Located within the Dawangshan Tourist Resort in Changsha, the Langham Hotel is surrounded by lush natural landscapes. It serves as the gateway to the Deep Pit Ice and Snow World amusement area. Standing 100 meters tall, the hotel overlooks the abandoned open-pit mine, making it a prominent landmark and visual focal point on the Dawangshan skyline in southwest Changsha.
Inspired by the bust of Egyptian Queen Nefertiti, the hotel’s design has evolved into a cylindrical tower with an elliptical base. The podium and tower are seamlessly connected in a streamlined form, creating a belt-like architectural system that maximizes flexibility for the interior layout. The exterior façade flows gracefully, with an elegant transition from top to bottom and side to side.
The hotel’s main entrance sits between the tower and the podium, highlighted by an iconic steel structure design. The podium spans three floors and houses amenities such as a restaurant, bar, multifunctional meeting rooms, gym, spa center, beauty salon, and hair and skincare salon.
The hotel tower contains 295 standard single and double rooms. The largest suite spans 225 square meters and features glass curtain walls offering a stunning 180-degree panoramic view. Separate elevator systems in the podium and tower ensure smooth and efficient vertical circulation.
The building’s central core tube, located in the main hall, supports the structure. A cantilevered steel system transfers loads from the podium to this core. The columns vary with the façade’s shape, creating a column-free space between the tower and podium. The tower’s sculptural form consists of complex structures and six coordinated elevators to enhance efficiency and reduce wait times. Reinforced concrete construction of the core tube provides resistance to vertical loads, wind, and seismic forces.
The floor slabs prevent column distortion and transfer lateral forces to the core tube via bent columns. Made of trapezoidal steel plates topped with concrete, these slabs span up to 5 meters and are supported by parallel steel beams connecting the core tube and outer columns. All steel structures are fireproofed. The reinforced concrete core provides essential lateral rigidity, while the rest of the structure uses lightweight steel to reduce weight and seismic loads. This combination forms an efficient system that allows flexible mechanical space allocation, shortens construction time, and lowers costs.
Project plans and diagrams:
△ First floor plan
△ Third floor plan
△ Fifth floor plan
△ Restaurant floor
△ Standard floor plan
△ Section diagram
△ Section diagram
△ Analysis chart
△ Analysis chart
△ Analysis chart
Project Information
Architectural Design: Coop Himmelb(l)au
Area: 60,000 m²
Project Year: 2021
Photographer: Summer Solstice
Design Director: Wolf D Prix
Project Partner: Markus Prossnigg
Project Coordination: Feng Lei
Project Architect: Angus Schoenberger
Design Architects: Quirin Krumbholz, Tyler Bornstein
Design Team: Tamara Soto, Laura Ghita, Crystal K.H Tang, Xinyu Wan, Paul Challis, Veronika Janovska, Denitsa Parleva, Sorena Dumitru, Philipp Scherl
Principal: Changsha Pioneer Land Development and Construction Co., Ltd
Structural Engineer: Bollinger und Grohmann, Vienna, Austria
MEP: Buro Happold Ltd, Bath, UK (competition stage); Arup Engineering Consulting (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. (planning stage)
Landscape Design Institute: Huajian Group East China Architectural Design and Research Institute Co., Ltd
Transportation Consultant: SKM | Sinclair Engineering Consulting (Shanghai) Co., Ltd
Fire Consultant: Changsha Kerui Fire Engineering Technology Co., Ltd
BIM: BIM
Specification: SPEC
Lighting Consultant: LEOX Design Partnership
Curtain Wall Consultant: Shanghai Xiangyun Construction Engineering Consulting Co., Ltd
Interior Design: Rockwell Group Europe
Location: Changsha, China
Must log in before commenting!
Sign Up