Designed by MVRDV, Bihailou Art Village is a mixed-use cultural and commercial centre currently under construction in Shenzhen, China. Located in the Shatoujiao neighborhood near the Hong Kong border, the mixed-use project combines cultural, commercial, and public programs within a vertically stacked composition derived from the firm's "Vertical Village" concept. Designed to accommodate independently operating venues while maintaining publicly accessible circulation, the development reinterprets the scale and spatial character of the surrounding urban fabric through a series of distinct volumes.
The project builds upon the Vertical Village concept, originally developed by MVRDV and The Why Factory in 2011 and published as a book the following year. Conceived as a response to the rapid densification and increasing uniformity of many Asian cities, the research proposed an alternative model for high-density development by combining the diversity and individuality associated with village life with the compactness of urban environments. Rather than organizing all functions within a single volume, the concept plans a collection of independent units stacked vertically while maintaining access to daylight, views, and individual entrances.
For the Bihailou Art Village, the concept has been adapted to accommodate a cultural and commercial program. Instead of a singular building mass, the project is composed of fragmented volumes that respond to the scale of the surrounding neighborhood. Each volume is differentiated through its geometry, materiality, and color, drawing references from nearby buildings as well as the former Bihailou restaurant, which previously occupied the site. The internal organization assigns each function to its own volume. The multifunctional performance theater occupies a double-height space equipped with retractable seating, allowing it to be reconfigured as an exhibition hall, while a floor-to-ceiling glazed facade facing the adjacent plaza establishes a visual connection between interior activities and the public realm. Smaller volumes accommodate retail spaces and restaurants, creating a mix of cultural and commercial uses distributed throughout the building.
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MAD Completes Shenzhen Bay Culture Square, a Coastal Design Museum and Public Park in ChinaEach program has an independent entrance, allowing the theater, restaurants, shops, and the Fish Lantern Museum, dedicated to the cultural heritage of Shatoujiao, to operate on separate schedules. Stairs, escalators, ramps, and elevated walkways remain publicly accessible, enabling visitors to move through the building regardless of individual operating hours and access a series of rooftop terraces overlooking the surrounding mountains, city, and bay.
"The joy of this design lies in its contradictions," says MVRDV founding partner Winy Maas. "It looks spectacular from afar, and up close, there is an intimacy to each space." According to Maas, the project revisits the principles developed in the Vertical Village research by combining urban density with individuality and human-scale experiences, offering an alternative to the scale of conventional tower developments.
In other recent developments, MAD Architects has completed the Shenzhen Bay Culture Square, an 188,000-square-meter cultural complex in Shenzhen's Nanshan District, eight years after construction began. Elsewhere in the city, the Shenzhen Natural History Museum, designed by a consortium of 3XN, B+H Architects, and Zhubo Design, has opened to the public. Beyond China, the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, designed by Frank Gehry, is scheduled to open on December 11, 2026, marking the fourth museum in the Guggenheim network after a development process spanning two decades.
