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Honorable Mention
2011 Skyscraper Competition

Asaf Dali
United States

As a result of the recent deteriorating economy and rising unemployment, homelessness is among the most pressing issues faced by US cities. Following the housing market crash, “tent cities” (makeshift shelters set up by people who have lost their homes) have been popping up all over the country. It is a time where the poverty rate is at a record high, and in many cities unemployment is in double-digits.

This project proposes a transient solution to accommodate growing numbers of citizens who have lost their houses to foreclosure. The main idea is to create an environment that will provide a stable ground during the search for a steady income and a permanent home. Read the rest of this entry »

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Honorable Mention
2011 Skyscraper Competition

Yiqing Jiang, Ying Tao
China and United States

This project examines the idea of developing a vertical park and farm between skyscrapers in Shanghai, China. Over the last 20 year Shanghai has exponentially grown due to the massive migration from rural to urban China. This has lead to the development of hundreds of skyscrapers that today define the city’s skyline. Unfortunately, the number of public parks and recreational areas have not increased and the city is now a large block of concrete and glass.

This project uses the structure of three contiguous skyscrapers to attach a vertical park that will serve as prototype for the city. The new park would provide a recreational green space to the office towers and a new lung to the city. In addition, the park is equipped with wind turbines and photovoltaic cells for wind and solar energy harvesting. Read the rest of this entry »

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Honorable Mention
2011 Skyscraper Competition

Mekano
Osama Mohamed Elghannam, Karim Mohamed Elnabawy, Mohamed Ahmed Khamis, Nesma Mohamed Abobakr
Egypt

The city of Cairo, in Egypt, has become one of the most polluted cities worldwide. The idea behind this proposal is to recycle the city’s waste and use it as building material for large-scale development that could eventually become a city in itself.

The project is composed of an exoskeleton where different types of living and working units could be plugged-in. Each unit is designed with a specific program in mind – from small ones for single families to large ones for recreational areas such as parks and sports facilities. Hundreds of terraces are used for agriculture and rainwater collection, while specific sites are used to bury organic waste and produce biogas, electricity, and fertilizers. Read the rest of this entry »

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Honorable Mention
2011 Skyscraper Competition

Anna-Maria Simatou, Marianthe Dendrou
Greece

The Living Mountain is a city-like skyscraper for one of the Earth’s harshest environments: the desert. Fertile land is gradually being transformed into deserts due to global warming. This project is located in one of those regions, the desert of Taklamakan, in the northwestern region of China.

This high-rise conglomerate, in conjunction with man-made lakes, could gradually transform the desert into a habitable environment. The Living Mountain would extract water from the regions substrate and through its smart use, treatment, circulation, and controlled evaporation, could create a microclimate inside the structure.

The housing areas are envisioned as “living pods” of 2,000 square-feet with easy access to all the facilities. Rainwater is collected and circulated on top of the super-structure and freely cascades to the atrium while filtering the air and promoting the growth of indoor vegetation. Read the rest of this entry »

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Honorable Mention
2011 Skyscraper Competition

Svirid  Denis, Gudzenko Anastasiya
Ukraine

The Tree of Life is a skyscraper proposal for open mines around the world. It is an autonomous ecosystem based on the structure of a plant where the inhabitants live and work producing ecological products.

The bottom part, or root, is comprised of a power station that harvests geothermal energy and includes a subterranean water purification plant. The stem is an external frame designed as two interlacing structures that provides stability to the entire project. Vertical communication is achieved through pneumatic elevators on all levels. The top part, or crown, is the public area with housing sectors, offices, schools, and entertainment facilities. Attached to these structures there are a series of pods or terraces that are used as geoponic greenhouses, covered with solar panels and wind turbines. Read the rest of this entry »

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Honorable Mention
2011 Skyscraper Competition

Milos Vlastic, Vuk Djordjevic, Ana Lazovic, Milica Stankovic
Serbia

Hydra is a skyscraper that investigates the possibility of creating a power plant that uses hydrogen as source of energy. The international community recognizes hydrogen as a key component of sustainable energy system for the transportation, industrial, residential, and commercial sectors. The power is produced through electrolysis and could be stored in batteries and transported by truck, pipes or cables. Another interesting part is that the by-product of the process is clean water.

Its exoskeleton is built from grapheme, the basic structural element of carbon allotropes such as graphite and carbon. Grapheme has a high thermal and electric conductivity and is two hundred times stronger than steel. The idea for the Hydra skyscraper is to harvest energy from lightning storms and store the power in several mega-batteries located at the base. The project also includes a research facility, housing, and recreational areas for scientists and their families. Read the rest of this entry »

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Honorable Mention
2011 Skyscraper Competition

YoungWan Kim, SueHwan Kwun, JunYoung Park, JoongHa Park
Republic of Korea

Despite the alarming news about global warming and its catastrophic consequences, the use of fossil fuels has not decreased. In an effort to alleviate this problem, this project seeks to transforms oil platforms around the world into sustainable seascrapers that produce and store fresh water. The old pipes are adjusted to bring water to spherical containers attached to the main structure which, through a series of distillation processes, produce fresh water and later transports it to countries in need. The project also contains a research facility and housing pods for workers. The platform is transformed into green areas that will serve as recreational areas and farms. Read the rest of this entry »

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Honorable Mention
2011 Skyscraper Competition

David Gull, Jin Young Song
United States

For more than one hundred years after the birth of the skyscraper, our tower designs have been defined by a simple notion, a rigid core and heavy perimeter columns. We envision a future skyscraper typology that is more efficient and unburdened by large vertical compression members at the perimeter. The Tensile Tower uses a structural concept that results in uninterrupted views, open space planning, efficient day lighting, and minimal material use.

The Tensile Tower uses one primary mega compression member, which also contains the vertical circulation, much like a traditional core. The perimeter edges of the floor slabs are supported by tensile cables suspended from the top of the mega column. These cables spiral the tower at an angle in both directions, creating a diagonal configuration that provides resistance to torsion and overall stability. The use of suspension members at the perimeter gives unprecedented lightness and openness to the exterior wall of each floor space. For lateral loads that would otherwise cause bending throughout the tower, this bow shape acts like an oversized herring truss; the mega core and slabs as compression members, and the perimeter cables, in tension. Read the rest of this entry »

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Honorable Mention
2011 Skyscraper Competition

Adam Nakagoshi, Thao Nguyen
United States

Elevated Connectivity is a high-rise proposal that creates a new urban grid above the city by connecting existing skyscrapers. This elevated horizontal platform would become a new type of public domain that will redefine the interaction between people and their city – allowing new program and architecture on the top levels of the existing structures. The entire city would have three main layers. The ground floor will remain public and mainly used for transportation. The middle layer will be a private one with residences and offices while the third one will be dedicated to leisure and entertainment activities. Read the rest of this entry »