Galaxy SOHO

Galaxy SOHO in Dongcheng District, Beijing, China, photographed at night from the lower courtyard between the curved towers. I made this frame during an evening walk, looking up from inside the complex as the white bands of light wrapped around the building.

What pulled me in was the way the architecture almost erased any straight line. From this angle, the whole place feels like it is flowing above you, with the bridges and terraces folding into each other and the dark opening in the middle giving the eye a place to land. Standing down in the sunken plaza, I could use the curves of the walls on both sides to lead everything upward toward the center.

The nighttime lighting does most of the work in this photo. In daylight, Galaxy SOHO is already distinctive, but after dark the illuminated edges make the layered forms much clearer. The bright white lines separate each level and turn the building into a stack of smooth ribbons. I liked the contrast between those clean lights and the black sky, which keeps the composition simple and lets the shape of the building carry the image.

I shot it wide to exaggerate the sweep of the structure and to keep the surrounding walls in the frame. That wider view helped me show how enclosed the courtyard feels while still giving enough space for the upper curves to open out overhead. I also wanted the glass railing and the sloping wall at the bottom of the frame, because they give a sense of where I was standing and make the view feel more grounded.

For me, this photo is really about perspective. Galaxy SOHO is a building many people recognize from the outside, but I was more interested in what it felt like from within the complex itself. Looking up from below turned it into something softer and more abstract, almost like a moving shape rather than a fixed building.