the Farm
a new urban condition
Thesis question
How do you combine vastly different programs in a city block and what does it become?
The City
The Farm is a speculative proposal for a self sustainable city block where as much food is produces as is consumed by it’s inhabitants. It is utilising the
potential that arise when the greenery of farming is brought in to the cities in creating a new hybrid that blends with the city fabric with the aim of
con-tributing to the areas multiplicity and vibrant life.
The aim of the project has been that through architecture design; study the possibility to go from a throughput society, where everything we consume
is produced outside of the community, to a society that produces what it consumes within the community in a cyclical integrated sustainable way. Can
we produce what we consume with in a city and what happens when the production, which in this case is the cultivation of crops and plants, merge with
the existing city fabric? What happens if the cultivation is combined with a traditional apartment program and what does it become? Can the programs
thrive together in symbiosis or will one of the programs become a parasite of the other? How does the vast open spaces required for farming relate to
the small intimate spaces suitable for living spaces? What is their interrelationship, how do they effect each other?
Diploma project in Architecture 2012
by Jesper Arvidsson
Performative Design Studio
Royal College of Technology (KTH)
Advantages of the Vertical Farm*
• Year-round crop production
• No weather-related crop failures
• No agricultural runoff
• Allowance for ecosystem restoration (when farmland is freed)
• No use of pesticides, herbicides or fertilizers
• Use of 70-95 percent less water
• Greatly reduced food miles
• More control of food safety and security
• New employment opportunities
• Animal feed from post harvested plant material
Some other positive side effects with the Vertical Farm concept is that it has the potential of being the solution to some of the main crises the world
faces today such as deforestation, lack of food due to population increases, climate change, pollution, depleting resources, dwindling ecology,
over-fertilization etc, etc, etc.
* The Vertical Farm, by Dr. Dickson Despommier
To meet the needs for a predicted world population of 10 billion people an agricultural footprint equal to the size of Brazil will be required. Since almost
all land suited for farming is already being used the land required simply doesn’t exist.
Today about 50% of all people live in the cites while in 2050 up to 80% will be living in cities.
Todays agricultural system isn’t sustainable since it relies heavily on fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides which in turn ends up as agricultural runoff
poisoning ground water and killing off sea life. And since most people live in the cities everything has to be transported from the farms into the city
causing even more pollution.
Today there is no food shortage in the world but we are using almost all arable land in the world to meet the demand. In 2050 the world population
is predicted increase from todays 7 billion people to around 9.5 billion. The consequence of the is that if we continue to farm in the traditional way we
would need another Brazil of arable land to feed all new mouths. A problem here is that this much new arable land simply doesn’t exist!
Why Urban Farming?
How?
Program
Todays
Feeding the world
Tomorrow
2012
2050
Gray water
remidation
City drinking
water
City power
grid
Biogas or
plasma arc
gasification
Energy
Clean water
Eco-City
Sustainability thru cyclical integration
Urban Farming
Food
Metabolic by
products
Liquid muncipal
waste
Resources in
Water
Energy
Food
Black water
Gray water
Muncipal waste
Waste out
The City
Throughput society
Requires
20% of fosil fuel
consumption
70% of available
fresh water
pestisides
Food
Agricultural runoff*
* Agricultural runoff is responsible for more ecosystem disruption then any oter single kind of pollution, killing off coral reefs and fishery.
fertilizers
herbicides
Traditional agriculture
Unsustainable in the long run
Produces
Hydroponic and aerophonic farming
To achieve the efficiency required the very resource effective ways of
hydrophobic and aerophonic farming will by utilised. In hydrophonic
cultivation plants stand in a mineral nutrient water solutions which
irriga-tion speed is carefully regulated.. The water is then recycled which leads to
a 10% water consumption compared to traditional farming.
The constant flow of water eliminates the risk of under or over watering of
plants that are the most common error when growing in soil.
Almost any plant will grow with hydroponic cultivation but there are some
plants that can’t and for them the more advanced aerophonic farming can
be used. In aerophonic cultivation the roots are continuously kept in a fine
mist of nutrient solution. Any species of plants can be grown aerophonic.
The overall scheme for the complex is to be a self sustainable city block. The program has been dimensioned to consist of as many apartment as if this
block would have been developed as a standard extruded city block. The apartments are suspended between cultivation towers which contains the
amount of cultivation area equal to it’s inhabitants ecological footprint in regards to food consumption. In addition to this it also contains an food
market and elevated park on top of the podium as well as an aquaculture in the towers ground imprint.
Where?
The proposed project is to be considered a show case and a pilot to set focus on the potential of cultivation plants and crops within the city in the
move towards a sustainable society. For it to be realised it needs to be located in a context where there is both the political will and the economic
power exist to carry it out.
The new development of Stockholm Royal Seaport is an areas that could fulfil those requirements. The project has very high goals in becoming an
environmentally sustainable city district. The goal is to secure Stockholms leading position in environmental friendly development. To reach this goal
the environmental design will focus on the following areas:
I believe that these goals can be raised to also include sustainability in a brother sense as proposed for this project.
• Renewable energy partly locally generated from sun and wind
• Low energy usage thru zero-energy buildings
• Environmentally effective transportations
• Adapt to a changing climate
• Food waste will be refined into biogas
• Support a sustainable lifestyle which minimizes transportations
Typology and Structure
The overall composition build on the idéa of a skyscraper complex by OMA to create a urban condition that blends with the city fabric and offers
variety and programmatic richness. The complex consists of three clusters of bundle towers which are arranged to create an enclosed intimate area
in the city. The bundle towers penetrates an podium and generates an imprint in the ground. The podium connects the bundle towers to create
programmatic continuity between them . The bundles are connected themselves by the infill structure between them to allow for an internal
programmatic continuity and circulation between them and not making them into dead end vertical corridors.
The towers are utilizing Faslur Kahns idé of an X-brazing xsoskeletion first introduced in the John Hancock Center in Chicago. This allows for the
core of the tower to be completely free of structure and thereby providing the best lighting environment for the cultivation of crops and plants.
