SHANGHAI
CITY AND ARCHITECTURE

The Shanghai Expo 2010 has been the first expo to be held in China and, as everybody was expecting from this country that loves world records, it was the largest expo in history, both for extension, for the number of participating countries and of course for number of visitors. It was also the first expo in which not only the traditional national pavilions were representing their countries, but also cities have been invited to participate with their own pavilions. The theme of the Expo "Better City, Better Life" has been the concept under which they selected 15 cities. In each one of their pavilions these 15 cities presented some of their best architecture and urban projects. The choice of this theme is not casual: in an era when, for the first time ever, the urban population is larger than the rural one, the need to re-think and carefully plan cities is huge, especially in a country like China that has metropolis of millions of people. Among the 15 winning projects there has been the Bamboo House and the Air Tree of Madrid, the two buildings that constituted the pavilion of the Spanish capital at the Shanghai Expo. In this interview, Ignacio Niño and Manu Rubio respectively General Coordinator and Head of Architecture of Madrid's pavilion, talk about the project, the structure and the program of activities of the pavilion during these six months of expo.