1. 1-Quotefrom Chris Stapleton, the creative venture catalyst from Simiosys
Interview with Charles Tang from the magazine (Architectural knowledge)
1. What are you working on recently?
I am currently working in Haskoll Beijing as creative design director. Haskoll is an experienced
design-led architectural practice with a dynamic and creative team, well-known for its retail
and large mix-use development with undertaken projects in 39 countries. Our major clients
include Wanda Group, Shimao Group, Evergrande Group, Antaeus Group and White Peak
Real Estate.
Founded in London in 1972, Haskoll has offices in Beijing and Shanghai within China. Having
projects in forty-two cities across China, Haskoll has been involved in more than eighty
projects in a variety of mixed use, tourism and leisure, shopping centre, residential and public
buildings uses – resulting in over 10 million square metres construction undertaken on site.
Recently, Haskoll has been awarded with 2014 British Business Award - Best Service by
CBBC, and Continued Commitment Category of China Business Awards 2014 by Cathay
Pacific.
One of the major project that I am working on is a 766,705m2 commercial mixed use
development in Zhengzhou for Hengda, it consists hotel, apartments, offices and shopping
malls. It’s a complex project located in the old city centre of Zhengzhou, the mixed use project
consists three malls center onto a large centre plaza, where festival activities, performances,
sidewalk cafes, will take place. External terraces, bridges linked the three 6 level malls, and
on top of these podiums, there are 10 towers with different functions. Development with such
density in the city centre, creates extremely difficult traffic flow problems, hence we created
sophisticated systems coordinating movements, all types of movements, including pedestrian,
loading and goods distributions’ circulations, car and truck vehicular circulations, fire
protection, exit and so on. However this particular mixed use development siege the
opportunity to provide the public a great public space, a place to meet, to see and be seen,
this is the place where sophisticated urban culture / lifestyle will be nurtured, this lifestyle can
never be replaced by internet shopping.
The other major project is a holiday and resort development, it’s called Hangzhou Mangrove
Tree Resort for Antaeus Group
Benefiting from Hangzhou’s well-deserved reputation as a holiday destination, Antaeus Group
are developing a new resort combining business and leisure functions. Covering almost
326mu at the confluence of two rivers, with FAR of 0.85 and construction area of 217400sqm,
Haskoll’s competition winning concept design is being fully developed through scheme and
detail design stages – including architecture and interior designs.
Fusing the Mangrove Tree’s brand of culture-focused activities with local tradition, Haskoll’s
design fully exploits the river edge to provide wetlands, a water park, traditional ‘water village’
streetscapes, quaysides, spas and bridges. These nestle around a conference centre, cinema
park and art and sculpture galleries. 1,600 keys are distributed in three types of hotels and a
range of villas.
One could arrive the hotel by the boat as the lobby is inter-connected with a jetty, and on the

2. 1-Quotefrom Chris Stapleton, the creative venture catalyst from Simiosys
way passing through aquarium, restaurant and Bar Island. Hotel and villas are planned as fan
shape. It’s to best take advantage of the Mountain View on the south of the river. The retail
street has a clear number 8 shape circulation wrapping around the lobby, so one could spend
the whole day in the complex, enjoying relaxation/recreation and shopping/entertainment.
2. How does your life experience influence your design? (How do you think a
designer’s life experiences affect his/her design?)
I come from a prominent family of artists and engineers; my grandfather was a well-known
hydro-electrical engineer, the pioneer of the professional field in China at the time. My uncle
was a famous music composer, my father an oil painter, artist and an educator at university. It
could be my family’s influence that I chose architecture which is a perfect combination of art
and science.
I grew up and educated in Sydney Australia, the education system in the western world tends
to emphasis more on creative thinking rather than memorizing oriented system. The university
require a minimum number of practical experience in the professional studio, the purpose of
this is so that as soon as you graduate, you are not only strong in conceptual design and also
have abundance of practical experience which allows you to be more all round architect.
Travelling with academic intentions had also great influence on me, especially my travel to
Europe during my last year of university has inspired me greatly on urban design till this very
day.
