Sumscope Experience Center | Quincy Li

Brief

"Fintech (financial technology) has now become a new impetus for all kinds of financial enterprises, it will undoubtedly build a new order in the financial market toward the industrial upgrading in the near future." This is what BNJN Design, designer of the project, has learned during those years from its practices for large financial companies both in china and abroad. Besides the creative financial products, a company like Sumscope needs a space to provide customers human-based offline training services and interactive communications, this is the reason the designer proposes the solution of creating a fintech space full of warmth and human-centered care.

Requirement
Sumscope, a company who has just celebrated its tenth anniversary this year, is now a rising star in the fintech field, who needs to create a multi-functional space where the corporate culture can be showcased properly, the virtual products can be presented prominently, and major events like training receptions, large-scale activities, etc, can be held, especially for high-end customers.

Solution
In order to create a space with a transparent, magnificent aura, the designer removed the original second floor slab at the entrance, then with this change when the visitors come into this space of two-storey height, a first impression of entering a modern company which is clean, professional and inspiring pops up from their minds.

By laying out the spaces in terms of the functions like training, reception, roadshow and office, the designer adopts the language of displaying interchangeably the curve of the building's facade and the straight line of the walls to create a flowing, rhythmic spatial arrangement which naturally represents Sumscope's corporate values of "openness and communication". Outside the two-storey floor-to-ceiling windows, lush greenery, together with lights and shades, penetrate through the "traditional bamboo curtain" grilles made of metal into the showroom space inside, which can be regarded as a "fourth side" specially designed to extend the interior view to the outdoor garden, "or put it this way, we borrow the outdoor garden into the showroom." The luminous strips deliberately embedded in the wall neutralize the backlighting from the intense natural lights, creating a comfortable and clean light atmosphere and at the same time eliminating the rigid high tech feel commonly felt in the fintech type of companies.

On one side, through a large Led screen, a huge glass door and a curved wooden wall "floating" from the ground has outlined the bright open training room. On the opposite side, a hollowed-out arched doorway made of black metal guides the visitor to a different space, where the function and structure are organically united, and the a decade of history and brand culture of the company are visibly displayed thereon.

Materials
Metal, concrete and other basic building materials contrast interestingly with the warm wood material and leisure furniture, like there is a rhythmic ensemble of hardness and softness in a rational, orderly and humane space context.

Highlight
The entire Sumscope Experience Center doesn’t have a clear-cut boundary, even for the training room which needs to be comparatively closed, the designer uses the "blurred boundary" approach to allow for a natural transition from space to space, so that people can easily travel in between to feel the charisma of a fintech space. As a continuation, the designer has also added a revolving staircase connecting the first and second floor at the "end" of the double-height space. Like a sculpture, the staircase not only serves as a "finishing touch" to the beauty of the whole space, but also as a semi-partition between the multifunctional showroom and the office.

Following the curve of the staircase to the second floor, functional areas such as VIP reception and the general manager's office are laid out in an orderly fashion in this limited space. Downstairs, in the back of the showroom, there is a separate staff office area and a dedicated entrance, and space for "meeting and training" and for "office" are therefore ingeniously set apart.

The design of the Sumscope Experience Center is a combination of technological and financial trends and modern architectural aesthetics, and will serve as the corporate image of being dedicated to "building the global leading financial information and service platform for the RMB market" and creating more vitality to ensure the company's future development.