The towers are groped within bundles to buttress each other and therefor be able to be lighter and slimmer then otherwise possible. This forms
them into the type of bundled towers first produced by FOA in their WTC proposal. They do how ever not buttress each other directly. Instead the
apartment slabs are spanned between them as an infill structure in what would otherwise has been a void space in between them and thereby
also acts as the join the buttress.
The farm
Program
area
area sqm floor heigth Volume
Hydroponic or aeroponic farm area
4,5 hectares*
45 000
3
112 500
Nursery
300 m2 *
300
5
1 500
Monitoring facility
100 m2
100
4
400
Quality control room
50 m2
50
4
200
Laboratories (3)
150 m2
150
5
750
Workshop
100 m2
100
5
500
Mechanical/technical
2% of farming area
900
5
4 500
Offices for management
300 m2
300
4
1 200
Dressing rooms (2)
100 m2
100
4
400
Toilets
50 m2
50
4
200
Delivery dock (for receiving and shipping) 250 m2
250
6
1 500
Storage
500 m2
500
4
2 000
Parking
1% of farming space
450
3
1 350
Foyer with information area
200 m2
200
5
1 000
Education centre
300 m2
300
4
1 200
Coatroom
50 m2
50
3
150
Café
300 m2
300
5
1 500
Green market
1000 m2
1 000
6
6 000
Total area for the Vertical Farm
50 100
136 850
* The farm area is based dimensioned for 420 people each using 107 sqm of higly efficient farm land
Apartments
Program No of units Inhabitants Total inhabitants Area Total Area Floor Height Volume Volume per unit
1,5 room 32 1 32 45 1440 3,5 5040 158 2 room 50 2 100 55 2750 3,5 9625 193 3 room 34 3 102 70 2380 3,5 8330 245 4 room 26 3 78 90 2340 3,5 8190 315 5 room 24 4 96 110 2640 3,5 9240 385 6 room 4 3 12 125 500 3,5 1750 438 Appartments 170 420 12050 42175 Laundry 1 20 20 4 80 Storage 170 5 850 4 3400 Mechanical 1 500 500 4 2000 Parking 0,5 per/app. 85 12 1020 3 3060
Bicykle parking 2,2/app 374 1 374 3 1122
Recycling 5 15 75 3 225
Services 2839 9887
Värtahamnen in Stockholm Royal Seaport - scale 1:2000
0 25 50 cm 0 2,5 5 m 0 5 10 m 0 10 20 m skala 1:5 skala 1:50 0 2,5 m skala 1:25 skala 1:100 0 5 15 m skala 1:150 skala 1:200 0 20 40 m 0 25 50 m 0 50 100 m 0 100 200 m skala 1:400 0 40 80 m skala 1:800 0 24 40 m skala 1:800 skala 1:500 skala 1:1000 skala 1:2000 0 250 500 m 500 m skala 1:5000 0 1 km skala 1:10000Ground plan - scale 1:400
0 25 50 cm 0 2,5 5 m 0 5 10 m 0 10 20 m skala 1:5 skala 1:50 0 2,5 m skala 1:25 skala 1:100 0 5 15 m skala 1:150 skala 1:200 0 20 40 m 0 25 50 m 0 50 100 m 0 100 200 m skala 1:400 0 40 80 m skala 1:800 0 24 40 m skala 1:800 skala 1:500 skala 1:1000 skala 1:2000 0 250 500 m 500 m skala 1:5000 0 1 km skala 1:10000Park and Apartment plan - scale 1:400
0 25 50 cm 0 2,5 5 m 0 5 10 m 0 10 20 m skala 1:5 skala 1:50 0 2,5 m skala 1:25 skala 1:100 0 5 15 m skala 1:150 skala 1:200 0 20 40 m 0 25 50 m 0 50 100 m 0 100 200 m skala 1:400 0 40 80 m skala 1:800 0 24 40 m skala 1:800 skala 1:500 skala 1:1000 skala 1:2000 0 250 500 m 500 m skala 1:5000 0 1 km skala 1:10000Cross section - scale 1:200 0 25 50 cm 0 2,5 5 m 0 5 10 m 0 10 20 m skala 1:5 skala 1:50 0 2,5 m skala 1:25 skala 1:100 0 5 15 m skala 1:150 skala 1:200 0 20 40 m 0 25 50 m 0 50 100 m 0 100 200 m skala 1:400 0 40 80 m skala 1:800 0 24 40 m skala 1:800 skala 1:500 skala 1:1000 skala 1:2000 0 250 500 m 500 m skala 1:5000 0 1 km skala 1:10000
View from the North
From Solitaire to Clustered Bundle Towers
Solitaire / Extruded Block
Stacking
An evolution driven by breakthroughs in technology, urbanism and program
Super Tall Atrium
XX & Marriot Marquies John Portman
Bundled Tube Structure
Segram Building / Wills Tower, Chicago 1970 SOM - Fazlur Kahn
Steel Frame
Home Insurance Building, Chicago 1885 William Le Baron Jenny First steel frame building.... Steel frame with brick cladding, allowed for large plate-glass windows = the Chicago Win-dow
Vertical steel columns & horizontal I-beams
Skyscraper as classical column : Base - Column - Capital - Cornice
Wainright Building, Chicago 1891 Adler & Sullivan Emphasises on the vertical
Lake Shore Drive, Chicago 1951 Mies van Der Rohe “Fordism” in architecture: standardization, grids, series and endless repetition
Fordism : Rational mass production using prefabricated elements
Sky Lobby
Trussed Tube Structure (Exoskeleton)
John Hancock Center, Chicago 1965
Trussed Tube Structure, not as diagram-matic as it may appear with columns for gravity and diagonals for lateral forces, it is in fact a hybird.
Structural Expressionist Style First Sky lobby - elevator exchange fl oors
42nd st, New York - project 1994 Zaha Hadid Stacking not extrusion. “Vertical pile of interlocking blocks” Diff erentiation by juxtaposition No extrusion, repetition or hermetic curtain walling.
