Influential Factors on Architectural Designs - Coursework Example

INFLUENTIAL FACTORS ON ARCHITECTURAL DESIGNS affiliate: Influential factors Over the past decade, there has been a trend of marvelous structures and building being raised in different parts of the word. The modernly structures are because of dedicated architects and their teams who work day and night to achieve such magnificent structures. The architects behind the designing and development of such structures are influenced by numerous factors that include ideology, cultural, environment, global and national among others. This volume intends to analyze and discus the motivation behind the construction of different iconic structures and building that have been completed over the last five years. This paper will focus on the Burj Dubai project among others as a sample to analyze architectural motivation. High-rise social structures will be given more focus in this paper to give a deeper insight. The Burj Project The Burj project comprise of a multiuse development high-rise building that lies beneath a floor of a total area of 460000 square meters; this includes residential homes, commercial stores, shopping malls, parking facilities, entertainment joints among other social gathering places (Baker, 2004). This project is that was commenced in 2004 was completed in 2010 when its door were officially opened on the forth of January the same year. The structure was specifically designed by architects to be a centerpiece in the overall large-scale project in Dubai. The Burj project is the tallest structure humankind has ever constructed; the tower is of a height of 700 meters above the ground with an upward of 600 floors (Baker, Korista, & Novak, 2007). To build a building that outdoes all the previous height records a team of more than 90 designers and engineers along with combination of innovative technology joined hands to create a cultural influenced global icon that serves as an example for a future urban center. While the buildings’ height may be the most likely attribute that parts the structure from others, the interior and architectural design remain unparalleled (Abdelrazaq, 2011). The architects of this magnificent structure gives the interior of the building a very prestigious setting. The building is designed in such a way that it hosts a state of the art technology that computerizes almost all the aspects of the building (Christensen & Hansen, 2011). The move is motivated by the architects’ interest to make technological achievements along with an attempt to inject modernization as the world is closing in to the future. The high-rise structure poses the perception of the city of the future. As the tallest standing structure constructed by man in the world, the Burj Khalifa project interiors’ highest floor borrow from celestial influences where the architect in influence by the view of a stationary spacecraft. The celestial influence consequently make him to design the upper part of the structure like a spacecraft ready for takeoff; this is in contrast to the lower section of the building which reflect an architectural design that is motivated by the natural elements of the region within which the structure is constructed. The high-rise building utilizes three “wing” elements that are arranged a core that is central to the whole building. As the building escalates from the desert base that is flat, some setbacks are made at the final bay of each wing in a vertical spiraling outline, reducing the weight of the structure as it approaches the sky. This elegant and iconic form of the design by the architecture attracts a new focus to the region, creating a life-long symbol and acting as a catalyst to hasten the future development of the city (Poulos, 2008). The tower employs a high performance cladding system in the exterior to withstand extreme conditions during the months of summer. These months are characterized by extremely high temperatures in Dubai. The primary exterior cladding materials comprise of high reflective glazing textured stainless spandrel panels of steel, steel tabular vertical stainless steel fins. The aluminum seems to be accentuate the slenderness and height of the tower; the architect at this point is motivated by the need to present a perception technical spacecraft or rocket ready for take-off influenced by celestial factors. However, the architect borrows the actual design of the tower from the geometrics of a desert flower that is an indigenous plant to the particular region. The designer further sources cultural influence when he designs the patterning systems of the structure embodied in Islamic architecture (Durdik, 2011). The structure’s lateral load resisting system comprise of reinforced ductile cores of concrete walls joined to the inner reinforced columns of concrete through a collection of shear wall panels of concrete that are reinforced at mechanical level. The walls of the core vary in the size of thickness ranging from 1300mm to 500mm; these ways are typically connected along deep reinforced concrete of a thicken ranging from 800mm to 1100 and if not composite links beams at each level. Due to depth limitation of the link beam, malleable composite link beams have to be supplied in particular locations of the system of the core wall. The composite malleable link beams characteristically comprise of sheer plates of steel, or structural steel built-up beams that are I-shaped, with shear studs that are entrenched in the section of concrete. The width of the link beam characteristically matches the thickness of the adjacent core wall. A very tall spire tops the structure at the top of the central reinforced core wall. The integration makes the structure the tallest tower of all categories in the world. As the architect decided on the height of the tower, he is motivated by social factors to show progress and advancement of the city within which the magnificent structure lies. The system that supports the foundation of the tower is laid on a high performance thick and reinforced wall of the thickness of 3700mm pile supplemented raft at -7.55DMD. Self-compacting