Sa(l)vaging the Forest

Feifei Zhou hopes to reassess and explore the value of nature in commerce through her architectural design and planning. She hopes to return the entire trade chain related to matsutake (a type of mushroom) to the local Tibetans, the mushroom gatherers, by designing matsutake collection centres at these seven strategic points. This allows their habitation, collection, and trade activities to occur within the forests they rely on for survival.

Shangri-La, a Tibetan village in southwest China, was excessively deforested in the 1960s. Severe devastation led to a ban on logging and subsequent desertification, unable to recover its previous vitality. However, this scarred ecosystem has unexpectedly cultivated one of the world's most valuable mushrooms, the matsutake. Matsutake is extremely picky about its growth environment. Its symbiotic relationship with parasitic trees is beyond human control, making matsutake impossible to cultivate artificially; it can only grow naturally.

Matsutake, as its name implies, is a mushroom that grows on pine trees. Pines thrive in slightly dry, sparse forests. Dense forests are not conducive to the growth of pines, as broad-leaf plants obstruct them from adequate photosynthesis. Therefore, on this land scarred by logging, the development of young pines is ironically encouraged, gradually giving rise to matsutake due to their symbiotic relationship. However, these valuable edible mushrooms have again led to ruthless commercial exploitation of this once pristine land.

In general, the best season to pick matsutake is in the fall. For example, there are signs of matsutake in Yunnan Province, China, from May to September and early October every year. Its unique and picky natural environment makes each year's harvest a mystery, resulting in fluctuating international market prices, much like the stock market. The matsutake picking season is the happiest and busiest time for mushroom pickers.

Every day at 5 a.m., mushroom pickers have to walk several hours uphill to find these precious mushrooms halfway up the mountains. However, language and trade barriers have allowed intermediaries and large import and export companies to reap enormous profits. Through this design, the designer hopes to reassess and explore the value of nature in commerce.

The design concept of the matsutake picking centre is to combine and utilize local traditional customs and culture to promote a symbiotic/mutual aid relationship between humans and nature. Planned sustainable logging maintains the sparseness of the forest, which is beneficial for the growth of matsutake; free-ranging poultry maintains an even layer of dead branches by feeding on forest ground cover, which is conducive to matsutake sprouting.

Fresh barley on the farm is the traditional staple food passed down by Tibetans for generations; dried barley leaves are also known as indispensable organic feed for poultry during the New Year. The role of architecture is to maximize the mutual aid relationship between humans and non-humans on which they rely for survival.

This intervention design includes seven strategic points distributed in/around the forests of Shangri-La village. The designer hopes to use the characteristics of matsutake, which relies on human/natural disturbance, to create beneficial "disturbances" to nature through architecture.

What is a "disturbance"?

Matsutake forests need regular trimming, and the traditional Tibetan wood culture for hundreds of years has promoted the regeneration of matsutake forests. The wood obtained from logging is used for conventional Tibetan wooden architecture and firewood. But in an eager bid to "protect" matsutake, local departments have banned logging in the forests where matsutake grow, leaving the locals no choice but to log in distant primary forests. And thus, the ancient trees weathered by hundreds of years of wind and rain disappear. We often stray further and further on the road to hasty success.

If human survival depends on "disturbing" nature, how can we turn such "disturbance" into treasure?

The design concept of the matsutake picking centre is to combine and utilize local traditional customs and culture to promote a symbiotic/mutual aid relationship between humans and nature. Planned sustainable logging maintains the sparseness of the forest, which is beneficial for the growth of matsutake; free-ranging poultry maintains an even layer of dead branches by feeding on forest ground cover, which is conducive to matsutake sprouting; fresh barley on the farm is the traditional staple food passed down by Tibetans for generations; dried barley leaves, also known as indispensable organic feed for poultry during the New Year... And the role of architecture is to maximize the mutual aid relationship between humans and non-humans on which they rely for survival.