by Peiwen Yu My initial curiosity about Athens was sparked by a New York Times travel story describing it as one of Europe’s most underrated capitals. I went in 2024 expecting antiquity: the Acropolis, archaeological sites, museums, and the familiar image of pale stone under the Mediterranean sun. What stayed with me after the trip […]

By Peiwen Yu Before our summer principals meeting, I assembled a guide filled with places I hoped to see: Mount Royal, the Old Port, Parc Jean-Drapeau, Habitat 67, Mile End, Jean-Talon Market, the Lachine Canal, and more. The list was ambitious. Our schedule was equally ambitious. Three days of presentations, working sessions, professional exchange, and

by Peiwen Yu As compelling as historic sites are, travel often draws my attention to the flow of everyday life, where routines unfold with intention, grounded and steady, far from a pace driven by speed and efficiency. Cities reveal themselves through daily rituals, not landmarks. During a recent trip to Naples and Palermo, this came

Suzhou is a city born of water. Millennia-old canals, gardens, and alleyways have shaped its skeleton and crystallized its understanding and expectations of public life. The Suzhou Huamao Center (China Trade Center) emerges from this very lineage – it does not merely stack modern functions but seeks a new balance between ancient urban traditions and

By Santiago Brockmann,  Luxury Boutique Hospitality Leader | Strategic Asset Management & Experiential Operations | Brand Builder & Value Creator August 14, 2025 “True comfort isn’t universal—it’s deeply personal, shaped by identity and values.” — Peiwen Yu, from her blog Rethinking Luxury and the Future of Hospitality Recently, I read a blog by my colleague

by Peiwen Yu The glossy promise of travel has always been seductive: step outside your comfort zone, find yourself, return transformed. After years bouncing between continents—watching elephants in Kenya, dancing in Havana’s streets, getting lost in markets I couldn’t pronounce—I’ve come to a messier realization. Travel doesn’t really expand our comfort zones. It exposes the

A case study on the Sky Garden Terrace at Haihao International Tower By Peiwen Yu In an era where urbanization often disconnects people from nature, biophilic design has emerged as a transformative approach to architecture and landscape design. By integrating natural elements into built environments, biophilic design enhances well-being, reduces stress, and fosters a deeper

By Peiwen Yu Will the climate action in landscape design develop new aesthetics derived from the emerging landscape in rising to the challenge faced by the planet? Climate change is a global problem felt on a local scale. It seems to be a daunting task for us the Landscape Architects to reverse global warming, but

By Peiwen Yu Being a creative, I sometimes suffer from “originality syndrome” as many of my fellow designers do. It feels harder and harder to create unique and insightful designs I’ve never seen before. Nowadays, the lack of innovation due to commercial survival is quite common in the marketplace. There are so many inspiring ideas

By Peiwen Yu Ever since the pandemic lockdown impacted global cities, people have speculated the possible new reality dense cities will face, and the turns of how public spaces may be designed and used. Will cities still be fun for everyone to enjoy and present a collective future for humanity? Some projection says that by

By Peiwen Yu   When one door closes, a window opens. The stillness of the world during pandemic shutdown offers a magical moment of pause. When the world slows down, we have the time and brain bandwidth to reflect, explore, reconnect, and reevaluate some of the important things in life and work. The coronavirus pandemic

By Peiwen Yu   When the owner of MedEx Pharmacy & Compounding first took over the business, the pharmacy’s interior space offers no different impression than any other typical drug stores – expressionless salesperson standing at the counter window in front of the compounding room, rows of shelves filled with messy medicines and groceries, hardly

By Peiwen Yu Are hand-drawn sketches a lost art?  Hand drawing is still very much alive and kicking. It remains the most fluent and unhindered way to transmit what is in the designer’s imagination to the physical world. My starting point of developing any design idea has to be hand drawings. Drawing is a conversation

By Peiwen Yu What drives people to travel a long way to see the world? To me, it is the curiosity to discovering what life is really like in another place first hand. The secret of getting most out of travel is to experience life as the locals do, seeing the world through unfamiliar eyes.