high performance concrete is used by the raft foundation positioned over a blinding slab of 100mm over a waterproofing membrane above at least a binding slab of 50mm.All bottom foundation is kept under the protection of a waterproofing membrane. Another social factor that dictates the course architects will follow is still related with increase in population density. It stands with logic that as cities become denser with increase in pedestrian movement the two-dimensional platform of the particular city reaches an elastic limit, beyond which the state and order of the city become chaotic. Which increased human automobile and human traffic a need arises for designers to come up with structures that can address this limitation; this is because failure to address that situation implies that the growth of the city is made to go to a standstill. Such situations influence the designers to come up with structures that can be incorporated in the cities to act as supplementary layers and systems such as underground rails, high-rise parking lots that can inevitably guarantee freedom of movement by the general populace. In the spirit of minimizing costs and the economic use land, architects had concentrated more on 3D structure in the recent past to maximize the productive use of both the vertical and horizontal spaces available. It quench the growing need for places to carry out commercial activities, social gatherings, restaurant, and joint, entertainment among other social amenities that are necessary in this era of increased and extreme constant human contact. Designers design buildings that host a wide variety of human activities. A recent trend show that more of the architects’ focus is pointed towards multilayered cities, by this the designers merge symbolic structures of a country or a city as well as addressing the implications of inflated land prices and economically justified use of land. Practicing designers also source a lot of motivation from the ideology of modernization; this can be noted from the recent trend of development of 3D layered buildings in which horizontal and vertical urban forms combine to form a vibrant view of the new urban form. This is the image of the architecture of the future. Designers and urban architects consequently are forced to view the construction of a high-rise building as a continuous phase of continued research, experimentation , and phase of transition and not as their building artistic quality and near perfected artifacts in a city (Tushman, Smith, Wood, Westerman, & O'Reilly, 2010). The absolute towers The absolute towers located in Mississauga close to Toronto popularly known as Marilyn Monroe because of their magnificent curves are because of Architectural motivation sourced from nature. A series of balconies provide the residents with and extended living space with very extensive views. The architect in a bid to promote a sense of community contained in the microcosms of the different levels of the stories. The sense of motion and mobility is underscored on a macro level on the way particular floors of different stories appear to rotate skywards (Chopin & Kudrolli, 2011). The structures’ complex is aimed at awakening the urban dwellers a longing for nature, wind and the sun. At the same time, it intends to give the formally faceless city, with its box-like uniform high-rises, with a landmark that is new; this gives the city its own identity. Each of the two high-rise buildings has an upward of 400 apartments with a series of continuous balconies in the over 50 and 56 storey’s of the towers. The structure’s lively design uses a simple structural organization; the length of the particular grid-like supporting walls is adapted to the respective footprint, which in turn is altered due to the structures rotation (Longcore et al., 2013). The rooms in summer are provided with shade by projected concrete slabs extended from the balconies. These slabs absorb the sun’s warmth during winter and consequently the architects achieve minimum costs of air conditioning expenses of air conditioning. The architects of this structure are to great extent influenced by the need to give the city praise worthy appearance and setting. The Pinnacle@Duxton Another example and show of architectural influence of the construction and building industry is the Pinnacle@Duxton. This project comprise of a residential complex of a 50-storey high-rise tower. The particular architects of this structure were fired by the need to close quarters living in towers at the same time highlighting means of transforming community housing to a self-sufficient form of architecture. The designer is motivated by the necessity and need to show that high-rise towers centered in any city can still provide high living standards as well as utilizing the vast free space typically drawn out from the sky. The residential complex includes seven discoid high-rise buildings with an upward of 1848 living units of which are in an open, comfortable style that forms a sweeping general shape. The seven skyscrapers of the elegant complex are linked by way of continuous roof gardens an area close to a total of one-hectare hosts 12 roof gardens that are laid out as lounges, lawns, sports facilities and beaches. There are also shops, an educational center, two residential centers around the development, a restaurant are and a kindergarten. The architects of this complex were influenced but the factor of social equality, by designing a structure that could not only host well up families but also ordinary family units. In this complex design, ordinary families of moderate incomes can afford to live within the city in the generous free space. The Troika Architects and designers in their works are influenced by the factor of identity. In the design of the luxurious complex in London, The troika located nears the KLCC in downtown Kuala Lumpur designed by Roberto Burle Max who is a landscape architect. Hosting 50, 44 and 38 stories respectively the tree residential high-rise buildings are the tallest residential complex there is in Malaysia. The interlinked towers provide a view over the park, PETRONAS, and