Ground and sky interface : “Dissolving”
Tour Sans Fins, Paris, 198? (project) Jean Nouvell
“The tower without ends”. The base is dark and recessed within a crater and becomes lighter and clearer as it approach the sky. “You don’t quite know where the cylinder begins and ends because it rises from an excavation and dissipates into the sky.”
The Miglin-Beitler Sky Needle, Chicago, 1990 César Pelli (Project)
Super tall structure utilising the idea a “mast” tied with outriggers to perimeter columns. Later realiset in the Peteronas Towers, Kuala Lumpur 1991-1997, Jin Mao Tower, Shang-hai, SOM and other supertall structures.
Eff ect: “Superfl at”
Hancock Place, Boston, 1968-76 I.M Pei
The consistent monolithic look fi rst envi-sioned by Mies in the Glass Skyscraper pro-jects fi nally realised: the start of the superfl at era.
Extrnal Cores with suspended slabs
Commerzbank Tower, Frankfurt 1991-97 Norman Foster
The “ecological” skyscraper. Modular arrangements in “villages” of inte-rior space”
Three external cores, slabs suspended in-between.
Max Reinhardt House, Berlin, 1992 (project) Peter Eisenman
Not an vertical dead end but allows for con-tinuous vertical and horizontal circulation.
Interconnected skyscraper complex / cluster
Togok Towers, Seoul - project 1996 OMA
“A new urban condition” The skyscraper as a solitary type: “It solves all its problems on its own. the contemporary city has be-come a collection of single separate buildings that are connected by streets but not really integrated with the city”
Cavities for Vortex suppression
7 South Dearborn, Chicago, 1998 Skidmore, Owing & Merrill Super tall structure that utilise notches to imped the formation and shedding of wind vortices. (Vortex formation and shedding are the principal cause of high-wind building vibrations.)
“Fordism” in architecture
Continious circulation
Diff erentiated stacking of interlocking blocks
Diff usion of mass Transition from horizontal to vertical extension
New York Times Building, New York, 2003 Renzo Piano
City Life Milano, Milano, 2004 Zaha Hadid Architects
56 Leonard St New York, 2008 Herzog & de Meuron
Sunrise tower, Kuala Lumpur, 2009, Zaha Hadid Architects Tour de Verre, New York, 2007
Atelier Jean Nouvel CCTW, Beijing, 2002
OMA
Museum Plaza, Louisville, Kentucky 2006 OMA/REX
Kowloon Terminus - 2009 Aedas - Andrew Broomberg Kowloon Station Tower - 2000-03
Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates
Diff usion off mass. Fluid and transition or horizontal extension
into vertical extension.
Bundle Towers
Bundle Tower - WTC proposal 2002(?) FOA
Buttress each other structurally No so deep plans A bundle tube with vertical variation
Setbacks
Massing studies, New York 1922 Hugh Ferris
In 1916 New York regulates building massing at certain heights in the Zoning Law resolution to stop massive buildings such as the Equitable Building that prevents light and air to reach the street. The zoning law was usually interpreted as a series of setbacks and gave rise to a new style w hich caught on throughout the world.
City within a City
Rockefeller Center, New York, 1930’ Raymond Hood The “City within a City”
the International Style glass skyscraper
Glass skyscraper, Fredrichstrasse, 1921 (project) Mies van der Rohe
Communicate an open, transparent and light fi lled space within.
The decorated object
Chrystler Building, New Yorik, 1928-30 William van Allen The building as a decorated object
Mast Structure - Super Tall buildings Framed Tube Structure
DeWitt - Chestnut, xx, 1961 Fazlur Kahn
Framed tube Structure ; “a three dimen-sional space structure composed of three, four, or possibly more frames, braced frames, or shear walls, joined at or near their edges to form a vertical tube-like structural system capable of resisting lat-eral forces in any direction by cantilever-ing from the foundation.”, Fazlur Kahn Lever Building, New York, 1950-52
SOM
Podium and tower Podium and tower clearly separated.
Segram Building, New York, 1954-58 Mies van Der Rohe Tower inset at plaza
Tower at plaza Emphasis on the ground interface
Ecological
THEAGENDASOFDIFFERENTIATION, INTERFACEANDNAVIGA
-TIONCOMBINETOARTICULATEANEWPARADIGMFORTHE DESIGNOFCOMPLEXTOWERSINURBANCONTEXTS. ON THISNEWBASISTHETOWERTYPOLOGYWILLRECEIVEANEW LEASEOFLIFEINTHECENTRALMETROPOLITANSOCIETIES,
WHERETHEDESIREFORCONNECTIVITY (RATHERTHANPURE QUANTITY) DRIVESURBANDENSITY. INTHEFUTURE, EVEN MORETHANISEVIDENTALREADYNOW, THISSUPER-DENSE BUILDUPWILLBEAMIXED-USEBUILDUP, WHEREMULTIPLE LIFE-PROCESSESINTERSECT. THESELIFE-PROCESSESNEEDTO BEORDEREDININTRICATEWAYSTHATNEVERTHELESSREMAIN LEGIBLE. MORETHANEVER, THETASKOFARCHITECTURAL DESIGNWILLBEABOUTTHETRANSPARENTARTICULATIONOF RELATIONSFORTHESAKEOFORIENTATIONANDCOMMUNICA
-TION. THEDIFFERENTIATION, INTERFACINGANDNAVIGATIONOF SPACESISSTATEDASACLEARAGENDATHATWILLREQUIREA SOPHISTICATED, VERSATILELANGUAGEOFARCHITECTURETOBE ARTICULATEDINALLITSFORMSANDCONTEXTS. PATRIK SCHUMACHER, LONDON 2006
“The skyscraper was born almost 150 years ago, when the elevator made it possible to have access to previously unimaginable levels of a building. Then steel made it possible to build higher and faster, electricity to illuminate deeper spaces and to inject conditioned air: engineers learned how to stabilize these tower-like structures. Over the past 150 years all these technologies have improved, but nothing has essentially changed.
