Settled near the historic center of Harbin, close to the train station and the river, the project is a key point of the future development of Harbin. Along the train rail and bordered by two busy streets linking it to the city center, the site is now composed of a lot of storehouses, small shops and a few housing. The program is to create a multi-functional core for the city, holding housing, shops, specialized local products stores, offices, hotel and a convention center. The concept is to organize different poles holding the activities and to link it all along the site on a 3D circulation net. This axis is linking the city and the river, strengthening the particular relation that the ice city holds with its river.

To make this area becomes not only a new core for the city but also a regional core, we settled in the middle of the land in front of the convention center a 438m high skyscraper, the highest skyscraper of the three provinces of the North of china. Holding offices and a five star hotel it is acting as a regional landmark, a new business face for the ice city. Next to the skyscraper is based a huge shopping mall, integrating the new shopping uses. Organized around a central atrium it holds not only shops but also leisure facilities and a man made indoor beach.