What is the heart of Shenzhen? It can’t be Window of the World, mimicking past glories of other nations. Sea World captures the city’s coastal heritage, and OCT shows off our love of malls, but neither are unique to Shenzhen. Huaqiangbei gets close, but unless you’re building something new, there’s not much to do there.
With that in mind, real estate developer Centralcon Group envisions a new heart of Shenzhen. FutureCity – two vast towers with over one million square meters of high tech office, residence, and commercial space – has already broken ground in Futian and should open to the public by 2020.
More than just another mixed-use property, FutureCity breaks from real estate tradition by weaving together the expertise of over 20 teams of specialists. Of course there are architects and lighting experts, but there are also scientists, software engineers, artists like teamLab and designers of all kinds.
Centralcon Group put its new C FutureLab in charge of it all, with a mission to bring international experts together and share the fruits of that labor with people like us.
What will it look like? Imagine acres of screens, with art shifting all around depending on the conditions of the moment. Sensors will tell the built-in AI everything about you – your purchase history, your facial features, even your body temperature – and change the scene accordingly. Splurged on some jewelry? Your virtual avatar gets a gold crown. Feeling tipsy? The sensors will know that too, and they can make the walls dance along.
“It’s like a lab,” Vice General Manager Linus Lv tells us. “Products and ideas will be created there.” After FutureCity is up and running, C FutureLab will continue to innovate and add (or subtract) features, based on our feedback: “Let the market make decisions.”
We make up the market as we explore the wonders that this new technology can bring, carry some home in our shopping bag, or move in because we want to live on the cusp of the coming age.
While we wait for that future, we can see – and hear – the sound of those coming days, in Centralcon Group’s public exhibition of works from their partners Maya Denki, teamLab, Tasko and more. The exhibit debuted as part of this year's National Mass Entrepreneurship and Innovation Week in Shenzhen, and will stay open through October 25.
Announcing the coming of FutureCity with robotic flourish, these artistic tinkerers bring us an android band, programmed to play real instruments everyday (except Sundays) from 1-1.30pm. Witness charming – and somewhat creepy – post-human music or try out the cute-as-Wall-E Otamatone, an electric keyboard with a mouth that sings. It has a voice somewhere in between an erhu and a theremin. Of course, you can buy it online.
Expect a fresh exhibit every season, showing off C FutureLab’s newest working group of artists, designers, and scientists. If you have talent in one of those fields, email zhuofy@stellarcourse.net to get involved—you could be invited to join the forum, or even find a job in the creation of FutureCity.
“The city is not just the hardware,” Lv reminds us. With the best minds, collected at workshops like this, Centralcon Group is building the software for the new heart of our city.
See listing for Centralcon Building.
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