The present generation of Asian skyscrapers only competes on the superfi cial level of height. It does not contribute anything more fundamental to the development of reinvention of the type. Because the Skyscraper is a solitary type – it solves all its problems on its own – the contemporary city has become a collection of single, separate buildings that are connected by streets but not really integrated with the city.
From a distance the skyscraper has a strong aura but its eff ect on the urban condition is usually negative: since most of its life takes place inside, it rarely con-tributes to the energy and intensifi cation of urban life. For almost 50 years now, the traditional solution for the encounter of skyscraper and city has been to place the tower on a plaza, but all over the world the emptiness of such spaces makes them an impoverished caricature of urban life. It is a solution that is no longer credible. Our ambition in this project is to imagine the ‘next’ skyscraper, both in a technical sense, and to create a skyscraper COMPLEX – a new urban condition for the 21st Century. The breakthrough this project represents, is the integration of several buildings into a larger whole. No longer soloists, the diff erent elements support each other in every sense: architecturally, they form an integrated complex; technically, issues of stability, access, circulation and servicing are organized collectively; urbanistically, the entire building becomes an urban quarter of a new kind. The combination of all these breakthroughs generates a quantum leap in quality. Instead of separation, the skyscraper complex creates continuity, variety and programmatic richness instead of repetition. For the city this arrangement means that the Skyscraper is not merely the imposition of a huge parasite, but that it now contributes to the reinvention of a new urban condition, a new way of receiving the public.” OMA 1996
At the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st we are at the brink of a great transition: real space and cyberspace coexist . Usually they are seen as each other’s opposites, almost enemies. The next skyscraper should celebrate that new condition and investigate if the coexistence of the real and the virtual can generate/sponsor a revolutionary new urban condition.
Precedents
Contemporary Designs
“THEWORLDSTALLESTBUILDINGREQUIRESANEWHIGH-RISETYPOLOGY. IFWELOOKATTHEEVOLUTIONOFTHE SKYSCRAPERTYPE, WECANSEEAPROCESSINWHICHTHEINCREASEINHEIGHTOFTHESTRUCTURERESULTINATEN
-DENCYOFTHEORGANIZATIONTOCONCENTRATETHESTRUCTURALSECTIONINTHEPERIPHERYOFTHEPLAN, ASTHE LATERALFORCESBECOMESTRONGERTHENTHEGRAVITATIONALONES… THISPROCESSHASEVOLVEDTHEPOSTAND BEAMTYPOLOGY, WHICHDISTRIBUTEDSTRUCTUREEVENLYACROSSTHEPLAN, INTODIFFERENTTYPESOFTUBULAR ORGANIZATIONS, CONCENTRATIONSTRUCTUREINTHEPERIPHERYOFTHEPLAN. ASTHESTRUCTUREGROWSTALLER,
THESTRENGTHOFTHEMATERIALSINSUFFICIENTTOPROVIDESTABILITYTOLATERALFORCES, SOTHEONLYSOLUTION ISTOKEEPINCREASINGTHEDEPTHOFTHEPLANPROPORTIONALLY. THISLEADSINTOBUILDINGTYPESTHATBECOME EXTREMELYDEEP, ANDTHEREFOREHEAVILYDEPENDENTONARTIFICIALLIGHTANDMECHANICALLYCONTROLLED VENTILATION. INORDERTOGENERATEANALTERNATIVETYPEOFHIGH-RISE, OURPROPOSALISTOOPERATEWITHTHE BUILDINGMASS, RATERTHANWITHJUSTTHEDISTRIBUTIONOFTHESTRUCTURE. OURPROPOSALISTOMAINTAINTHE PHYSICALCONTINUITYOFTHEWHOLEMASS, ANDTOUSEITASASTRUCTURALADVANTAGE, FORMINGTHECOMPLEX ASABUNDLEOFINTERCONNECTEDTOWERSTHATPROVIDEAFLEXIBLEFLOORSIZEANDTHATBUTTRESSEACHOTHER STRUCTURALLY. ASOURTARGETWASTOREACHAPPROXIMATELY 500MINHEIGHT, WENEEDED 100 FLOORSOF ACONVENTIONALFLOORTOFLOORHEIGHTOF 4.5M. THETOTALFLOORPLATEWASAIMEDTOMATCHTHESIZEOF THE TWIN TOWERSINSIXBUNDLEDTOWERSOFAPPROXIMATELY 1000 SQMPERFLOOR, THEAVERAGELEASEIN
View from the North
From Solitaire to Clustered Bundle Towers
Solitaire / Extruded Block
Stacking
An evolution driven by breakthroughs in technology, urbanism and program
Super Tall Atrium
XX & Marriot Marquies John Portman
Bundled Tube Structure
Segram Building / Wills Tower, Chicago 1970 SOM - Fazlur Kahn
Steel Frame
Home Insurance Building, Chicago 1885 William Le Baron Jenny First steel frame building.... Steel frame with brick cladding, allowed for large plate-glass windows = the Chicago Win-dow
Vertical steel columns & horizontal I-beams
Skyscraper as classical column : Base - Column - Capital - Cornice
Wainright Building, Chicago 1891 Adler & Sullivan Emphasises on the vertical
Lake Shore Drive, Chicago 1951 Mies van Der Rohe “Fordism” in architecture: standardization, grids, series and endless repetition
Fordism : Rational mass production using prefabricated elements
Sky Lobby
Trussed Tube Structure (Exoskeleton)
John Hancock Center, Chicago 1965
Trussed Tube Structure, not as diagram-matic as it may appear with columns for gravity and diagonals for lateral forces, it is in fact a hybird.
Structural Expressionist Style First Sky lobby - elevator exchange fl oors
42nd st, New York - project 1994 Zaha Hadid Stacking not extrusion. “Vertical pile of interlocking blocks” Diff erentiation by juxtaposition No extrusion, repetition or hermetic curtain walling.
