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"The angles and curves are meant to stimulate different uses of the space, such as reading, walking, meeting and discussing." ing over 362,000 square feet of space. "e plot is situated be- tween the cultural corridor de- signed by GMP's master plan and Zhongyang Avenue road," Lopez explained. Adding that the space was conceptualized to replicate an urban living room, she said, "the brief was to create a new library as part of a larger master plan in order to trans- form Tianjin Binhai cultural district into a world-class area between the city and public park nearby." e entire program revolves around the luminous sphere. "For this project the main chal- lenge was to create a design that was ambitious and rethink the typology for a library, so it is no longer a dull and depressing environment." Lopez explained, "the idea of the ball, as a central district performance auditori- um, pushes the space away to create the cave-like public atri- um and the accessibility from city and park side contributed to design." Nicknamed e Eye of Binhai, the translucent sphere that anchors the five cultural buildings is the focal point of the library. e sphere's iris per- forates out through the build- ing's polished exterior and onto a neighboring park, functioning as an auditorium with a capacity to hold 110 people. e first thing visitors no- tice is the rolling topography of the bookshelves surrounding VUE ON ARCHITECTURE V U E N J . C O M 67

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