Thursday, 26 Jun 2008
Yesterday Dubai’s plans for a ‘moving’ skyscraper became the talk to the ‘net (unfortunately I was locked in an excel report and Chris was very excited about toast so we kinda missed the boat but we’re catching up now!)
The “Dynamic Tower”, dreamt up by Italian architect David Fisher (who has never built a sky-scraper before), will be the world’s first moving building - Dubai do like their firsts don’t they?
The Dynamic Tower will house 80 apartments that will all spin completely independently of one another.
“It’s the first building that rotates, moves, and changes shape,” Fisher said, at a New York news conference. “This building never looks the same, not once in a lifetime,” he also said “These buildings will open our vision all around, to a new life.”
The Beeb have an interview clip with a great computer animation of David Fisher’s ‘Dynamic Tower’ undulating away and looking generally very cool (what’s with the gratuitous car though?)
It’s in that clip that you discover some eco-thinking has been thrown into the mix too - the building should be energy self-sufficient and Fisher claims the turbines would produce enough electricity to power the entire building and even feed extra power back into the grid!
Whether the building can live up to that boast or not, it’s very impressive because it’s the turbines that make the tower move - there are a total 79 giant wind turbines, one located between each floor, which all connect up to the central column that the apartments will all circle. At voice command, if that wasn’t enough!
It’s projected that the apartments will take between one and three hours to make a complete rotation (much to the relief of anyone planning to eat dinner inside one I imagine!) and will cost from $3.7m to $36m.
According to Associated Press:
movement isn’t the only unique feature about this building - Designers say they plan to build it all in a factory in Italy. When its complete, they’ll ship the structure to Dubai, where they hope it will be ready for offices and residents by 2010.
Another hugely exciting and ambitious, green but also dynamic building to watch on the ever growing skyline of Dubai - now I just have to find $3.7m in the next 2 years…