VINHOMES SMART CITY JAPANESE GARDEN GRAND OPENING FESTIVAL | “WHERE CULTURE MEETS FUTURE”

When Vinhomes unveiled its 6.1-hectare Japanese Garden at Vinhomes Smart City, one of the largest Japanese gardens in Southeast Asia at the time, the challenge extended far beyond organizing a conventional opening ceremony. Dream Studio was tasked with creating an experience that connected the timeless values of Japanese culture with the vision of Vietnam's first smart mega-city.

Responding to this challenge, Dream Studio developed the project under the theme “Where Culture Meets Future” Rather than creating a standalone launch event, the team designed an immersive experience ecosystem. Over the course of four consecutive weekends, the festival unfolded through eight themed event nights, combining Japanese cultural showcases, community engagement activities, and large-scale outdoor concerts into a unified destination experience.

One of the project's greatest challenges was its exceptionally tight delivery schedule. While the Japanese Garden was scheduled for completion on 12 September 2019, the grand opening was set to take place just two days later. As a result, the entire stage design, technical infrastructure, and operational plan had to be developed simultaneously with the construction of the garden itself. Most structural calculations, load assessments, and technical engineering solutions were completed using architectural drawings and construction data long before the venue was physically completed.

Beyond the demanding construction timeline and infrastructure constraints, the project required the coordination of multiple international partners under significant time pressure. The entire urban landscape was illuminated by thousands of lanterns produced by Haitian Lantern, one of the world's leading lantern manufacturers, with installation completed in just 20 days. The festival also featured professional sumo wrestlers from the Japan Sumo Association, adding an authentic cultural dimension to the experience. All these elements were mobilized to meet the stringent standards of quality, timeline, and experience set by Vinhomes, while  Dream Studio simultaneously had to develop programming, visitor experiences, and operational scenarios for a venue still under construction.

Running alongside the cultural activities was a concert series featuring more than 30 of Vietnam's leading artists. Each performance at the Japanese Garden was conceived as an interconnected concert, requiring multi-themed stage productions that were both contemporary and artistically distinct.  One of the event's most memorable moments featured singer Thu Phuong performing on a grand piano suspended several dozen of meters above the Japanese Garden. The technically demanding installation, with a total suspended load approaching one metric ton, created a spectacular fusion of live performance and stage engineering, marking one of the most ambitious aerial staging effects ever realized in Vietnam at the time.

For Dream Studio, “Where Culture Meets Future” was far more than the opening of a new destination. It was the creation of a large-scale cultural experience where technology, performance, architecture, and community came together to define the identity of a new urban landmark, demonstrating how placemaking can transform a real estate development into a memorable cultural destination.