SPATIAL STRATEGIES SOLUTIONS

Spatial hierarchy refers to the rank or order of importance of various spaces determined on the grounds of functional importance related to the concerned type of human activity and spatial importance expressed in size, volume, positioning, geometries and even symbolism of spaces and their shapes.

Well defined spatial hierarchies tend to make functioning and interactions of people better defined, more transparent, easier to manage, more efficient. In the West the term is most often met in architecture referring to internal organizational patterns of objects, and much less popular with other space-related sciences.

In the West space denotes freedom of movement on a symbolic level, it grants equal right and possibility to change life and social standing. As Yi-Fu Tuan wrote in Space and Place “space is a common symbol of freedom in the Western world. Space lies open; it suggests the future and invites action.” Despite that, we still differentiate places according to their size, position, relative importance, activity, reach of influence, we just usually do not associate it with actual physical shapes that predispose the place to a certain level of hierarchy.

In the East...well, one doesn`t meet the term, but the application, and shapes associated with meanings. On a geographical scale.

I was reading an article on the Chinese urban design concept of Shan-Shui – a new concept trying to reinterpret and incorporate the traditional Chinese urban and environmental design concepts in contemporary urban design. Being involved into spatial issues as both a geographer and a feng shui consultant, I was interested in finding out how much of the traditional spatial philosophy and feng shui methodology has been involved in shaping this new concept, and to see how the reinterpretations are fitted in with the contemporary requirements defined by socio-spatial processes.

I was really surprised to find out quite accidentally on which scale the traditional principles of shaping and defining space appear to be used to establish and preserve a social and spatial hierarchy – whether knowingly and purposefully or just unconsciously expressing social realities, is hard to say.

The paper analyzed the shan-shui aspects of three towns in the broader neighborhood of Beijing. While checking out the not very commonly known towns on the maps of Google and National Geographic, the formation of both internal and bypass ring roads, the most prominent feature of Beijing's layout caught my eye.

Beijing on the map

The rings were no rings at all, but three round-cornered, almost perfect squares, concentrically arranged around the also square-like complex formed by the Great Hall of the People, Tian'anmen Square, and the Forbidden city. The whole structure was enclosed in a circle tending towards an octogonal shape, followed by another wavy circle somewhat irregular due to the terrain. The shape is even more obvious in a night-time aerial shot:

 Beijing on night-time aerial photograph

The thought that the traditional city was organized to reflect the traditional chinese cosmology of Heaven and Earth was not very surprising, being acquainted with the role of feng shui or kan yu during the history of China. The concept, as described by Mircea Eliade perfectly fits the traditional setting of the city:

“As for the structure and rhythms of universe, there is perfect unity and continuity among the various fundamental conceptions from the time of Shang to the revolution of 1911. The traditional image of the universe is that of the Center traversed by a vertical axis connecting zenith and nadir and framed by the four quarters. Heaven is round (it has the shape of an egg) and the Earth is square. The sphere of Heaven encloses the Earth. When the earth is represented as square body of a chariot, a central pillar supports the dais, which is round like Heaven. Each of the five cosmological numbers—four quarters and one Center—has a color, a taste, a sound, and a particular symbol. China is situated at the center of the world, the capital is in the middle of the kingdom, and the royal palace is at the center of the capital.”

The surprise part was that, even after the fall of the Empire and during the communist era, these symbolic spatial patterns were not destroyed and replaced by the patterns of an egalitarian social order. The traditional patterns were even developed further, suggesting that along with the reorganization of the society in accordance with more egalitarian principles, the spatial order of the city was set to preserve traditional social patterns, relations and boundaries.

I did a quick-check on other cities. Not very astonishingly, they seem to display a similar pattern with a decreasing prominence as the city ranks lower in the hierarchy of places. Shanghai and Guangzhou (Canton) are the two cities one step down in the hierarchy, and they display somewhat less elaborate designs, tending more towards circular forms as seen on both map representation and on night-time aerial shots:

Shanghai on map and the night-time aerial shot

Guangzhou on the map

Circle also denotes movement, and the instability and change resulting from it, while sqare stands for stability and duration. It seems that the spatial layouts of the capital and the two big cities are supporting their role in the hierarchy. While Beijing is the seat of the Emperor, the basis of stability and order, Shanghai and Guangzhou are the centers that concentrate and link economic activity to the basic order, playing the role of Ministers in relation to the Emperor.

The cities less important than these two centers display an even less prominent grand design, the ring roads tending more to form circles than squares or octogons, like in Wuhan for instance.

Even in the historically important ancient capital, Xi`an, the layout of which was at the time in accordance with cosmological principles, the design was not developed to repeat the pattern of center of the world. Instead, its square grid is enclosed with one circle (which in a symbolic manner could perharps be interpreted as a spatial expression of acknowledging the ancestor):

 The conclusion that the ancient principles and traditional teachings are used to define spatial hierarchies on a geographical scale in China seems quite inevitable. These patterns should perharps prevent the atomization and desintegration of social structures by the ever more accelerating changes of the modern world. To which result, remains to be seen.