With Nantou Ancient Town in Shenzhen being one of the most discussed urban revitalization projects in recent years, various design programmes at HKDI have been actively engaged in using the district as a focused site, to explore the role of design in a revitalizing urban village. 

In Academic Year 2024/25, a series of cross-discipline collaboration projects were devised to investigate issues such as local cultural and urban preservation, the history and development of Nantou, the relationship between commercial operations and the daily life of residents, and public spatial design. The projects also aim to leverage cultural tourism as a way to expand its reach and impact incorporating landscape and space design elements, as well as thematic events. 

The projects result in the final design proposals presented in this exhibition, which focus on two main themes: Public Intervention and Cultural Retail. Public intervention involves collaborations of students from Landscape Architecture and Visual Arts and Culture programmes, designing human scale interventions to help improve the social and communal activities within the urban village; Cultural Retail involves students from Interior Design, Visual Communication, and Advertising Design, to explore how retail and commercial venues can help the village to promote its unique urban village character, and promote the sustainability of the urban village.