I have a particular love for history, and only through learning history, knowing history, one can
understand the future, understand humanity, in Berlin, there are reminiscence of bombed
structure, it serves to remind people of the history, and to protect the history with minimum
interference.
This has reflected in my refurbish design of the 4 heritage listed industrial buildings, and turn
them into a large retail outlet, the entire façade of these buildings need to be protected, but
instead we convert its structures and linked its levels, using frameless glass curtain walls to
enclose the heritage listed brick façade, that way there is minimum changes to the existing
building façade, and pay great respect its historically industrial heritage.
Living in China for the past 4-5 years, understand how Chinese live, their lifestyle, how their
city operates, unique cultural attributes. All of these inspires me greatly in creating vernacular
architecture that is designed specifically to its local climatic, cultural and economic conditions.
3. Could you share some of your major projects, (most memorable experiences).
One of the most memorable project experiences I ever had was when I was acting as
independent design consultant for a Xinjiang developer, designing a shopping mall and office
tower mixed use development. The client invited me to go on a trip with him to Hanas nature
reserve Xinjiang, a very beautiful and scenic place on the boarder of China and Kazakhstan,
the purpose of the trip was also for me to get to know Xinjiang, and fall in love with it, as a
result express that feeling through design. I have to admit I was absolutely blown away by the
beauty of untouched nature, how friendly the local people are, even though they are living in a
very simple and sustainable lifestyle. Eventually in my design of the complex, the form of the

3. 1-Quotefrom Chris Stapleton, the creative venture catalyst from Simiosys
shopping mall reminiscence of the rugged mountain that is unique to Xinjiang province,
colours of Hanas filters onto the façade of the tower, and simple but clear circulation with a
slight curve for the shopping mall bears strong resemblance to the free flow of Xinjiang Hanas
river. Also implement the energy sustainable principles, as using more solid materials and
insulation on the building facade and as to introduce natural ground cooling devices, by
sucking air into the underground tunnels and let the natural cooling effect underground for
cooling the air, then channel the cooled air up into the atrium of the mall. This is inspired by
low carbon, energy sustainable lifestyle of the people in Hanas Xinjiang. It has always been
my wish to create vernacular architecture that incorporate local uniqueness into the design
that is specifically to the place
4. How do you make sure that your design fulfills aesthetic quality and at the same
time fulfills practical, functional, social and economic requirements?
As I have mentioned in the previous question, during my professional training at university, we
were emphasizing on creative thinking process and making strong aesthetic statements, but
at the same time, set a very high bar for practical experience requirement. My principle in
practice is to provide my client world class services, give them value for money, therefore
fulfilling their commercial interests is a must, but at the same time my creations will also be
works of art. This is where the skill of professional architect is crucial, as the two need to
compromise each other, sometimes functional aspect of the design need to give in a little in
order to achieve aesthetic quality, and sometimes vice versa, and through many trial and error
and skillful manipulations, and exceptional solution eventually reveal itself.
5. You have extensive experiences in shopping mall and major commercial mixed use
projects such as mall, hotel and office towers mixed use design, and you have
been recognized as expert in the field. Could you share with us on your findings
and discoveries on this subject?
I will elaborate on this question from two aspects, one is from experience design point of view,
and the other is from practical, functional design point of view.
First of all in mixed use experience design, we will be talking about what people experience
and feel as they walk through the mixed use complex, as it has the most influence on people’s
lifestyle anywhere in the world! Hence it is not a rubber stamp of consumerism, but an oasis of
dreams fulfilled. Interactive entertainment became increasingly important in the survival of the
future malls, as people don’t just come to shopping malls to consume anymore, they can do
that cheaper on the internet, but like a theme park, they come for the entertainment, for social
interaction, hence we need to create a sense of place where it will lift up their spirits,
stimulates social interaction with friends and families, and place that will create special
memories, and experiences that’s worth travelling for.
One of the suggested ways is for the use of media architecture; urban planning and
communication interweave in a fabric with dense and intricate design of tapestry and creates
new experience that fulfills the unmet need for human interaction, as contrary to lonely,
isolated and unhealthy life of excessive internet shopping.