Ground and sky interface : “Dissolving”
Tour Sans Fins, Paris, 198? (project) Jean Nouvell
“The tower without ends”. The base is dark and recessed within a crater and becomes lighter and clearer as it approach the sky. “You don’t quite know where the cylinder begins and ends because it rises from an excavation and dissipates into the sky.”
The Miglin-Beitler Sky Needle, Chicago, 1990 César Pelli (Project)
Super tall structure utilising the idea a “mast” tied with outriggers to perimeter columns. Later realiset in the Peteronas Towers, Kuala Lumpur 1991-1997, Jin Mao Tower, Shang-hai, SOM and other supertall structures.
Eff ect: “Superfl at”
Hancock Place, Boston, 1968-76 I.M Pei
The consistent monolithic look fi rst envi-sioned by Mies in the Glass Skyscraper pro-jects fi nally realised: the start of the superfl at era.
Extrnal Cores with suspended slabs
Commerzbank Tower, Frankfurt 1991-97 Norman Foster
The “ecological” skyscraper. Modular arrangements in “villages” of inte-rior space”
Three external cores, slabs suspended in-between.
Max Reinhardt House, Berlin, 1992 (project) Peter Eisenman
Not an vertical dead end but allows for con-tinuous vertical and horizontal circulation.
Interconnected skyscraper complex / cluster
Togok Towers, Seoul - project 1996 OMA
“A new urban condition” The skyscraper as a solitary type: “It solves all its problems on its own. the contemporary city has be-come a collection of single separate buildings that are connected by streets but not really integrated with the city”
Cavities for Vortex suppression
7 South Dearborn, Chicago, 1998 Skidmore, Owing & Merrill Super tall structure that utilise notches to imped the formation and shedding of wind vortices. (Vortex formation and shedding are the principal cause of high-wind building vibrations.)
“Fordism” in architecture
Continious circulation
Diff erentiated stacking of interlocking blocks
Diff usion of mass Transition from horizontal to vertical extension
New York Times Building, New York, 2003 Renzo Piano
City Life Milano, Milano, 2004 Zaha Hadid Architects
56 Leonard St New York, 2008 Herzog & de Meuron
Sunrise tower, Kuala Lumpur, 2009, Zaha Hadid Architects Tour de Verre, New York, 2007
Atelier Jean Nouvel CCTW, Beijing, 2002
OMA
Museum Plaza, Louisville, Kentucky 2006 OMA/REX
Kowloon Terminus - 2009 Aedas - Andrew Broomberg Kowloon Station Tower - 2000-03
Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates
Diff usion off mass. Fluid and transition or horizontal extension
into vertical extension.
Bundle Towers
Bundle Tower - WTC proposal 2002(?) FOA
Buttress each other structurally No so deep plans A bundle tube with vertical variation
Setbacks
Massing studies, New York 1922 Hugh Ferris
In 1916 New York regulates building massing at certain heights in the Zoning Law resolution to stop massive buildings such as the Equitable Building that prevents light and air to reach the street. The zoning law was usually interpreted as a series of setbacks and gave rise to a new style w hich caught on throughout the world.
City within a City
Rockefeller Center, New York, 1930’ Raymond Hood The “City within a City”
the International Style glass skyscraper
Glass skyscraper, Fredrichstrasse, 1921 (project) Mies van der Rohe
Communicate an open, transparent and light fi lled space within.
The decorated object
Chrystler Building, New Yorik, 1928-30 William van Allen The building as a decorated object
Mast Structure - Super Tall buildings Framed Tube Structure
DeWitt - Chestnut, xx, 1961 Fazlur Kahn
Framed tube Structure ; “a three dimen-sional space structure composed of three, four, or possibly more frames, braced frames, or shear walls, joined at or near their edges to form a vertical tube-like structural system capable of resisting lat-eral forces in any direction by cantilever-ing from the foundation.”, Fazlur Kahn Lever Building, New York, 1950-52
SOM
Podium and tower Podium and tower clearly separated.
Segram Building, New York, 1954-58 Mies van Der Rohe Tower inset at plaza
Tower at plaza Emphasis on the ground interface
Ecological
THEAGENDASOFDIFFERENTIATION, INTERFACEANDNAVIGA
-TIONCOMBINETOARTICULATEANEWPARADIGMFORTHE DESIGNOFCOMPLEXTOWERSINURBANCONTEXTS. ON THISNEWBASISTHETOWERTYPOLOGYWILLRECEIVEANEW LEASEOFLIFEINTHECENTRALMETROPOLITANSOCIETIES,
WHERETHEDESIREFORCONNECTIVITY (RATHERTHANPURE QUANTITY) DRIVESURBANDENSITY. INTHEFUTURE, EVEN MORETHANISEVIDENTALREADYNOW, THISSUPER-DENSE BUILDUPWILLBEAMIXED-USEBUILDUP, WHEREMULTIPLE LIFE-PROCESSESINTERSECT. THESELIFE-PROCESSESNEEDTO BEORDEREDININTRICATEWAYSTHATNEVERTHELESSREMAIN LEGIBLE. MORETHANEVER, THETASKOFARCHITECTURAL DESIGNWILLBEABOUTTHETRANSPARENTARTICULATIONOF RELATIONSFORTHESAKEOFORIENTATIONANDCOMMUNICA
-TION. THEDIFFERENTIATION, INTERFACINGANDNAVIGATIONOF SPACESISSTATEDASACLEARAGENDATHATWILLREQUIREA SOPHISTICATED, VERSATILELANGUAGEOFARCHITECTURETOBE ARTICULATEDINALLITSFORMSANDCONTEXTS. PATRIK SCHUMACHER, LONDON 2006
“The skyscraper was born almost 150 years ago, when the elevator made it possible to have access to previously unimaginable levels of a building. Then steel made it possible to build higher and faster, electricity to illuminate deeper spaces and to inject conditioned air: engineers learned how to stabilize these tower-like structures. Over the past 150 years all these technologies have improved, but nothing has essentially changed.
