Canada
Following the planet’s future needs, Parkland has commissioned Sanyou Architectural Design Firm to reimagine a typical highway gas station and create a roadside oasis to recharge both EVs and visitors.
The Sunflower Station— The Electric Fuelling Station of the Future has been awarded a 2023 International Architecture Award from The Chicago Athenaeum and The European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies.
The Sunflower Station is a unit that contains 24 charging spaces, and it can be copied and expanded into two or more as the demand increases.
In order to make the charging station different from the previous gas stations and make it more attractive and happily, the architects adopted the following methods: First of all, the architects hope that this charging station is different and has characteristics. For example, when the architects see it, they will of the future or the sunflower.
They divide the functions into activity areas and rest area so that they do not interfere with each other.
On the outside, there are 24 charging parking spaces on the inner side of the road and 57 ordinary parking spaces on the outer side of the road.
Further inward, there is a pedestrian landscape footpath, with pedestrian entrances at both ends of the building.
There should be more interesting space, and you can have different experiences each time.
So, the architects designed seven spherical spaces, each ball has different functions.
These are surprise spaces, where you can sleep, watch movies, watch the stars at night, meditate and yoga, and it can also be a children’s paradise.
For example, the architects designed solar panels on the top of the umbrella colonnade, and sloped the photovoltaic panel properly to collect rainwater into the inner courtyard in summer, and in winter, a heating system is used to melt the snow.
The architects also made it more scientific and technological. With better technology, the charging parking space can rotate as a whole.
When the electric vehicle is charged, the umbrella platform can raise a light curtain to produce a more scientific and technological effect.
Project: SUNFLOWER STATION — The Electric Fuelling Station of the Future
Architects: Sanyou Architectural Design Firm (Beijing) Co., Ltd
Lead Architect: Wei Kang Design Team: Lin Feng, Dawei Li, and Zhao Zhang
General Contractor: Parkland
Client: Parkland
Photographers: Wei Kang