4. 1-Quotefrom Chris Stapleton, the creative venture catalyst from Simiosys
With increasing number of shopping malls been built each year, so is competition! Monotony
is the worst enemy for malls. All these characterless, commercial driven shopping malls that
all look the same, not only destroys one’s imagination, but also one’s desire to be in one let
alone travelling to one. However by adding experience design and entertainment as sensory
imagination achieved with the assistance of MR technology; 1“Interact with audiences and
their immersive feeling increases, and sparks their imaginations and imagination triggers
sensory areas of the brain, sparks ideas, manipulates audience’s own knowledge of
experience and memories to heighten the thrill of adventures into your created world. ”
Secondly from practical and functional point of view, for a highly complex project such as
mixed use development, coordinated system of movements are crucial, movements like
pedestrian, vehicular movements, loading and goods lift to service corridors, vertical and
horizontal movements. Incorporating retail principles such as utilizing anchor to pull the
movement of people towards the deeper end of the mall, and maximizing retail frontage and
exposure for specialty shops. In the recent years with increased popularities of internet
shopping in China, entertainment and F/B became the main attractions in a mall, they usually
take up more than 50% of overall tenancy mix. We can locate them in the higher levels, and
pulls people upwards. Hotel is an important part of a mixed use, hotel lobby, restaurants and
ballroom and circulations associated with it are critical, for instance the ball room should have
a separate vertical circulation for wedding processions.
For a dense mixed use project, a central public plaza is equivalent to the heart of a human
body, this is where performance, activities, human interactions will take place. However many
architects and developers have the misconception that public plazas are the bigger the better,
trust me, it’s not! Because when it’s too big, it can cause intimidation, feeling of emptiness,
hostile and other unease feelings. Whereas if it’s a human scale enclosed or semi enclosed
open space, it can be charming, comfortable and vibrant!
A mixed use project is the most complex type of development, it usually an iconic project
where art, aesthetics, poetry meets the functional efficiencies.
6. What is an exception piece of architecture to you?
The term architecture in English means art, poetry, sculpture, exceptional functional qualities.
Whereas the term building is referring to a structure that fulfills the functional aspect only.
Unfortunately in Chinese language there is no such word as architecture, it’s building design
(建筑设计) or the study of buildings (建筑学). A great piece of architecture is not only refer to
buildings, but also spaces, internal/external spaces, private/public spaces and how people
interact and utilize these spaces. Hence architecture has profound influence on our lifestyles,
as quoted by Winston Churchill;” we shape our buildings, therefore they shape us.” This is a
perfect summary on how our lifestyle determines the outcome of the building, but at the same
time, it also shapes our lifestyles as well. It’s all about interactions between human beings and
their living environments. Hence an exceptional architecture is architecture that consists all of
the qualities mentioned above, and has more influence on our lifestyles than these average
looking buildings.

5. 1-Quotefrom Chris Stapleton, the creative venture catalyst from Simiosys
7. The theme of this magazine issue is on details, “God is in details” quote from Mies
Van de Rhone. With the raise of living standards in China, Chinese are becoming
fonder of good details. Charles, from a well-known international architect point of
view such as yourself, can you share with us on your experience on detail designs.
Coming from a commercial retail specialist architect, where great deals of attentions are paid
to details. Detailing a shopping mall for instance, a shadow line, normally 10mm wide, 15mm
deep. It’s a very small detail, but it makes a huge difference, as to a perfectly connected joint
with a beautiful shadow line, as oppose to a clumsy uneven badly constructed join that don’t
meet. When we detail a light box, we think about how the glass panels can be removed and
change LED lights inside. When detailing a shop front within a mall, the glass line is usually
150mm in front of the column, this is because a person can have enough space for him to
operate his installation and maintenance procedure, and it looks better too. Hence detail
design thinking is not only about aesthetics but also about user convenient, operational safety
and efficiency.
Details are not only restricted to building details, this could apply to attentions paid to people’s
experience as they walk through the spaces you created, for example, in the space theatre of
Wanda Wuhan movie park, there are in creditable amount of details in the show set, the space
ship’s door is heavy and grey metallic colour, linear lighting that emphasis horizontal lines,
laser monitor suspended in the midair, but seemingly floating in the space. All of these
intricate details create a very futuristic impression and take people into their fantasy land.