A suspiciously familiar architectural design in a shopping mall in Shanghai, China has drawn comparisons to the iconic indoor waterfall at the centre of Jewel Changi, days after Qatar Airlines’ outspoken CEO Akbar Al Baker claimed that Singapore copied the design plans for Qatar’s Hamad International Airport.
Reddit user u/Twrd4321 shared a photo of the architectural feature within the LuOne mall in Shanghai to the Singapore subreddit last weekend and asked whether China copied Singapore. Netizens responding to his post, however, pointed out that both the LuOne mall and Jewel Changi were designed by the same architect, Moshe Safdie.
Others pointed out that this is not the first time the Israeli-Canadian architect has built a structure that looks similar to one of his previous designs. Moshe Safdie designed Marina Bay Sands and replicated the design in the Raffles City Chongqing integrated development in China later:
Interestingly, both the LuOne mall and Raffles City Chongqing is developed by Singapore’s own CapitaLand.
Headquartered and listed in Singapore, CapitaLand is one of Asia’s largest real estate companies and owns and manages a global portfolio comprising of integrated developments, malls, lodging, offices, homes, real estate investment trusts and funds. Present across more than 160 cities in over 30 countries, CapitaLand focuses on Singapore and China as its core markets. -/TISG