'FU FU' – A Meditative Water Cemetery

In a time when the world is rethinking how we approach life and death, the project FU FU offers a bold, poetic, and deeply philosophical reimagining of the cemetery. This shortlisted entry from the Circle of Life competition, designed by Wang Zhiyue, Yiwei Li, and Wu Xinjie, explores how innovative funeral architecture can foster a more inclusive and meditative space for both the living and the deceased.

Rooted in the ancient Chinese verse by poet Su Shi—"To send mayflies to heaven and earth is a drop in the sea"—the project takes inspiration from the mayfly’s short life cycle and its affinity with water. By using a saltwater platform as its core architectural element, FU FU offers a new spiritual typology that reconnects us with the element of water—the origin and end of all life.

Concept

The core idea revolves around the ‘circle of life’, a redefinition of death as a return to water, the element of origin. In contrast to rigid, industrial cemeteries, FU FU introduces a dynamic, organic water-based design. It reflects on death not as an end, but as part of a cycle—just like birth. The design is envisioned as a justice space, encouraging peaceful coexistence and reflection.

Instead of graves, the deceased are stored in architectural volumes containing digital and symbolic representations, freeing memory from physical attachments. The worship rituals shift from fixed monuments to floating experiences, turning the act of remembrance into a spatial, sensory event.

Form & Function

The project sits in a dense urban site in Shanghai, yet it carves out a peaceful void through thoughtful layering and circulation. The key features include:

• Water Platform: A pink salt lake populated by floating lily-pad-like islands where visitors can engage in quiet meditation.
• Circular Walkway: Offering elevated perspectives, symbolic of the ongoing journey between life and death.
• Underground Space: Functions as a digital memory archive, creating a non-physical connection to the departed.

Floating platforms allow visitors to physically engage with the water, offering a sense of immersion and connection. The use of Dunaliella salina, an algae that thrives in salt lakes, makes the water buoyant and vibrant—literally lifting participants during the ritual experience.

User Experience

The entire space is designed with user inclusivity in mind. Different zones—ground level, elevated walkways, and floating pods—offer a range of experiences from communal gathering to solitary reflection. Devices and modules placed on the platform help control crowd density while offering periodic rhythm to rituals.

This innovative funeral architecture does not just memorialize the dead—it invites the living to participate in a healing, circular, and elemental journey.

Sustainability & Scalability

FU FU is inherently sustainable. By moving away from material-heavy burial practices and toward symbolic digital remembrance, it reduces the environmental footprint. The adaptable platform design also addresses the shortage of burial spaces in growing urban centers, offering a scalable model for the future of memorial architecture.

Through FU FU, Wang Zhiyue, Yiwei Li, and Wu Xinjie have created an architectural narrative that uses water as both metaphor and medium. Their work not only questions our current relationship with death but also proposes an innovative funeral architecture model that reconnects spirituality, environment, and human emotion.

In doing so, FU FU transforms mourning into meditation, and remembrance into ritual—floating us gently into the next cycle of being.