SpActrum has recently completed the M2 Training Centre in Hangzhou, China, a space designed around the concept of an amphitheatre. The architecture firm has created a multi-centred interior landscape by overlapping three sets of concentric circles, advancing traditional stepped spaces into a fluid, rippling terrain. This design unlocks a versatile space capable of accommodating a wide range of functions.
The space is intentionally ambiguous in its purpose. While it serves as a training facility for the corporate headquarters, it also holds potential for exhibitions and filming.
Today,training and sharing spaces are often arranged in stepped formations. Thus the interior is conceived as a kind of landscape, where steps merge movement and seating into a single, continuous topography. For SpActrum's architects, this geometric approach adapts to various behavioural patterns, imbuing the space with an unprecedented sense of fluidity and continuity. While although it breaks down functional boundaries, it still maintaining a strong central focus and unified narrative power. In today's society, there is a need for innovative prototypes that can adapt to and create multi-centred spaces where speakers and audiences merge, unlocking greater spatial potential and freedom.
SpActrum drew inspiration from the ancient prototype of the amphitheatre, where seating and performance are intertwined, and envisioned three interlocking sets of concentric, stepped spaces. Together, these form a continuously shifting terrain. The design process involved constant adjustments to the geometric parameters of the three concentric circles. Key parameters include:
1.Centre Point Location: The position of the centre points defines the relationship between spatial groups and the basic usage patterns.
2.Step Height and Gradient: The steps must accommodate standard seating heights while ensuring ease of movement by avoiding excessively high intervals. Although the space no longer features a uniform staircase, it retains a general trend of higher steps at the back and lower steps at the front, allowing the space to function as a presentation area when the three circles align. Thus, the first two concentric circles have lower centre points, while the rear circle has a higher one, reinforcing the landscape imagery of "terrain" and "hillside."
3.Circle Spacing (Step Width): Influenced by human scale, the width of the steps should allow for seating at the edges while leaving enough space for passage. When used as a walkway, the width should provide a sense of security and comfort.
4.Eccentric Rotation Angle: Simply overlapping the circles on a flat plane would not achieve the dynamic and rich intersections desired. By introducing a slight angle to the concentric steps, similar to natural terrain, the steps evolve into a series of ramps along the circumference, creating complex interweaving relationships between the circles.
It is worth noting that these parameters were not determined sequentially but through a process of mutual coordination and experimentation.
With the basic structure in place, the raised sections of the ramps create space for a café, serving those who gather in the area. Skylights are strategically placed in the higher front sections, along with a central circular skylight, to flood the space with natural light. In addition to its connection to the office spaces, the centre features a simple, direct entrance leading outdoors.
In this way, an indoor landscape unfolds, where gathering, sharing, and movement are no longer rigidly defined. Like the natural terrain, the space invites people—adaptive and imaginative beings—to navigate its contours, find their own paths, and interact with it. The space, through its parametric design, suggests certain tendencies and encourages activities to emerge organically, without imposing strict boundaries.
Project Info:
Project Name: M2 Training Centre
Location: MREGINA, Sanjianghui, Xiaoshan District, Hangzhou, China
Area: 275㎡
Completion Date: 2024.06
Client: MREGINA
Interior Design: SpActrum
Lead Designer: Yan Pan
Design Team Members: Zhen Li, Chunxu Li
Construction Team: Beijing Jinghui Decoration Engineering Co., Ltd.
Photography: Terrence Zhang, Jinyu Wan
Other Image Copyrights: SpActrum