Designing from the Heart: New Thinking in Contemporary Spatial Design

When Eastern philosophy meets spatial design and lived experience becomes the source of creativity, the fourth-floor space becomes more than a study in form. It explores shared civilisations, emotional connections and design rooted in everyday life. Designers Zhu Baiyang and Zhu Yanqing explain the thinking behind the fourth floor, revealing the purpose and human warmth behind each detail.

▲ Designer Zhu Baiyang

▲ Designer Zhu Yanqing

Zhu Baiyang: An internal courtyard, whether U-shaped or enclosed on four sides, feels inherently Eastern. Yet it also appears in historic European buildings and many contemporary European designs. I see it as a type of space without cultural barriers: it belongs neither exclusively to the East nor to the West, but to the accumulated experience of world civilisation.

The appeal of spatial design often lies in connections that cross geographical and cultural boundaries. The courtyard is a classic architectural form, not the exclusive symbol of any one civilisation, but spatial wisdom developed through generations of everyday living.

Traditional Chinese courtyard houses arrange family life around an enclosed centre, while European historic and modern architecture also uses internal courtyards to create distinctive environments. U-shaped and enclosed plans cross cultural boundaries and express a shared architectural language. The fourth-floor courtyard builds on that language to create an inclusive, considered space.

Zhu Baiyang: People enjoy courtyards. The Chinese courtyard house grew from Chinese ways of living, just as European courtyards grew from theirs. An inward-facing space brings people together while allowing them to move freely. It recalls something familiar and ancient, yet also expresses our hopes for the future. Reinterpreting it as a usable modern space makes it interesting.

Good design responds to deep emotional needs. The courtyard's appeal lies in its inward-facing connections. Whether it supports family and neighbourhood life in China or European patterns of living, it offers both a sense of togetherness and freedom.

Bringing this classic form into the fourth-floor design recalls familiar ways of living and gives the space emotional warmth. Contemporary reinterpretation adapts the traditional courtyard to present-day needs, connecting memories of the past with hopes for the future and making movement through the space an engaging experience.

Zhu Yanqing: Life is the result of many experiences that accumulate and mature over time. In design, we weigh ideas through professional judgement and learning. We combine, develop and reorganise our lived experience and everything we have seen to arrive at a solution for a particular place.

Design is not an inspiration that appears from nowhere; it grows from lived experience and professional skill. Behind every moving design is sustained observation and accumulated experience. Fragments of life, landscapes and stories are assessed through professional judgement and learning, then combined and reworked into solutions suited to a place.

Every considered detail on the fourth floor follows this approach: rooted in real experience and supported by spatial design expertise. Design becomes a practical, achievable and welcoming expression of space, bringing design and everyday life together.

··· Closing Thoughts ···

Connecting the civilisations of East and West, remaining true to the idea of building inwards, and drawing strength from lived experience. Professional execution turns ideas into spaces that can be felt, experienced and brought to life.

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