, the current five star hotels all have very small guest room.In terms of the whole size of the space,to ensure that the hotel public area and guest room bear high standard,the whole architecture adopts the 9*9m axis network and part is adjusted according to the building shape.At the same time,4.5m is the standard width of the guest room.The bigger width can make the guests enjoy the natural environment fully.

Architectural Modelling Design

Owing to the whole project is located in Belarus with typical regional characteristic,the architectural modelling should follow the principle of elegance,characteristic,tradition and culture and the the regionalism and culture of the whole style should be emphasized.On one hand, the natural culture of Belarus should be reflected ,on the other hand, it should bear the inner features of Chinese style architecture.The modelling of the whole building group should pay attention to the combination of different blocks and material.With traditional architectural elements, the hotel building constructs unique cultural characteristic and becomes unique landscape.

As for the architectural style, the traditional Chinese style architecture is taken as the starting point and the slope roofs and white walls and gray tiles are taken as the the main elements,which are abstracted and sublimated to make it bear the modern sense.The white color wall corresponds to the national tradition of Belarus people who like white color.In terms of elevation treatment,the simplicity of modernism is taken as the main method,the unique artistic conception of black,white and gray in the Chinese ink-wash painting is reflected through the virtual-real comparison.In the details,symbolic design techniques are adopted,the corbel-steps of China traditional architecture and other elements are expressed abstractly,simple and interesting.The Chinese traditional style is reflected fully by the language of modernism.At the same time,Chinese traditional red and local birch color are added to embody the heritage of the traditional culture and respect to local culture.

Interior Design and Luxury Hotel Furniture Design

For the interior design,it continues the sense of rhythm and line of the building facade,mainly to adapts to the habits of European people and also combines properly some Chinese elements such as hollowed flower windows.In terms of color, the color relation between the natural wood color and the combination of black,gray and white is introduced into the room and a little red color is added to render a unique combination of Chinese and western charm.As for the texture,with a more modern interpretation,the spirits contained inside the traditional texture is simplified.Instead,the horizontal and vertical lines delivers the meaning of the classical hollow window.The lobby ,reception,restaurant and other public area are decorated with wood properly ,giving off warm and soothing atmosphere.As for the bedroom,more concise and generous pattern with local cultural factors as decoration gives the whole hotel a wide range of adaptability.

As for the luxury hospitality furniture design, its also combination of Chinese traditional elements and local elements.The beige and light yellow color are widely used to echo the white color of the building.As for the wood color, it is the color of Chinese traditional rosewood furniture.A lot of hotel bedroom furniture such as the bed bench, study desk,desk chair and night stand and restaurant furniture such as dining table and ding chair are made of birch.All these furniture is made in China by luxury hotel furniture suppliers.

Traffic Arrangement

In the design,dividing the dynamic and static area is emphasized.The north side of the building is close to the city road and the south side is the river.The main exit and entrance are arranged along the north side.At the south side, only invisible fire control road is built.The main pedestrian guests are hotel guests,banquet guests,entertainment customers,management office members.Hotel guests enter into the building through the middle of north side.Banquet guests and entertainment customers enter into the building through the entrance in the north east.The ground parking space is interspersed among the trees at the east and west sides of the architecture to reduce the damage on the original trees.There are a few garages in the north and east to solve the parking problem of the logistic management personnel.

Conclusion

The building design and 5 star hotel furniture design of Minsk Beijing Hotel fully reflects the full integration of the excellent culture from two countries through deeply study and abstracting two countries’ culture and integrates into the graceful city naturally with a elegant and magnificent gesture.The 5 star hotel just stands silently beside the river with a pure and noble temperament.The Minsk Beijing Hotel will become the friendly messenger of two people and continue to inherit the friendship of two people.