My Idol In Architecture Nowdays

Norman Foster was born in Manchester in 1935. After graduating from Manchester University School of Architecture and City Planning in 1961 he won a Henry Fellowship to Yale University, where he gained a Master’s Degree in Architecture.

He is the founder and chairman of Foster + Partners. Founded in London in 1967, it is now a worldwide practice, with project offices in more than twenty countries. Over the past four decades the company has been responsible for a strikingly wide range of work, from urban masterplans, public infrastructure, airports, civic and cultural buildings, offices and workplaces to private houses and product design. Since its inception, the practice has received 470 awards and citations for excellence and has won more than 86 international and national competitions

Current and recent work includes the largest single building on the planet, Beijing Airport, the redevelopment of Dresden Railway Station, Millau Viaduct in France, the Swiss Re tower and the Great Court at the British Museum in London, an entire University Campus for Petronas in Malaysia, the Hearst Headquarters tower in New York, Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington and research centres at Stanford University, California. He became the 21st Pritzker Architecture Prize Laureate in 1999 and was awarded the Praemium Imperiale Award for Architecture in 2002. He has been awarded the American Institute of Architects Gold Medal for Architecture (1994), the Royal Gold Medal for Architecture (1983), and the Gold Medal of the French Academy of Architecture (1991). In 1990 he was granted a Knighthood in the Queen’s Birthday Honours, and in 1999 was honoured with a Life Peerage, becoming Lord Foster of Thames Bank.

Todays, author Deyan Sudjic has write the biography about Foster anf full of his co-peration.

You can check it here:http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/may/23/norman-foster-biography-book-review

Architecture in Malaysia

SUNRISE TOWER

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
2009

Render © Zaha Hadid Architects

PROGRAM:
Mixed-use tower: Offices, Commercial, Hotel and Residential (competition)

CLIENT:
Sunrise Berhad

AREA:
Gross Floor Area 150000 m²
Site Area 6800 m²
Footprint Area 2800 m²

CONCEPT:
Zaha Hadid Architects’ design for Sunrise Tower engages with the city in multiple ways. By exploring potential synergies at different levels and anchoring itself to the existing urban fabric, it creates a platform of services that engage with neighbouring developments, sustaining critical mass and a sense of community. The scheme merges all programmes into one building, distancing itself from the traditional tower and podium typology. Through a detailed landscape strategy the design interweaves tower and ground, extending and connecting the different parts of the site, integrating the new pedestrian routes and internal road system, structuring the fabric of the new development.

The design houses 5 different programmatic components: residential, hotel, offices, retail and parking. Connectivity between these parts becomes central to the project in order to produce an articulated design that encompasses both the scale and the different qualities of each of the parts, fusing them into a coherent scheme. The program is stratified, stacking one function over the other, or carrying them in parallel when the tower branches. Programmatic synergies are created by blending certain programmatic aspects that are common to create powerful spaces that not only differentiate between programs but also enable a system that separates public from private, yet integrating the necessary security features to organize a seamless transition between environments. The design concept creates spaces that blur the difference between building and landscape, intensifying the fluidity between interior and exterior. The tower body is developed through a performative outer skin that merges programmatic, structural and building envelope requirements. A spatial grid is generated through parametric component design, enabling the local adaptation of each component to accommodate for different requirements within a pool of repeated elements. Components variation is choreographed through the floor grid with a rhythm that is defined by topology, orientation, programme and structural load, generating a customized gradient that mutates from strong diagonals at the base to gentle verticals at the top.

The programmatic parameter also develops a grid of occupation, a modular system for hotel rooms and residential apartments. Because this grid is integral to the buildings topology and structure, tube-in-tube system, the partitioning system becomes interchangeable, constructing a flexible landscape to be tailored to the client’s requirements, capable of assimilating changes in short, medium and long terms. The created pattern is supported through the structural frame elements, carrying the building’s façade and generating interesting elegant views through the tower. Its design concept integrates natural light, shading, program, access and views, making the component the key operator of the transition between interior and exterior spaces.

The building is designed through a series of independent flows that map the tower and organize different routes for different programmes. Along these routes the lobby and shared facilities floors work as communication hubs, like intersections that enable flexible itineraries and changes between uses. Similarly to the skin, the circulation materializes as a multi dimensional spatial grid, inclusive of the program, treating interior and exterior in a seamless way, thus maximizing the clarity of the scheme and the perception of the different levels. The design of a clear navigation system for lobbies, atria and common areas, enables visual communication as well as access through the cores, ensuring fully accessible environment for all users. The building’s complex programme is distributed through 66 floors in total, 4 bellow ground and 62 above ground, with an absolute height of 280m. The ground lobby is the primary hub of the tower, defining 4 different dedicated lobbies for residential, hotel, offices and general public.

RENDERS:

Render © Zaha Hadid Architects

Render © Zaha Hadid Architects

Render © Zaha Hadid Architects

ARCHITECT:
ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS
DESIGN: Zaha Hadid with Patrik Schumacher
PROJECT DIRECTOR: Tiago Correia
PROJECT ARCHITECTS: Victor Orive, Fabiano Continanza
PROJECT TEAM: Alejandro Diaz, Rafael Gonzalez, Monica Noguero, Oihane Santiuste, Maren Klasing, Martin Krcha, Daniel Domingo

CONSULTANTS:
ENGINEERING: Buro Happold
LOCAL ARCHITECT: Veritas Design Group
QS/COST: JUBM

P/s: i think this building is really2 great...impressive