Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
Flying saucers, glass roadways, subterranean caverns: three visions of the Grand Central Station of 2112
Three leading architects gathered last week at the third annual summit of The Municipal Art Society to present their visions for the dramatic redevelopment of New York's Grand Central Terminal. Foster + Partners, SOM and WXY each put forward ideas to renew Grand Central's grandeur, while also making it fit for purpose for the the hundreds of thousands of people that will use the station on any given day in the next hundred years. The three schemes offer strikingly different visions for the future of the terminal, though only one includes an enormous flying saucer. Read More
Architectural practice SOM's 17.6-sq km (6.8-sq mile) master plan for Beijing Bohai Innovation City has won an international design competition for the redevelopment of the region. The design is focused on a redevelopment corridor along the high-speed rail connection between Beijing, and the port of Tianjin. Though incorporating existing infrastructure, the scheme constitutes an ambitious planned city, and one which, if fully realized, may set a new standard for environmentally-conscious urban planning. Read More
The 71-story Pearl River Tower, described as one of the most energy-efficient skyscrapers in the world, has reached its topping out milestone on the way to its planned completion later this year. (For those not in the architectural know, topping out or topping off is a ceremony held when the last beam is placed at the top of a building.) With a height of 309.6 meters the 2.3-million square-foot Pearl River Tower incorporates the latest green technology and engineering advancements, the most immediately obvious of which will be a pair of openings in the tower’s facade which feed wind turbines to generate energy for the building. Read More
Skidmore, Owings and Merrill LLP (SOM) has just unveiled details of the first phase for the expansion and redevelopment of three business districts in China's capital city, Beijing. Key to the success of the project is the installation of a Central Park area which will help to heat and cool energy efficient buildings in the Dawangjing District by geothermal exchange instead of relying on energy-intensive cooling towers. Read More
If you're ever likely to suffer from Acrophobia (from the Greek: akron , meaning "peak, summit, edge" and phobos, "fear" and meaning an extreme or irrational fear of heights), then Sears Tower in Chicago is the place that'll surely bring it on. Standing at 1,450 feet and 110 stories, Sears Tower is the tallest building in North America and the third tallest building in the world. The building recently added a new attraction as part of an updated Skydeck Chicago experience. Christened “The Ledge”, it's a series of glass bays on the 103rd floor that offer visitors unobstructed views of Chicago – 1,353 feet straight down. Read More
