Alila Yangshuo
Designed by Chinese firms Vector Architects with interiors by Horizontal Space Design, Alila Yangshuo is a 117-room hotel that’s housed within a renovated 1960s sugar mill.
An old sugarcane dock was turned into a swimming pool, which offers views of the Karst mountains and Li River from a distance.
Much of the sugar mill’s original brickwork and concrete structures were retained and restored.
To create a few new wall sections, founding partner of Vector Architects Dong Gong created hollowed-out brickwork inspired by the sugar blocks produced in China in the 1920s.
Dong designed a special machine to produce the customized hollow bricks, which are made of local sandstone.
Five tradesmen worked for more than six months to hand-make each of the new 60,000 hollowed bricks that were used to create sections of the hotel's exterior and interior walls.
Red volcanic rock that was discovered during the construction process was ground and mixed into the terrazzo floors, and also used throughout the walls, adding subtle red hues to the space.