Florian Beigel and the Architecture Research Unit were invited by the Provincial Government of Jeollabukdo, Korea in 2008, along with seven other teams to participate in an international ideas competition to develop urban design proposals for the Saemangeum land reclamation project. Saemangeum Island City comprises a surface area of some 400 km², more than a quater of the area of Greater London (which is approx. 1,570 km²). In late 2008, the design project by ARU / London Metropolitan University was declared one of three winning competition proposals (along with Columbia University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology). Kazuyo Sejima, Director of the 12th Architecture Biennale, has selected the ARU project to be part of the main exhibition in Venice 2010. The urban land-use concept plan begins with a phased landscape infrastructure design of 8 new islands with a highly remarkable solution as to environmental issues.