Special Mention
2008 Skyscraper Competition

Frank Mahan
United States

Special Mention

The government-established program for the new U.S. embassy currently under construction in Baghdad is extraordinarily large, dwarfing any other embassy in the world. This project accepts this dubious program as its starting point, but questions how it and the architecture might change over time. In the first radical gesture, the embassy is configured as a tower, the most iconic, visible, and counterintuitive form for the building. Read the rest of this entry »

Special Mention
2008 Skyscraper Competition

Vincent Barué
France

Special Mention

Live in a tower if you want to! Simply push one button to look beyond the horizon, watch the sun rising, admire your town’s aerial view. See without being seen with a complete view range of 360 degrees. Live the tower without the disadvantages, the price, the fears and dangers. Read the rest of this entry »

Special Mention
2008 Skyscraper Competition

Daniel Hammerman, Kevin Kehler
United States

Special Mention

Inspired by the transformative process of rusting and ecological gradients of day lighting, our mixed-use tower twists and modulates from a thin, flaky character to a sharp, solid condition as it rises from Battery Park City, in Lower Manhattan. Facade porosity varies in response to environmental simulations and incident solar calculations, becoming more open on the north face, while more enclosed on other elevations, and distribution of program is informed by interior day lighting levels. The concrete core, composite slab and complex lateral bracing are clad in Corian panels, which have been thoroughly studied for curvature and seaming to delineate and accentuate continuity of flow from floor to wall to window mullions to ceiling. Read the rest of this entry »

Special Mention
2008 Skyscraper Competition

Alessandro Antonelli
Italy

Special Mention

Paral.lel is the result of the modeling of the skyscraper’s archetype. Several parallelepipeds are transformed following different directions. This design, obtained through three different “formal actions” (stretch, bend, wrap), brings a new perspective to the skyscraper’s usual design; the building is perceived differently from different points in the city. Size and height are not important. What is crucial is the relation between skyscraper’s design and its position in the city (at urban and human scale). Read the rest of this entry »

Special Mention
2008 Skyscraper Competition

Claudiu Barsan-Pipu, Oana Maria Nituica, Irina Maria Dragomir, Bogdan Nicolae Ispas
Romania

Special Mention

The “genetic” predisposition
The urban structure of the city of Bucharest was designed without a master plan; since its creation, drifting neighborhoods developing around religious centers have defined its urban characteristics. This continuous migration, as well as the poor “circulatory irrigation”, led to a city predisposed to suffer from massive “urban strokes”, both in terms of functional disposition, as well as in the associated circulatory system.

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Special Mention
2008 Skyscraper Competition

Akram Damisi, Ghalia Bisharat, Firas Thalji, Alaa Abdalat, Ashraf Damisi
Jordan

Special Mention

The concept of high density in cities is one that has transformed the modern city. Architecture and technology made the development of towers and skyscrapers just another element of the modern city’s urban fabric, casting large shadows on social life, both literally and metaphorically speaking. The changed urban fabric brought with it a change in urban life. In these cities, crowdedness, pollution, traffic, noise, and crime, have become an everyday experience. The private, single-use, outsized skyscraper brought on a hefty impact on city life. The instinct to climb up to some high place, from which you can look down and survey your world, seems to be a fundamental human instinct. However, while the rest of the urban world lay in the horizontal, the vertical presence in the city became a privilege for a few; a private realm that towered over the urban stage of everyday life. Read the rest of this entry »

Special Mention
2008 Skyscraper Competition

Maria Pasavento, Fabio Ferrian, Lara Rizzardini
Italy

Special Mention

MILone is the result of a research begun during the Integrated Design Workshop of Prof. Montuori at IUAV (University Institute of Architecture in Venice).

It is conceived as an outside-in city, located in the near periphery of Milan, and called to be an attraction point of the area, where green, stone paths, wooden relaxation areas and water basins are projected to foster a symbiotic relationship between the natural and the artificial environments. Read the rest of this entry »

Special Mention
2008 Skyscraper Competition

Paul Burgstaller, Ursula Faix, Michael Kritzinger
Switzerland

Special Mention

The ‘flyscraper’ is a revolutionary and visionary design proposal for the next generation skyscraper, consisting of flying living units, attached with individual ‘carbon isogrid’ tubes to the ground. In urban areas across the world we see two phenomena: fast growing metropolitan areas, as well as shrinking cities. The ‘flyscraper’ is designed for both: deserted as well as congested urban areas. Moreover the ‘flyscraper’ responds to the existing urban fabric in a very adaptive way, respecting the historical context and heritage landmarks. In addition, the ‘flyscraper’ offers a solution for very dense urban fabrics, making small, irregularly shaped, and usually commercially worthless pieces of land (‘curb property’) accessible and worthy for developments; since only ground for the foundation of the ‘carbon isogrid’ tubes is needed. Read the rest of this entry »

Special Mention
2008 Skyscraper Competition

Natalie Ghatan
United Kingdom

Special Mention

The premise behind Urban Mountain is a high-rise geometry that can simultaneously accommodate a vertically-arrayed subsidiary ski community program, along with indoor and outdoor skiing amenities. The project was informed by examination of the modern city and the phenomena of urban densification, as well as analysis of varied sets of parameters and emergent behaviors. Indeed, the evolving condition of the urban quality of life and what measures can be taken to enhance it, are relevant to the Urban Ski Mountain. Taking into account the scenario of an intensified cityscape, with increasing stresses on air quality, open space for leisure, and general feelings of well-being, the importance of these commodities are no longer being taken for granted. Read the rest of this entry »

Special Mention
2008 Skyscraper Competition

Tassilo Hager
Germany

Special Mention

The beginning of the 17th Century was the advent for the first trade routes. It was because of its great geographical position, that New York grew fast. After the Erie Canal was finished in 1825, it opened vast areas of New York to commerce and settlement. It was the wind which carried the first ships to this place and it was the beginning of its financial, cultural, and political development. Sailing ships were able to transfer trade goods via the Atlantic to Manhattan, and about the Hudson River to the vast areas of New York. The early historical background of New York is the main idea of this project. To combine the early seafaring with necessary methods to save energy is an important element. It should be a self-sufficient tower, constructed with light metal. The buildings’ envelope should be able to catch the wind. A symbol of the early history of New York, which represents its energy-conscious future. Read the rest of this entry »