China's "Weird Architecture", as President Xi Jinping Refers to It

Under Xi, China’s Wave of ‘Weird Architecture’ May Have Peaked. (The New York Times, 12/21/2014)

Such as.....

Giant Trousers....or Big Pants....or Pants of the East.



The New York Times didn't get it right.

No official elaboration has emerged on what Mr. Xi might have meant by “weird.” But a report carried on a social media platform under People’s Daily, the Communist Party’s mouthpiece, predicted that “in the future it is unlikely that Beijing will have other strangely shaped buildings like the ‘Giant Trousers’ ” — a colloquial reference to the China Central Television headquarters, a hulking, long-limbed edifice designed by Rem Koolhaas and Ole Scheeren.

As a 9/5/2012 Australian news story notes ($700 million skyscraper 'resembles a pair of pants')...

 .....The $700 million Gate to the East skyscraper in Suzhou has been mocked for its striking resemblance to a giant pair of pants. 

The building was meant to be a "dramatic, iconic gateway to the East" that would outshine Paris's iconic Arc de Triomphe.

Not part of Beijing's skyline, in other words.   It's also known as the Gate of the Orient.

Here is a series of still photos of the China Central Television headquarters.




The Giant Egg -- a.k.a. the National Center for the Performing Arts, Beijing