Asked to design an indoor games hall, together with miscellaneous installations scattered through a green enclave that once housed a military barracks in the heart of the city. Edward Ho of Wong Tung & Partners Limited, persuaded the Urban Council that the whole area would benefit from an integrated plan. He had two choices: to return it to an entirely natural domain, interlaced with footpaths, or make use of the various interesting platforms left behind by the demolished army quarters. The latter, he thought, could be blended into surviving vegetation as pediments for a variety of amenities of far greater interest and attraction to the general public.

Unveiled in 1991. the 10 hectare park has provided much needed green lungs in the heart of the city, affording a series of terraced delights from a visual arts centre, utilizing one of the surviving barracks, to a children’s playground and giant walk-through aviary, where one views birds from treetop height on an elevated wooden path. The aviary is overlooked by a tai chi garden and lookout tower, below which is a circular outdoor theatre of classical Graecian proportions, adjoining a massive conservatory (opposite) whose interlocking rooms, sunlit through a stepped pyramid of glass, sequester varieties of plants in different temperature and humidity zones. Beyond is a waterfall, whose intricate synthetic rock formation would be at home on an antique Chinese scroll, descending beside a restaurant with an alfresco dining courtyard.

At the coiled heart of this constellation lies an artificial lake, ringed by trees which frame superb perspectives of surrounding skylines. The public would seem to agree with architect Ho when he confesses that the lake is his favourite feature. The considerable pedestrian traffic traversing this park, between Central’s commercial centre and the busy precincts of Pacific Place, momentarily slows here to absorb the effects of nature cajoled by man into a happy union with his artifice.

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