Classic Project

INAKI ADING AIRPORT

Location: City of Daocheng, Sichuan
Status: Completed
Size: 15,000 sqm

Inaki Ading Airport is located on Hizi Mountain of Inaki plateau where is made up of Minya Konka and Haizi Mountain, and is covered by glacial rock basins and down-faulted basins all over the surface of the ground. It is known as the “Inaki ancient ice cap” because of its largest ruins of ancient ice in Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. The elevation of the airport is 4411 meters, which is the civilian airport with the highest elevation in the world. The overall building area is approximately 15465 m², including a terminal, air traffic control building, freight warehouse, office building, fire control building, gas station, and other supplementary buildings. The general building area of the terminal is 8796m², and it is officially open to use since September 2013.

Poetry is the expression of our mood, and poetry comes from our natural feelings. Quoting from Frank Lloyd Wright who is a great American architect, “Nature is my manifestation of God. I go to nature every day for inspiration in the day's work. I follow in building the principles which nature has used in its domain.” On the desolate surface of Haizi Mountain, it has distinct landform that is similar to the lunar surface. We did our best to minimize damage of the land surface.

For overall layout, we introduced the most representative culture locally - Khata. As the resource of our creativity, the architectural complexes are formed into two surrounded ribbons. We picture the terminal as an UFO, which has unique modeling, high-tech texture, and lightsome architectural style. Auxiliary buildings are incorporated into the distinct surface of Haizi Mountain, so that it not only decreases the damage to environment and respects local culture and nature, but also take advantage of native materials and plants in order to reduce the loss of heat and energy. When you look down at the terminal, it seems like an UFO is seated on a flying khata. These contrasts between future and nature, light and heavy create strong visual impact, so as to achieve the effect scenic area.

After the establishment of Inaki Ading Airport, the flight time will be reduced to 1 hour between Inaki and Chengdu. It has also created a formation of Shangri-La ring with the airports of Yunnan and Panzhihua, sharing “Shangri-La’s soul”, “the last pure land on earth”.