Sponge City designs draw inspiration from natural water flows and traditional methods for managing water during the monsoon season in rural China. This nature-based approach focuses on ecological restoration to support the natural cycles of water flow and absorption.  By doing so, these designs improve urban resilience, alleviate flood risks, reduce urban heat island effects, and offer low carbon solutions that enhance biodiversity, air quality, and urban aesthetics. Additionally, they offer inspiring places for community to reconnect with urban ecologies and contribute to broader urban climate adaptation efforts.  

（↑海口美舍河凤翔公园，点击图片链接了解更多项目信息）

（↑三亚红树林生态公园，点击图片链接了解更多项目信息）

In 2013, Turenscape’s Sponge City vision was adopted as a national policy in China, prioritizing large-scale nature-based infrastructures. Key features of this approach include wetlands, greenways, parks, canopy tree and woodland protection, rain gardens, green roofs, permeable pavements, and bioswales. This work sets a powerful precedent for designing with water as a living system, rather than treating it as a threat. What stands out is its scalability and adaptability; it goes beyond a theorical concept and is now shaping urban planning policies. 

The interconnected climate and biodiversity crises necessitate architectural strategies that enact forms of 'radical repair' beyond the building and hard infrastructures. As built environment professionals, we must design urban environments that promote the healing of the land and support the ongoing flourishing of life. Where life does not flourish, we ultimately cannot thrive.  Sponge Cities set a precedent for practices worldwide, showcasing how water can be skillfully celebrated as a creative resource, the foundation of living systems, and an invaluable natural asset. 

（↑三亚红树林生态公园，点击图片链接了解更多项目信息）

（↑南昌鱼尾洲湿地公园，点击图片链接了解更多项目信息）

Turenscape’s Sponge City work offers a model for transforming our understanding of living in harmony with nature in a changing climate. Their work celebrates beauty and ecology, drawing lessons from natural systems to develop holistic responses that regenerate degraded urban ecosystems, increase resilience to flooding and sea level rise, cultivate natural habitats in urban areas, and create inspiring spaces that foster human reconnection with our natural world.