The present generation of Asian skyscrapers only competes on the superfi cial level of height. It does not contribute anything more fundamental to the development of reinvention of the type. Because the Skyscraper is a solitary type – it solves all its problems on its own – the contemporary city has become a collection of single, separate buildings that are connected by streets but not really integrated with the city.
From a distance the skyscraper has a strong aura but its eff ect on the urban condition is usually negative: since most of its life takes place inside, it rarely con-tributes to the energy and intensifi cation of urban life. For almost 50 years now, the traditional solution for the encounter of skyscraper and city has been to place the tower on a plaza, but all over the world the emptiness of such spaces makes them an impoverished caricature of urban life. It is a solution that is no longer credible. Our ambition in this project is to imagine the ‘next’ skyscraper, both in a technical sense, and to create a skyscraper COMPLEX – a new urban condition for the 21st Century. The breakthrough this project represents, is the integration of several buildings into a larger whole. No longer soloists, the diff erent elements support each other in every sense: architecturally, they form an integrated complex; technically, issues of stability, access, circulation and servicing are organized collectively; urbanistically, the entire building becomes an urban quarter of a new kind. The combination of all these breakthroughs generates a quantum leap in quality. Instead of separation, the skyscraper complex creates continuity, variety and programmatic richness instead of repetition. For the city this arrangement means that the Skyscraper is not merely the imposition of a huge parasite, but that it now contributes to the reinvention of a new urban condition, a new way of receiving the public.” OMA 1996
At the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st we are at the brink of a great transition: real space and cyberspace coexist . Usually they are seen as each other’s opposites, almost enemies. The next skyscraper should celebrate that new condition and investigate if the coexistence of the real and the virtual can generate/sponsor a revolutionary new urban condition.
Precedents
Contemporary Designs
“THEWORLDSTALLESTBUILDINGREQUIRESANEWHIGH-RISETYPOLOGY. IFWELOOKATTHEEVOLUTIONOFTHE SKYSCRAPERTYPE, WECANSEEAPROCESSINWHICHTHEINCREASEINHEIGHTOFTHESTRUCTURERESULTINATEN
-DENCYOFTHEORGANIZATIONTOCONCENTRATETHESTRUCTURALSECTIONINTHEPERIPHERYOFTHEPLAN, ASTHE LATERALFORCESBECOMESTRONGERTHENTHEGRAVITATIONALONES… THISPROCESSHASEVOLVEDTHEPOSTAND BEAMTYPOLOGY, WHICHDISTRIBUTEDSTRUCTUREEVENLYACROSSTHEPLAN, INTODIFFERENTTYPESOFTUBULAR ORGANIZATIONS, CONCENTRATIONSTRUCTUREINTHEPERIPHERYOFTHEPLAN. ASTHESTRUCTUREGROWSTALLER,
THESTRENGTHOFTHEMATERIALSINSUFFICIENTTOPROVIDESTABILITYTOLATERALFORCES, SOTHEONLYSOLUTION ISTOKEEPINCREASINGTHEDEPTHOFTHEPLANPROPORTIONALLY. THISLEADSINTOBUILDINGTYPESTHATBECOME EXTREMELYDEEP, ANDTHEREFOREHEAVILYDEPENDENTONARTIFICIALLIGHTANDMECHANICALLYCONTROLLED VENTILATION. INORDERTOGENERATEANALTERNATIVETYPEOFHIGH-RISE, OURPROPOSALISTOOPERATEWITHTHE BUILDINGMASS, RATERTHANWITHJUSTTHEDISTRIBUTIONOFTHESTRUCTURE. OURPROPOSALISTOMAINTAINTHE PHYSICALCONTINUITYOFTHEWHOLEMASS, ANDTOUSEITASASTRUCTURALADVANTAGE, FORMINGTHECOMPLEX ASABUNDLEOFINTERCONNECTEDTOWERSTHATPROVIDEAFLEXIBLEFLOORSIZEANDTHATBUTTRESSEACHOTHER STRUCTURALLY. ASOURTARGETWASTOREACHAPPROXIMATELY 500MINHEIGHT, WENEEDED 100 FLOORSOF ACONVENTIONALFLOORTOFLOORHEIGHTOF 4.5M. THETOTALFLOORPLATEWASAIMEDTOMATCHTHESIZEOF THE TWIN TOWERSINSIXBUNDLEDTOWERSOFAPPROXIMATELY 1000 SQMPERFLOOR, THEAVERAGELEASEIN
MANHATTAN.” – ALEJANDRO ZAERA-POLO
From Solitaire to Clustered Bundle Towers
Solitaire / Extruded Block
Stacking
An evolution driven by breakthroughs in technology, urbanism and program
Super Tall Atrium
XX & Marriot Marquies John Portman
Bundled Tube Structure
Segram Building / Wills Tower, Chicago 1970 SOM - Fazlur Kahn
Steel Frame
Home Insurance Building, Chicago 1885 William Le Baron Jenny First steel frame building.... Steel frame with brick cladding, allowed for large plate-glass windows = the Chicago Win-dow
Vertical steel columns & horizontal I-beams
Skyscraper as classical column : Base - Column - Capital - Cornice
Wainright Building, Chicago 1891 Adler & Sullivan Emphasises on the vertical
Lake Shore Drive, Chicago 1951 Mies van Der Rohe “Fordism” in architecture: standardization, grids, series and endless repetition
Fordism : Rational mass production using prefabricated elements
Sky Lobby
Trussed Tube Structure (Exoskeleton)
John Hancock Center, Chicago 1965
Trussed Tube Structure, not as diagram-matic as it may appear with columns for gravity and diagonals for lateral forces, it is in fact a hybird.
Structural Expressionist Style First Sky lobby - elevator exchange fl oors
42nd st, New York - project 1994 Zaha Hadid Stacking not extrusion. “Vertical pile of interlocking blocks” Diff erentiation by juxtaposition No extrusion, repetition or hermetic curtain walling.
