05. Le jardin de tuiles
The tile garden
When you design a garden, cost and upkeep can’t be ignored. Drawing inspiration from the wisdom of the ancient oriental world, one of its traditional materials has been put to a new use: clay tiles, an impermeable roofing material with over three thousand years of history to its credit. The Chinese didn’t only use clay tiles on their roofs for drainage, but also to collect rainwater. By adapting history to the contemporary era, Le jardin de tuiles (The tile garden) blurs the line between a functional irrigation system and a joyous water feature. It shows us how we can recover and direct water in order to grow plants on our rooftops. You can recycle ideas too!
The garden opens with a forest of bamboos whose poetic shadows fall across the tile paving. An ascending walkway enables visitors to make their way against the current of the water that flows languidly downwards, retained by the tiles. This revival of the traditional Chinese clay tile isn’t just ecological, it’s also cultural. It merges an ingenious, age-old irrigation system with our present-day world. Perhaps there’s never been a gap between present and past?
DESIGNERS
Shilei Lu is the founder and landscape architecture director of Landtek Group China. She received a B. A from the South China University of Technology; an M.L.A from the University of Pennsylvania School of Design. With both local and international educational backgrounds, her work is blurring the boundaries between landscape and architecture, local and global. She is passionate about bringing the local culture with the modern science and art of resiliency into landscape experience. Her works are in a wide range of project scales and contexts, including large-scale landscape planning and design to small-scape garden design. In the exploration of innovative design languages, landscape materials and construction over the years, she is highly professional at drawing inspiration from nature, culture and art. To keep producing landscape beyond imaginations, she works with Landtek constantly exploring new method-ology by introducing innovative attempts such as parametric design, 3D printing and physical modeling.
Born in Guangzhou, China, Jingshi Diao studied landscape architecture in Unite State, at Graduate School of Design, University of Pennsylvania with a master’s degree, where he learned from Laurie Olin, Frederick Steiner, and Richard Weller, in 2015-2017. He previously worked for pioneer landscape firms in the United States, including SWA Group, Sasaki Landscape Architecture and Port Urbanism. During his tenure at those firms, he took charge of a number of design projects from concept to implementation, which brought him professional practice in urban planning, urban design, urban public open space, and urban complex. He founded Landtek Group in 2021. As a co-founder of Landtek, he works with his partner Shilei Lu getting deep into the complex Chinese context by a series of urban renewal projects in Chinese metropolis, bringing innovative concept to the Chinese vernacular public realm where the traditional Chinese culture is highly mixed with the fast growth of contemporary urbanization. In recent years, led by Jingshi and Shilei, Landtek Group has completed some built projects including Grand Slope Park in Qingdao and KK Park in Jiangsu Province, successfully regenerated the decaying urban environment with both ecological and cultural sustainability.
Shuwen Su is a landscape architect with seven years of work experience. After graduating from South China Agricultural University with a bachelor's degree in landscape architecture in 2014, he engaged in the design practice of public landscape projects. He is good at construction design, professional construction technology and built material research. He believes that the ecological sustainability in landscape project is built on professional design of structure and smart use of resilient. In his life, he likes to go back to his hometown, a traditional Chinese village with field and fishponds. His family is good at making farm tools, turning the soil and plant. Such life style helps him keep a passion for landscape architecture. With the experience of growing up in the Chinese village, he believes that "weeds will really take over the world again". For him, the materials and construction techniques always have the vitality in environment like weeds. In recent years, he is interest in planting, especially the planting method with ecological value. On the other hand, he began to get in touch with the prefabrication process of various garden construction projects, exploring a prefabricated construction method, which is more environmentally friendly and less interventional.
Kangtai Feng was born in Guangdong, South China. After high school study in Guangzhou, he attends college in Beijing in 2016 and received a bachelor's degree in engineering from Beijing Forestry University (BFU) in 2020. He completed the study of Master of Landscape Architecture in National University of Singapore (NUS) in June 2022 and joined Landtek Group in September. His study background at BFU helped him deeply understand the space and culture of Chinese traditional gardens. And he comprehensively recognizes the historical and modern development of Chinese landscape architecture, planting design, and engineering. The study in landscape architecture at NUS centered on ecology and technology. He learned about forest restoration, urban agriculture, and waterfront ecology during that time. As well, he mastered the digital landscape, including parametric modeling and environmental analysis. The living environment also shaped his understanding of landscape. His first recognition of landscape is the beauty of rivers and hills in the subtropical area, where he was born and grew up. While studying in the temperate and tropical zone, he realized the role of climate and local culture in shaping the landscape. This greatly influenced him thinking about design——no stable methodology, always focus on the context.
Jiawei Liang is a landscape designer of Landtek Group, graduated from the Landscape Architecture Department of Guangzhou University. He loves the landscape and always believes that landscape has the great mission of connecting people and nature. As a fresh landscape designer, he actively meets the challenges in his work, extensively contacts and assists in the completion of the whole design process, and is deeply involved in every link from the initial concept plan to the later construction details. He always believes that a good landscape designer should also be a good builder. During the period of landscape construction, Jiawei Liang deeply participated in the renovation project of Taidong 3rd Road Commercial Pedestrian Street in Qingdao, KK PARK, Yancheng China-Korea International Street and other actual construction projects, and accumulated rich construction experience. Outside of work, he loves sports and is good at skiing. While skiing, he feels the charm of the natural environment, obtains design inspiration, and balances work and life. At the same time, he is a city walker. He likes to walk between cities, inspect landscape architecture projects, and improve his professional ability by studying and inspecting other people's design works. He believes that the power brought by the landscape is infinite. A good landscape can heal people's body and mind, and bring positive value to urban development. At the same time, a good landscape must be useful, beautiful and fun. This is also his lasting motivation and work belief in the landscape career.
