Nowhere is this growth more evident than in two of China’s major cities, Beijing and Shanghai. The cultural differences between the two cities are vast. Beijing is the seat of government that carries the influence of a mix of traditional and modern styles of architecture and larger and massive public building projects. Shanghai is the more cosmopolitan of the two, reflected by spectacular single-family, mixed-use and tower residential projects.

The cities have one thing in common, though: They’re furiously building housing in the urban core for the growing appetite of new homebuyers.

Many North American developers and architects are answering the call for this demand by successfully setting up shop in China. Though the path to successfully designing and developing for the Chinese market can be tricky, it can also be ultimately rewarding.

Working locally

“You absolutely need to understand the local market,” says Robert Mankin, NBBJ, who has designed a range of projects in Beijing and Shanghai, including residential apartment towers, stadiums and retail projects. “I know that’s a very general statement but that’s what it always goes back to. It’s quite a bit different than what we do here in North America.”

It’s also critical to have someone at ground level during a project’s life cycle, from the beginning of the projects when materials are specified, through filing paperwork, to the actual construction of the project.

“You need to have someone local to engage with either a person you hired for your company or partner with a local company that understands the local knowledge and local history and the language barrier issues,” says Mankin.

Driving force

A current project of NBBJ’s is the spectacular Zhuhai Marina Center in the city of Zhuhai. Mankin says the project is typical in China in that it’s a larger mixed-use development where the housing towers are the highest margins for developers because housing is in higher demand.

There are five towers, and three are residential.

“These are built first, and the presales from those essentially fund the construction of the balance of the project. We were pretty involved in individually planning apartment units but that can vary pretty wildly in China. It goes back to that local understanding of the nuances of the code and the local preferences. We were able to bring in some pretty innovational thinking into the unit plans through our knowledge of local knowledge.”

Oftentimes in China, apartments are an accumulation of assets. For instance, a new apartment building is developed and quickly sold out—not by buyers wanting to immediately move in but by those wanting to invest in the unit.

A large new project that was built across the street from one of Mankin’s projects in Hangzhou is completely sold out but sits empty in the dark every night. “It’s sold out by people from Shanghai investing in real estate and property. They’ve essentially purchased those assets and are holding them for future family members and children’s use. Buyers either pass the property on to the next generation or hold and accrue some profit off the property then sell it in a couple of years. It’s an interesting dynamic.”

Mankin says it’s a cultural understanding which was explained to him by several Chinese developers. “It’s really about the continuation of assets. It’s not to enrich but to be cognizant of family—a very big aspect, so the next generation would have homes. And as housing prices continue to go up in China, particularly in the high-end developments, it’s a trend that will continue.”

Outside of Beijing and Shanghai, other cities have their own design sensibility, too, with a noticeable difference in the second-tier, rural areas. “People in rural areas aren’t as used to real modern design so there’s more of a tendency to want to have things that are more, for lack of a better word, ‘traditional.’ Very tall high-rise residential apartments can be quite uncomfortable to some of the residents in these second-tier cities just because it’s a lot newer to them, as opposed to someplace like Shanghai.”

Material world

Materials in China are getting easier to purchase, especially home-based concrete, while foreign companies are either importing their wares or are now based in China and manufacturing throughout the country. What once was difficult to get in China—especially high-end materials imported from Europe that would have been cost-prohibitive—is now locally sourced or are available through local distribution.

“The encouraging thing is that there’s a broader range of materials, costs have come down, they’re more familiar to the locals, and clients are more willing to consider and use them,” Mankin says.

Still, while a wide variety of materials are available, the quality can range from very good to poor. “There’s a project we’re doing using a polycarbonate material on the exterior of the building,” Mankin says. “We’ve met with a couple of polycarbonate manufacturers, and the variety is dramatically different between manufacturers.”

That’s why it’s important for developers and architects to stay engaged when diving into specifying of materials, as well as keeping track during the construction process.

“It’s critical to be on the ground locally to ensure that the materials being selected are compatible with the design. Other times we may spec something early in the design and hand it off to the local architect who works with the local builder. In that extra steps the nuances of quality of the material could get lost.”

Read about single-family homes in China.