At the 19th International Architecture Exhibition in Venice, which ran from 10 May to 23 November 2025, MAD Architects set a large paper umbrella in the outdoor garden of the China Pavilion, at the end of the route through the Arsenale. Chinese Paper Umbrella takes the oiled paper umbrella of Chinese craft and opens it to the size of a public shelter.
Paper made to take the weather
The canopy is made of xuan paper, the soft paper used for Chinese calligraphy and painting. It is coated with several layers of tung oil, a treatment traditionally used to protect wood, which makes the paper waterproof while keeping it translucent. In Venice’s damp, salty air, with its sudden rain and occasional strong wind, the result is a pale dome that glows when the sun is behind it.
The form follows the ribs and spread of a hand-held umbrella, enlarged so that visitors can walk in and sit beneath it. In a biennale full of dense displays, it offers somewhere to pause.
A canopy that responds
MAD built technology into the piece rather than around it. A misting system at the top of the umbrella runs off temperature sensors and cools the space below. OPPLE Lighting’s Smart Dynamic Light system changes the light under the canopy with the weather and the time of day, so shadows, colour and temperature shift gradually through the hours.
Letting the material age
Chinese Paper Umbrella does not try to stay new. Over the months of the exhibition, sun, rain and wind darken and soften the oiled paper. MAD presents this as part of the work, an acceptance of impermanence rather than a sign of damage. The umbrella treats architecture as something that lives alongside people and weather, and lets an old craft lead the way for the new systems inside it.
Architecture: MAD Architects
Photography: MAD
Location: China Pavilion, Arsenale, Venice, Italy
