Opening Soon: the 2008 Construction Countdown

So the Olympic year is finally upon us, as armies of workers toil round the clock to ready Beijing for the legions of foreign and domestic guests expected in 2008. A host of innovative construction projects are now nearing completion that will crown the Chinese capital’s transformation from drab Communist throwback into a modern, affluent metropolis and perfect showcase for the nation’s growing fortune, power and global status. Here are some key ventures that will contribute to Beijing’s new look over the coming months.

(1) Handel on the High Life: the Legation Quarter

American-born Chinese Handel Lee was the inspiration behind Shanghai’s renowned Three on the Bund complex of upscale restaurants, clubs, boutiques and galleries. Now bon vivant Lee has switched his attention to Beijing, Shanghai’s dowdier twin sister, in an attempt to raise the city’s luxury quotient. His latest brainchild is the 15,000 square-meter Legation Quarter project, located close to Tiananmen Square.

Once the site of the US legation to the Qing Dynasty in the early 1900s, the redeveloped site promises to be Beijing’s hippest new hotspot, and a milestone in the capital’s rags-to-riches transformation. Scheduled to open in March 2008, it will host six haute cuisine eateries, a gaggle of exclusive bars, cafes and shops, an art gallery, and an underground theater that will “present experimental plays, art-house and classic movies.”

(2) Cinderella Story: the New Sanlitun

Beijing’s most famous (or infamous) expat haunt is slipping on its glass slipper and joining in the capital’s citywide pre-Olympic preening exercise. With the first stage of the internationally-designed development set to open in May 2008, the re-born “Village at Sanlitun” will be a sprawling entertainment, retail and hospitality complex hosting a plethora of glitzy shops, hotels, clubs, restaurants and a cinema.

The Village is not Sanlitun’s only new construction project. Celebrated real estate developer Pan Shiyi is also overseeing Sanlitun SOHO, a RMB 5 billion retail and commercial property going up on a site across the way. The 120,000 square-meter commercial section will be completed by the end of next year, with offices and high-level apartments finished by 2009.

(3) CBD Kool: the Mandarin Oriental Hotel

There aren’t many hipper locations for a Beijing hotel than inside Rem Koolhaas’s new CCTV building; the luxury 241-room Mandarin Oriental Hotel is slated to open in mid-2008 and will offer panoramic vistas of Beijing CBD. The interior of the hotel is described as “strikingly contemporary,” - 203 guestrooms and 38 suites will feature high ceilings and the latest in in-room entertainment.

There will be six dining and cocktail venues at the hotel, including the Chinese and signature restaurant on the top two floors, which will be linked by a champagne bar suspended over a connecting staircase. The property will also cater to the conference and events market, with a circular ballroom surrounded by a ring of water.

(4) Room with a View: the Park Hyatt

Hyatt guests have a penchant for the high life, and as part of the soaring Yintai Centre, Beijing’s tallest building, the Park Hyatt Beijing will not disappoint. The 63-story work in progress is scheduled to open in mid-2008 - the top of the hotel has been designed to resemble a traditional Chinese lantern, housing a bar that will offer drinkers head-spinning views of the bicycles and BMWs cruising Chang’an Avenue miles below.

(5) Size is important: Beijing subway gets bigger and better

Beijing’s woefully inadequate subway system is thankfully getting a much-needed upgrade ahead of the big event next August. Joining the recently opened Line 5, Line 10 and the Olympic “sub-line” should both start operating in June 2008, in time to ferry the anticipated influx of foreign guests around the city in high-tech, pollution-free comfort.

Operating entirely underground, the 22 stations of the first phase of Line 10 will stretch nearly 25 km east to west - eventually the line will run from western Haidian to eastern Tongzhou. Running north-south the 6-km Olympic line will bisect Line 10 and connect up the Olympic Village to the expanding subway network.

Images by Daniel Allen

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