新浪微博
腾讯微博
微信
QQ空间
QQ好友
手机阅读分享话题

Chongqing News

TESTBED 2: from old factory buildings to popular scenic spot

2020-09-03 14:15:32

TESTBED 2 as a good place for residents to relax and play (Photo by Xiong Ming / Vision Chongqing)

CHONGQING (CQNEWS) -- At noon on August 31, the sun was blazing. After getting off the plane at Chongqing Jiangbei International Airport, four tourists from Zhejiang Province headed straight for Eling TESTBED 2, taking pictures as they dragged their luggage. 

In recent years, Eling TESTBED 2 has been being a new rising tourist “scenic spot” and popular place in Chongqing. In 2019, the passenger flow exceeded 3.5 million and the sales volume exceeded 300 million yuan. In the same year, it was given as the “Most Valuable Award of Chinese Cultural Tourism Brand”.

However, only a few years ago, it was a dilapidated factory building group.

How does it turns old factory buildings into popular scenic spot? Chongqing Daily reporter found that it thanks to the three steps to change TESTBED 2.

Firstly, to create special appearance

Appearance is the first step to change TESTBED 2.

It was formerly known as Eling Printing Plant 2. It was shut down due to environment problems in 2012, and the old buildings were left. Then, it was taken over by Zhou Yaxin who is the founder of TESTBED 2.

“I hope to create a cultural and creative park with characteristics in China,” Zhou Yaxin said. For this end, Zhou has been to many foreign cultural and creative park, and was inspired by such cultural and creative parks built from an abandoned factory buildings as Providence Steel Works and Port Adelaide Mill, Australia.

Therefore, in the process of development, Zhou did not take a drastic step to dismantle and build, but remained the original style. With this style, every building here appears “old”, and many exterior walls are worn even, but its interior decorations are very delicate.

The reporter saw that TESTBED 2 gave a person to feel with sharp contrast on the vision, the modern with the ancient, the depressed with the flourishing as well as the heavy with the pure and fresh......Various seemingly contradictory elements are an organic integration.

For instance, “Huajiang Building” at TESTBED 2 has slightly yellow exterior walls and old style, simple lifts as narrow as construction site lift. However, there are 15 stores in the building, each with a distinctive, well-decorated style. Especially on the sixth floor, there is not only a fresh and elegant Thai restaurant bar, but also an ultra-modern pool where visitors can enjoy Chongqing's urban scenery.

The renovated TESTBED 2 quickly attracted the attention of young people. Nowadays, at TESTBED 2, you can meet people who are taking photos almost every few steps.

In addition, TESTBED 2 is rated as one of the top 10 renovated projects in China.

Secondly, to promote as shooting location

In order to make TESTBED 2 outstanding among cultural and creative parks, Zhou promoted it by being shooting location.

Hearing of the preparations for the film I Belonged to You, Zhou invited friends and Zhang Yibai, the Director of the film, to visit TESTBED 2 which had not opened to the public. Zhou lobbied Zhang Yibai to select TESTBED 2 as the shooting location.

Zhang Yibai, a native of Chongqing, had the idea of promoting his hometown Chongqing, and so they hit it off.

After the release of the film, Hongyadong, Shibati and other scenes in the film, quickly became popular on the Internet, and TESTBED 2 became popular throughout the country.

Subsequently, a large number of tourists, especially non-local tourists crowded into TESTBED 2, many people with cameras and equipment to live, shoot and film. A large number of photos and short videos about TESTBED 2 were spread on the Internet.

Statistics show that non-local tourists accounted for up to 70 percent of the visitors to TESTBED 2 in 2019.

Thirdly, to recruit people rather than stores

Different from other cultural and creative parks with “stores” as attraction model, TESTBED 2 attracts people

Zhou said that after taking over of TESTBED 2, he visited more than 300 associations including Architectural Association, Design Association and Art Designer Association, and get acquainted with their key opinion leaders. After that, he invited key opinion leaders from more than a dozen local communities, including sports, crafts, life aesthetics and food to settle down. 

Such leaders stationed in TESTBED 2 for investment, but also indirectly introduced their own community into TESTBED 2. At the same time, the positioning of each community is different and their store choice and decoration style is also different, so that the store of TESTBED 2 does “not stick to one pattern” different appearances.

“The present TESTBED 2 is built by such key opinion leaders according to their own ideas. I just provide a space and platform for them,” said Zhou. There is another advantage that the scope of TESTBED 2 can be further expanded due to the unlimited restriction for community communication.

Currently, more than 30 communities invested here including Zhang Yibai and others.

Such model brings a stable flow of visitors for TESTBED 2.

Zhou said that after the initial achievements in COVID-19 prevention and control, these leaders held many activities of their own accord so as to restore their popularity. At present, the flow of visitors has recovered to 70 percent of last year’s. (Translated by Liu Hongyan, Fathom Language Limited)

Editor:Jiang Yiwei