A people's national pavilion at the World Expo is expected to put their best foot forward in terms of aspirations, innovation and world view. That of the host country is always under particular pressure to be the most eye-catching and mind-blowing.

Giving a Global Gala an Eastern Face

"Our objective was that people could see this was the China pavilion at first glance, even from afar," said He Jingtang, chief of the pavilion's design team. He is president of the architectural school of South China University of

Technology and a member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering. Chinese-ness is core to the design. The Chinese Pavilion sits at the intersection of the east-west and north-south axes of the Expo site. It consists of three sections; the 69-meter-tall National Hall perches in the center, overlooking the 13-meter-tall building for provinces and autonomous regions, and the section shared by Taiwan, Macao and Hong Kong on its circumference.

Perched on four massive pillar-like structures on a nine-meter-high base, the square National Hall resembles a huge, multiple-layer roof with overhanging eaves giving it the shape of an inverted pyramid.. This is an exaggerated rendition of the post and beam construction of an old-time mansion and an amplification of the interlocking dougong - a bracket system characteristic of traditional Chinese architecture. Dougong are the parts that join pillars to the roof, and provide increased support for the weight of the horizontal beams that span the vertical pillars. An assembly of dougong enable the structure, predominantly made of wood in old China, to be flexible enough to withstand earthquakes while sustaining little damage.

This construction creates an open space below the overhanging eaves that allows for maximum exposure to both earth and sky. Unity of mankind and cosmos is essential to Chinese philosophy, and is at the heart of the culture's traditional architectural concepts. At the metaphoric level the design signals China's willingness to reach out to the world, and at a practical level, it helps divert the flow of visitors.

Inspired Building

Red is a lucky color in Chinese culture, standing for blessings and affluence. The Chinese Pavilion is in the hue of "palace red," which was preserved for residences of the royal families in feudal China. But the building is in fact not monochromatic: it varies across four shades from top to bottom. This painterly tactic creates subtle effects that promote the progress of the viewer's gaze without compromising the integrity of the building's uniform appearance.

The outer walls are adorned with relief Chinese characters of the Zhuan style (or seal script), which is dated to Western Zhou Dynasty (1100-771B.C). Chinese writing, a system more than 3,000 years old, is the most important media of Chinese civilization, and at the same time, a distinctive form of art. Besides their ornamental value, these character carvings shield ventilation system features from public sight.