the city; they have been aligned in such an outlay that provides a shady interior courtyard, which provides a cool retreat spot for the residents in the humid and hot climate of Malaysia. The complex comprise of shops, offices and cafes. The complex if further reinforced and supported with an innovative structure built of sliding walls commonly known as shear walls. When the towers are linked by sky bridges on the 24th floor, they form a sky lobby from which a very spectacular view of the city and a rapidly changing skyline. The architects of the Troika design took account and considerations of sustainability and criteria in terms of material choice, energy needed for operation and construction (Douglas, 2006). The designers of this complex concluded such an artistic structure based on the motivation and spirit of promoting a strong sense of identity. Such structures commonly strive to put a show of pride in and loyalty in ones country while at the same time showing political stability. Architect Argument At the beginning of the century construction using concrete was at its infancy. Very few architects dreamt of designing such tall build as discussed above using concrete. The architectural design and its successful implementation in the construction of marvelous architectural structures such as the Burj Dubai project reflects the impact and influence impacted to architects due to factors like advance in technology ,structural theories of engineering ,construction methods and computer technology among others. The most and vital issue is how the change in ideologies and the new wave of people wanting to invent the future has had tremendous influence of architects and their designs. Architects all over the world have been hit by a wave of technological advancement that have rippled through all architectural firms; this with respect to the compounding issue of increase in population density as the more numbers demanding more settling space have had an impact in the architectural designs. The situation has deemed it necessary for practicing designers to focus more on the dimension of structures, to meet the rising special and settling demands of the rapidly growing population. Based on the influence of the social special requirements, designers have majored lately in the construction of high-rise structures to serve the public in their numerous social activities. A shift coupled with global population explosion has greatly motivated and had a lot to do with the final designs that architects present for implementation. The shift has resulted to unprecedented heights of transmigration in a globalized setting of the world leading to physical and social economic impacts. It is arguably true that this phenomenon influence the architectural future forms comprising complex architectural designs of buildings that are oriented more to show high social standards in line with globalization elements. Unlike the beginning of the century marvelous sky scuppers built of concrete seemed like a thing of the distant future. The analysis of the factors and influence that motivated the architect of the structures the paper has discussed is a clear demonstration; the works of the contemporary architects of this century is influenced by a series of related factors ranging from necessity, egoistic reasons to political reasons as in the case of creating an identity. The best example of a project stocked with various forms of influence is the Burj Khalifa project, which in it a tower is built that borrows its geometrical designs from the desert flower and utilizes Islamic architectural culture in the construction of almost the whole of the exterior design. Culture is another factor that has been deeply implemented is almost case scenarios; these shows that the issue of culture is of vital concern when it comes to influence in the kind of design an architect will settle on. It therefore can be concluded with certainty that the architectural structures we see in our current world are a combination of progressive influential factors that influence the designs of the designers. Every design or plan an architect designs and presents for implementation is as a result of a particular influential factor. References Abdelrazaq, A. (2011). Validating the dynamics of the Burj Khalifa. CTBUH Journal, 18–23. Baker, W. F. (2004). The World’s Tallest Building, Burj Dubai, U.A.E. In CTBUH Conference (pp. 1168–1169). Baker, W. F., Korista, D. S., & Novak, L. C. (2007). Burj Dubai: Engineering the world’s tallest building. Structural Design of Tall and Special Buildings, 16, 361–375. doi:10.1002/tal.418 Chopin, J., & Kudrolli, A. (2011). Building designed granular towers one drop at a time. Physical Review Letters, 107. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.107.208304 Christensen, H. B., & Hansen, K. M. (2011). Towards architectural information in implementation: NIER track. 2011 33rd International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE), 928–931. doi:10.1145/1985793.1985948 Douglas, J. (2006). Building Adaptation. Building Adaptation (pp. 251–295). doi:10.1016/B978-075066667-1/50011-5 Durdik, Z. (2011). Towards a process for architectural modelling in agile software development. In Proceedings of the joint ACM SIGSOFT conference -- QoSA and ACM SIGSOFT symposium -- ISARCS on Quality of software architectures -- QoSA and architecting critical systems -- ISARCS - QoSA-ISARCS ’11 (p. 183). doi:10.1145/2000259.2000291 Longcore, T., Rich, C., Mineau, P., MacDonald, B., Bert, D. G., Sullivan, L. M., … Drake, D. (2013). Avian mortality at communication towers in the United States and Canada: Which species, how many, and where? Biological Conservation, 158, 410–419. doi:10.1016/j.biocon.2012.09.019 Poulos, H. G. (2008). FOUNDATION DESIGN FOR THE BURJ DUBAI – THE WORLD ’ S TALLEST BUILDING. Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering, 1, 1–16. doi:10.1139/t05-004 Tushman, M., Smith, W. K., Wood, R. C., Westerman, G., & O'Reilly, C. (2010). Organizational designs and innovation streams. Industrial and Corporate Change, 19, 1331–1366. doi:10.1093/icc/dtq040  Read More