Jensonb wrote:darwin_dali wrote:gilles27 wrote:Building anything in Britain is a nightmare. Planning laws and short-sighted conservatism on the part of local councils have sounded the death knell for some fantastic projects in the UK. So many British architects have to move abroad to get their work recognised as so little innovation is permitted in British projects
Really?
You're surely not arguing that that...thing is great architecture?
I cited this one in response to your claim that there's little innovation permitted.
See also:
The building uses energy-saving methods which allow it to use half the power a similar tower would typically consume. Gaps in each floor create six shafts that serve as a natural ventilation system for the entire building even though required firebreaks on every sixth floor interrupt the "chimney." The shafts create a giant double glazing effect; air is sandwiched between two layers of glazing and insulates the office space inside.
Architects limit double glazing in residential houses to avoid the inefficient convection of heat, but the Swiss Re tower exploits this effect. The shafts pull warm air out of the building during the summer and warm the building in the winter using passive solar heating. The shafts also allow sunlight to pass through the building, making the work environment more pleasing, and keeping the lighting costs down.
The primary methods for controlling wind-excited sways are to increase the stiffness, or increase damping with tuned/active mass dampers. To a design by Arup, Swiss Re's fully triangulated perimeter structure makes the building sufficiently stiff without any extra reinforcements.
Despite its overall curved glass shape, there is only one piece of curved glass on the building — the lens-shaped cap at the very top.
- By hass25