Ground and sky interface : “Dissolving”
Tour Sans Fins, Paris, 198? (project) Jean Nouvell
“The tower without ends”. The base is dark and recessed within a crater and becomes lighter and clearer as it approach the sky. “You don’t quite know where the cylinder begins and ends because it rises from an excavation and dissipates into the sky.”
The Miglin-Beitler Sky Needle, Chicago, 1990 César Pelli (Project)
Super tall structure utilising the idea a “mast” tied with outriggers to perimeter columns. Later realiset in the Peteronas Towers, Kuala Lumpur 1991-1997, Jin Mao Tower, Shang-hai, SOM and other supertall structures.
Eff ect: “Superfl at”
Hancock Place, Boston, 1968-76 I.M Pei
The consistent monolithic look fi rst envi-sioned by Mies in the Glass Skyscraper pro-jects fi nally realised: the start of the superfl at era.
Extrnal Cores with suspended slabs
Commerzbank Tower, Frankfurt 1991-97 Norman Foster
The “ecological” skyscraper. Modular arrangements in “villages” of inte-rior space”
Three external cores, slabs suspended in-between.
Max Reinhardt House, Berlin, 1992 (project) Peter Eisenman
Not an vertical dead end but allows for con-tinuous vertical and horizontal circulation.
Interconnected skyscraper complex / cluster
Togok Towers, Seoul - project 1996 OMA
“A new urban condition” The skyscraper as a solitary type: “It solves all its problems on its own. the contemporary city has be-come a collection of single separate buildings that are connected by streets but not really integrated with the city”
Cavities for Vortex suppression
7 South Dearborn, Chicago, 1998 Skidmore, Owing & Merrill Super tall structure that utilise notches to imped the formation and shedding of wind vortices. (Vortex formation and shedding are the principal cause of high-wind building vibrations.)
“Fordism” in architecture
Continious circulation
Diff erentiated stacking of interlocking blocks
Diff usion of mass Transition from horizontal to vertical extension
New York Times Building, New York, 2003 Renzo Piano
City Life Milano, Milano, 2004 Zaha Hadid Architects
56 Leonard St New York, 2008 Herzog & de Meuron
Sunrise tower, Kuala Lumpur, 2009, Zaha Hadid Architects Tour de Verre, New York, 2007
Atelier Jean Nouvel CCTW, Beijing, 2002
OMA
Museum Plaza, Louisville, Kentucky 2006 OMA/REX
Kowloon Terminus - 2009 Aedas - Andrew Broomberg Kowloon Station Tower - 2000-03
Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates
Diff usion off mass. Fluid and transition or horizontal extension
into vertical extension.
Bundle Towers
Bundle Tower - WTC proposal 2002(?) FOA
Buttress each other structurally No so deep plans A bundle tube with vertical variation
Setbacks
Massing studies, New York 1922 Hugh Ferris
In 1916 New York regulates building massing at certain heights in the Zoning Law resolution to stop massive buildings such as the Equitable Building that prevents light and air to reach the street. The zoning law was usually interpreted as a series of setbacks and gave rise to a new style w hich caught on throughout the world.
City within a City
Rockefeller Center, New York, 1930’ Raymond Hood The “City within a City”
the International Style glass skyscraper
Glass skyscraper, Fredrichstrasse, 1921 (project) Mies van der Rohe
Communicate an open, transparent and light fi lled space within.
The decorated object
Chrystler Building, New Yorik, 1928-30 William van Allen The building as a decorated object
Mast Structure - Super Tall buildings Framed Tube Structure
DeWitt - Chestnut, xx, 1961 Fazlur Kahn
Framed tube Structure ; “a three dimen-sional space structure composed of three, four, or possibly more frames, braced frames, or shear walls, joined at or near their edges to form a vertical tube-like structural system capable of resisting lat-eral forces in any direction by cantilever-ing from the foundation.”, Fazlur Kahn Lever Building, New York, 1950-52
SOM
Podium and tower Podium and tower clearly separated.
Segram Building, New York, 1954-58 Mies van Der Rohe Tower inset at plaza
Tower at plaza Emphasis on the ground interface
Ecological
THEAGENDASOFDIFFERENTIATION, INTERFACEANDNAVIGA
-TIONCOMBINETOARTICULATEANEWPARADIGMFORTHE DESIGNOFCOMPLEXTOWERSINURBANCONTEXTS. ON THISNEWBASISTHETOWERTYPOLOGYWILLRECEIVEANEW LEASEOFLIFEINTHECENTRALMETROPOLITANSOCIETIES,
WHERETHEDESIREFORCONNECTIVITY (RATHERTHANPURE QUANTITY) DRIVESURBANDENSITY. INTHEFUTURE, EVEN MORETHANISEVIDENTALREADYNOW, THISSUPER-DENSE BUILDUPWILLBEAMIXED-USEBUILDUP, WHEREMULTIPLE LIFE-PROCESSESINTERSECT. THESELIFE-PROCESSESNEEDTO BEORDEREDININTRICATEWAYSTHATNEVERTHELESSREMAIN LEGIBLE. MORETHANEVER, THETASKOFARCHITECTURAL DESIGNWILLBEABOUTTHETRANSPARENTARTICULATIONOF RELATIONSFORTHESAKEOFORIENTATIONANDCOMMUNICA
-TION. THEDIFFERENTIATION, INTERFACINGANDNAVIGATIONOF SPACESISSTATEDASACLEARAGENDATHATWILLREQUIREA SOPHISTICATED, VERSATILELANGUAGEOFARCHITECTURETOBE ARTICULATEDINALLITSFORMSANDCONTEXTS. PATRIK SCHUMACHER, LONDON 2006
“The skyscraper was born almost 150 years ago, when the elevator made it possible to have access to previously unimaginable levels of a building. Then steel made it possible to build higher and faster, electricity to illuminate deeper spaces and to inject conditioned air: engineers learned how to stabilize these tower-like structures. Over the past 150 years all these technologies have improved, but nothing has essentially changed.
