MVRDV Transforms Former Cement Factory on Shanghai’s West Bund

MVRDV has completed the GATE M West Bund Dream Center, a major adaptive reuse project that transforms a former cement factory into a dynamic cultural and leisure district in Shanghai. Located along the city's Huangpu River, the development contributes to the growing series of West Bund cultural initiatives and offers a wide array of public amenities, from food and retail spaces to climbing facilities, event venues, and riverside relaxation areas. Once the site of Asia's largest cement factory, the area underwent a significant shift following the 2010 Shanghai Expo, which prompted the relocation of industrial activities and the revitalization of the riverbanks.

Winning the 2017 international competition organized by the Institut Municipal de l'Habitatge i Rehabilitació de Barcelona (IMHAB), Cierto Estudio proposed a groundbreaking design for the Illa Glòries block, situated at the nexus of Barcelona's 22@ technological district and the historic Eixample neighborhood.

At a time of ecological collapse and rising food insecurity, architecture is increasingly called upon to engage not only with landscapes but with the systems that sustain and regenerate them. Among these systems, agriculture occupies a paradoxical role, as both a leading contributor to environmental degradation and a potential agent of ecological recovery. Industrial farming has depleted soils, fragmented habitats, and driven climate change through monocultures, fossil-fuel dependency, and territorial standardization. In response, agroecology has emerged as a counter-practice rooted in biodiversity, local knowledge, and the cyclical rhythms of nature. It reframes farming not as extraction, but as regeneration of ecosystems, communities, and the soil itself.

This small refuge of about 50 m² is located near Valdivia, on the Pacific coast. It sits in the middle of the dense and humid Valdivian rainforest. The client wanted a small cabin to spend holidays, and the main challenge was to reinterpret the deeply rooted concept of the traditional cabin.