As a transition from high-rise buildings and urban streets, Millennium Plaza, an entry point to the Jinji Lake waterfront, is a hard-surfaced communal space of alternating concentric circles: black, gray and rose granite inlaid with a clock whose large and small rectangles of lights denote the hours and minutes.

A grand staircase leads down between berms to the lake, passing sweeping, curved basins of water. (The berms are exceptionally high to overcome a Chinese aversion to tomblike shapes.) On a lower level, ginkgo trees grow amid bright red and yellow flowers, which create the wide bands of color that are an important element in Chinese parks.

A long squared-off pergola walkway of wood and steel makes up the spine of the Harbor Plaza below. Here an immense granite surface with a shallow amphitheater of steps comes alive on Friday and Saturday nights, when some 10,000 people gather for a spectacular fountain display with colored lights and music at the water’s edge. In early mornings groups practice tai chi; later in the day people stroll along boardwalks that frame shallow pools of water strewn with boulders: a very Zen and serene setting.