ZeBar by 3GATTI Architecture Studio

The project started in 2006, when a Singapore film director and a former musician from southern China decide to open a bar in Shanghai with a very low budget and tight schedule. The client immediately approved one of the first concepts to be proposed: a cavern space formed by digital subtraction of hundreds of sheets of amorphous goal.

The idea seemed complex but it was actually very simple and born naturally from the 3D modeling environment where architects enjoy working with volume and virtual spaces. To generate a similar effect to the skin of the zebra, the space is subdivided into hundreds of blades that create an attractive play of shadows, providing a real way to endless sections of a volume that arises from a fluid Rhino.

Generally, for this type of design, is delivered to a factory model and, with numerical control machines, are easily cut sections, which are different from one another. However, China’s work on the machines is replaced by the underpaid labor of workers who, using a projector placed each section on the plates and cut each one manually, Having a much lower monetary cost.

The building was incredibly fast and almost complete in a couple of months. However, lack of customer business plans had to closed for 3 years and was finally completed and opened in 2010.