The 2010 World Expo: Shanghai!

Expo Architecture

On May 1st Shanghai will surprise and please the globe with theatrics and architecture to rival their impressive presentation at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Some 70 million people will descend on Shanghai between May and October, flooding the city with diversity.

The theme locally is ‘Better City, Better Life’ which to many is a justification for the constant construction that has not ceased since the Olympics launched in 2008. That was the year of Beijing, this is the year of Shanghai, and the rival cities are doing their best to be number one in China.

The theme of the expo internationally is diversity, and the expo architecture is surely some of the most diverse on the planet. With soft-lined structures and modern materials, some of the designs will surely be as iconic as the Sydney Opera Hall. China’s structure is meant to signify a blending of the old and the new- a classical design turned upside down and perfectly balanced upon its own yin and yang.

China Architecture

With participants from over 200 countries, Shanghai will swell from a modest 20 million, to a dazzling 90 million people during the duration of the expo. Luckily they planned ahead! Two new subway lines opened this year, and a third is in the final stages of preparedness. The nanpu bridge and Lupu bridge, which house the entire expo between their high towers, will carry an unknown amount of human cargo across the river as the expo spans both a cultural and language gap, as well as a physical body of water. If Beijing was China’s coming out party, then the World Expo in 2010 is the ‘I told you so’ party of the decade!