Within the expansion plans of Ningbo City, the Houtang River stands as one of the main development axes. The BAU team provided various consultations and projects along the river. From the Masterplan of the Central Corridor that organized the entire new developable stretch of the river at the Masterplan level, to the urban project of the Gateway, one of the main landmarks within the axis.

The urban project shapes the needs of mixture, intensity, and identity demanded by the context in an operation that aims to integrate architecture with the river's natural surroundings. An apparently continuous base is the unifying element of the entire operation, a large vegetal cover from which volumes emerge, accentuating the main uses of the operation.

The BAU team developed three exemplary buildings as paradigms for the rest of the project and designed the open space to give coherence to the ensemble. The base becomes porous to promote continuity with neighboring urban fabrics and expands to create vegetal spaces near the ponds and "sunken" mineral plazas incorporated into the project's section to provide a natural continuity between the subway level, the street level, and the equipped bridges that connect to the other bank.