The present generation of Asian skyscrapers only competes on the superfi cial level of height. It does not contribute anything more fundamental to the development of reinvention of the type. Because the Skyscraper is a solitary type – it solves all its problems on its own – the contemporary city has become a collection of single, separate buildings that are connected by streets but not really integrated with the city.
From a distance the skyscraper has a strong aura but its eff ect on the urban condition is usually negative: since most of its life takes place inside, it rarely con-tributes to the energy and intensifi cation of urban life. For almost 50 years now, the traditional solution for the encounter of skyscraper and city has been to place the tower on a plaza, but all over the world the emptiness of such spaces makes them an impoverished caricature of urban life. It is a solution that is no longer credible. Our ambition in this project is to imagine the ‘next’ skyscraper, both in a technical sense, and to create a skyscraper COMPLEX – a new urban condition for the 21st Century. The breakthrough this project represents, is the integration of several buildings into a larger whole. No longer soloists, the diff erent elements support each other in every sense: architecturally, they form an integrated complex; technically, issues of stability, access, circulation and servicing are organized collectively; urbanistically, the entire building becomes an urban quarter of a new kind. The combination of all these breakthroughs generates a quantum leap in quality. Instead of separation, the skyscraper complex creates continuity, variety and programmatic richness instead of repetition. For the city this arrangement means that the Skyscraper is not merely the imposition of a huge parasite, but that it now contributes to the reinvention of a new urban condition, a new way of receiving the public.” OMA 1996
At the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st we are at the brink of a great transition: real space and cyberspace coexist . Usually they are seen as each other’s opposites, almost enemies. The next skyscraper should celebrate that new condition and investigate if the coexistence of the real and the virtual can generate/sponsor a revolutionary new urban condition.
Precedents
Contemporary Designs
“THEWORLDSTALLESTBUILDINGREQUIRESANEWHIGH-RISETYPOLOGY. IFWELOOKATTHEEVOLUTIONOFTHE SKYSCRAPERTYPE, WECANSEEAPROCESSINWHICHTHEINCREASEINHEIGHTOFTHESTRUCTURERESULTINATEN
-DENCYOFTHEORGANIZATIONTOCONCENTRATETHESTRUCTURALSECTIONINTHEPERIPHERYOFTHEPLAN, ASTHE LATERALFORCESBECOMESTRONGERTHENTHEGRAVITATIONALONES… THISPROCESSHASEVOLVEDTHEPOSTAND BEAMTYPOLOGY, WHICHDISTRIBUTEDSTRUCTUREEVENLYACROSSTHEPLAN, INTODIFFERENTTYPESOFTUBULAR ORGANIZATIONS, CONCENTRATIONSTRUCTUREINTHEPERIPHERYOFTHEPLAN. ASTHESTRUCTUREGROWSTALLER,
THESTRENGTHOFTHEMATERIALSINSUFFICIENTTOPROVIDESTABILITYTOLATERALFORCES, SOTHEONLYSOLUTION ISTOKEEPINCREASINGTHEDEPTHOFTHEPLANPROPORTIONALLY. THISLEADSINTOBUILDINGTYPESTHATBECOME EXTREMELYDEEP, ANDTHEREFOREHEAVILYDEPENDENTONARTIFICIALLIGHTANDMECHANICALLYCONTROLLED VENTILATION. INORDERTOGENERATEANALTERNATIVETYPEOFHIGH-RISE, OURPROPOSALISTOOPERATEWITHTHE BUILDINGMASS, RATERTHANWITHJUSTTHEDISTRIBUTIONOFTHESTRUCTURE. OURPROPOSALISTOMAINTAINTHE PHYSICALCONTINUITYOFTHEWHOLEMASS, ANDTOUSEITASASTRUCTURALADVANTAGE, FORMINGTHECOMPLEX ASABUNDLEOFINTERCONNECTEDTOWERSTHATPROVIDEAFLEXIBLEFLOORSIZEANDTHATBUTTRESSEACHOTHER STRUCTURALLY. ASOURTARGETWASTOREACHAPPROXIMATELY 500MINHEIGHT, WENEEDED 100 FLOORSOF ACONVENTIONALFLOORTOFLOORHEIGHTOF 4.5M. THETOTALFLOORPLATEWASAIMEDTOMATCHTHESIZEOF THE TWIN TOWERSINSIXBUNDLEDTOWERSOFAPPROXIMATELY 1000 SQMPERFLOOR, THEAVERAGELEASEIN
MANHATTAN.” – ALEJANDRO ZAERA-POLO
Conceptual model based inspired by Xylem
Inspiration for a new breath : Interrelationships, packing and mutual deformation
Natural Packing in Xylem
Horisontal cut thru Xylem*
*Xylem is one of two types of transport and mechanically supportive tissue in vascular plants. Its basic function is to transport water, but it also transports some nutrients through the plant.
Vertical cut thru part of Xylem*
Adjacent cells deforms each other depending on size, equal size causes greatest deformation
Fields of different density
Vessels of vascular cells Porous areas of poche
Strong verticality Bulk of cells squezed in
between vessels Voids in the poche
Straight and bent lineworks emerge from cell deformation Gradient transitions from
large cells to small
Oval boundaries between areas with different density
The exception to the deformation rule
Structural poche Natural Packing in Xylem
Horisontal cut thru Xylem*
*Xylem is one of two types of transport and mechanically supportive tissue in vascular plants. Its basic function is to transport water, but it also transports some nutrients through the plant.
Vertical cut thru part of Xylem*
Adjacent cells deforms each other depending on size, equal size causes greatest deformation
Fields of different density
Vessels of vascular cells Porous areas of poche
Strong verticality Bulk of cells squezed in
between vessels Voids in the poche
Straight and bent lineworks emerge from cell deformation Gradient transitions from
large cells to small
Oval boundaries between areas with different density
The exception to the deformation rule
Structural poche