Not a building this time, but a car!

GINA is a concept for spaceframe vehicle covered with a lycra mesh, using hydraulic/pneumatic actuators to change the shape. Awesome.

Presentation A0 - Tree of Life

Had to call it a day on this one, which is a shame as there's so much more I'd liked to have done, including more photomontages and working details. Overall I'm pleased with the result give or take a few presentation tweaks. We'll see how it gets received tomorrow!

Tree of Life Renders

A few renders of the finished model. Just need to bling it out in Photoshop and put it on the A0 and we're done!

New Materials

After more rationalising, I think ETFE is the way to go for the modules. I'm imagining a reinforced concrete floor deck supported by the truss, with underfloor heating/cooling direct from the solar hot water systems and providing some thermal mass. The walls and roof would be ETFE panels on an aluminium frame, with an inner lining of steel mesh to protect the cells from internal damage. Think Eden Project.


The cells could be arranged like the weaves found on the new technology of Carbon Nanotubes, linking in with the 'weave' idea of historical Briggate - but updating it with a thoroughly 21st century technology.



Meanwhile the inner mesh could have fibre optic or LED lighting tubes further weaved into it to provide lighting - such as the MediaFacade system

After a little rethink, the design has been reduced considerably in scale - the sky cafe is now a mere 25m and with the additional wind turbine the entire building is now just over 36m in height. The rings are now open air - solar hot water tubes running over a walkway.

Of course, the larger model would fit in just fine next to Bridgewater Place!

Presentation A0 - Tree of Life

Here's a first go at a final presentation board. On the right there is a funky wireframe/full render split, with annotations going to technical details and internal views (not done yet!).

Only 1 week to go!

Tree of Life Refined

The design has now been rationalised somewhat - scaled down further, properly modelled and with new materials proposed - the in-situ cast concrete uprights have been replaced with three steel trusses for a better strength/weight ratio and a more slender form. There is also an additional vertical wind turbine at the tip of the spire, a scaled up version of the one by Helix (previous post)