[Paper Architecture (Competition Entry)] — New Construction Project for the Gymnasium of National Taiwan University of Sport

Team Architects Partnership + Shih-Cheng Yang Architects & Associates + Original Structure Engineering Consultants

This project was a competition entry collaboration between our firm and Shih-Cheng Yang Architects & Associates. Weare pleased to have had the opportunity for our two teams to inspire and challenge each other throughout this working experience.

The site is located at the Ying-cai Campus (West District) of the National Taiwan University of Sport. The campus itself is modest in size. The construction area is situated at the southeast corner of the campus, featuring a narrow rectangular east-west orientation with limited space. The two adjacent roads (Zizhi Street and Lane 225, Minsheng Road) are narrow, while the Ying-cai Building, constructed in recent years, stands to the north.

The program is for a multi-purpose sports venue with extensive requirements; beyond academic teaching, it must also accommodate public operations. Consequently, unlike traditional sports facilities that are often bulky and enclosed, weaimed to create a new building characterized by transparency, lightness, openness, and a human-friendly scale. Our goalwas to provide a shared sports space that connects the campus with the community through scheduled resource sharing.

To address the diverse spatial needs—including a multi-purpose court, 25m standard swimming pool, SPA area, table tennis room, gym, specialized classrooms, lecture hall, offices, and underground parking—our structural design (above ground) utilizes two major units: a low-level K-type RC frame and top-level steel truss beams. The large-span diagonalbeams of the K-frame provide upward support to organize the specialized classrooms on the 2nd and 3rd floors, creating a sense of vertically layered, stacked spaces. Downward, they support a powerful triangular pool area and a mezzanine lecture hall, while creating a setback along Zizhi Street to the south to produce a soft, open lighting surface. For the top-level all-weather court, we employed steel truss beams to meet the large-span requirements, covered with perforated metal panels to enhance the overall sense of lightness.

"Responding to the site through architecture and form, satisfying spatial functions and needs, and creating a robust yet lightweight structure with an intuitive and gentle aesthetic." This reflects our design team's vision and expectations for this gymnasium.