By Peiwen Yu why post-industrial cities? And how do we renew the dynamism of modern urbanity in the postindustrial era? This photo essay is my attempt to demonstrate the benefits of adaptive reuse design thinking for urban development, the community, and the environment. After having experienced those post-industrial places photographed, and personally directed a number

Wenzhou Tech City Postindustrial Waterfront: resonates with the memory of the place By Peiwen Yu As a city historically known for its vibrant Commerce, charming landscapes and cultural heritages, Wenzhou is undergoing an urban transformation towards upgraded industrial structure and renewed lifestyle. Situated at the south-eastern coast along East China Sea, one of the densest

Narrative by Peiwen Yu Suzhou Huamao Center (Gusu-Li) mixed-use complex is envisioned to be the next cultural landmark in Suzhou’s old town, which houses many world cultural heritage sites. Occupied 9.5 ha of precious urban land next to Shang-Tang Canal, the 1.27 billion USD development will be the newest lifestyle destination with retails, office, and

By Peiwen Yu In an age of technology that so often produces simulated reality at the expense of the real, how do we design American and global cities to be smarter and more enjoyable to live in?  As a landscape architect and city builder, I am convinced the urban places we inhabit shape us, acknowledging

The Urban Transformation, China Dream, and an Urban Planning Strategy This essay is an attempt to comprehend the “new urbanization” (新型城镇化) put forward by Chinese central government as an important national strategy for the next decades – what it means to a new typology of economy, the upgrading of industrial structure, reform of social benefits

Photo Essay by Peiwen Yu Craving adventure, once in a lifetime experiences and culture, I had wanted to visit African safari and witness one of the top wonders of nature world – wildlife migration. In this July, I finally made the trip to Kenya! My imaged-reality of Africa was largely made of stories including the

In an age of technology that so often produces simulated reality at the expense of the real, how do we design American and global cities to be smarter and more enjoyable to live in? Today’s technology and artificial intelligence has amplified the power of humans significantly. However, human feelings will never been delivered through a

If you’re happy, does reality matter? Happiness is subjective, not objective. Prosperity and wealth help, but definitely not the only things that matter to happiness. By visiting some of the most vital urban places in La Habana, Cuba, I was deeply impressed by the mixture of charms offered by this unique city with both history

By sharing the following two stories in the beginning of the New Year, I hope to explore environment and culture-friendly models of urbanization, towards more sustainable, memorable and vital communities, with the renewed power of design. Around the Christmas and New Year holiday seasons, I was visiting and living in the heart of metropolitan Beijing. While

We at RenChi Space are excited to see Hutong Children’s Library and Art Center selected as one of the winners of this prestigious award. It transformed a crowded and messy Hutong courtyard into a refreshing and vibrant community space, envisioning a new use of traditional housing units at the dense core of modern metropolitan. See all winners of Aga

In mega cities with millions of residents, public places with life and vibrancy are commonly expected. Observing dynamics in a high desert small town with only 2000 people could be more fun, for it may lead to better insight into what created RenChi attraction in the large canvas of natural landscape. Located between the Davis Mountains and Big

Renchi Space is excited to learn about the massive recycled steel installation at 2016 Venice Biennale’s main venue curated  by People’s architect Alejandro Aravena (2016 Pritzker Prize Winner). The architect’s body of work and TED talk demonstrated tremendous value on social impact work through architectural practice, an approach emphasizing both intelligence and intuition in design process,

Narrative by Peiwen Yu (Publication of this article approved by Shenzhen Nanshan Urban Management Bureau client) Shenzhen, one of China’s fastest urbanizing megacities, would be unlivable without its parks, squares, waterfront promenades, and green mountains. As the first Special Economic Zone China Established in 1980, the city placed itself on the frontier of domestic reform

— Edge, Complexity and Informality in shaping places for 528 Art Village What makes a charming traditional city moving forward in the global era while keeping its memories of place? I believe in the resilience of its social energy. It is what makes a city healthy and competitive, and often has little to do with

When it comes to quality of life, are people really better off in cities?  As the world is entering the Urban Age, Americans are moving to cities in ever increasing numbers. But in what speed and scale average American suburban oriented cities may embrace the idea of density, more integrated land use, creative tension between