Focusing on Shanghai’s Suzhou Creek, this book examines waterfront industrial heritage through a social-spatial perspective. It approaches the river not as a collection of isolated relics, but as an evolving urban landscape shaped by changing planning ideas, production relations, and forms of public access. Based on sustained investigation of Suzhou Creek’s waterfront industrial heritage, the book proposes the ‘shared waterfront’ as both an analytical framework and a design vision for urban regeneration. It argues that waterfront industrial heritage should become a shared urban landscape, understood through five interrelated qualities: historicity, permeability, temporality, diversity, and everydayness. Covering the transformation of the creek from an economic shoreline to an increasingly open civic landscape, the book offers a new way to connect heritage conservation with public life, urban design, and adaptive reuse. It will be of particular interest to graduate students, researchers, and professionals in architecture, urban design, urban history, heritage studies, and planning. Its key strengths lie in three areas: a distinctive social-spatial approach to industrial heritage; a Shanghai-based case study with broader relevance to post-industrial waterfront regeneration; and a clear conceptual and design framework for turning former production sites into shared civic space.

Dr. Zhu Yichen is an assistant professor in the Architecture Department at Tongji University’s College of Architecture and Urban Planning (CAUP). With academic and professional expertise in both architecture and landscape architecture, her research interests encompass urban regeneration, waterfront industrial heritage, landscape heritage, shared architecture, and architectural typology. She is leading one NSFC Youth Program grant. Authored the monograph Sharing Waterfront: Suzhou Creek Industrial Heritage Narrative (Tongji University Press, 2022).

She holds a Bachelor of Architecture from South China University of Technology, a Master of Landscape Architecture from the University of Pennsylvania, and a Doctor of Architecture from Tongji University. Dr. Zhu has professional experience in Boston, Shenzhen, and Shanghai, where she has contributed to various design projects, including the Landscape Design for the Qingguo Historic Zone in Changzhou and the masterplan for the regeneration of Zhangyan Village. Additionally, she is a LEED ND AP, certified as a Green Community Associate by the U.S. Green Building Council.

Currently, Dr. Zhu is involved in teaching design courses for both undergraduate and graduate students in architecture. She is also actively involved in teaching for the international summer camp and participates in international collaboration programs.