Masterplan Shenzhen Towers | Steven Holl Architects

SHENZHEN 4 TOWER IN 1 MASTERPLAN (eng - ita) ENG The "Shenzhen 4 Tower in 1" competition design for the master plan is based on the concept of tropical skyscrapers as Shade Machines with a Social Bracket connecting the towers and the street level with a horizontal structure containing public programs and a rooftop water garden. The Social Bracket gathers the public programs from all four towers, combining them as one continuous element that links the four sites with the city streets and pedestrian traffic. Supporting programs for the towers, such as cafeterias and gyms, are combined in the Social Bracket and enhanced with cultural programs such as art galleries, auditoriums, and a cinema. The Social Bracket's sculpted form allows it to negotiate between environmental restrictions and the requirements of the public programs. It features a continuous roof garden park that collects storm water and recycles all the greywater from the four skyscrapers. Roof garden ponds and plantings utilize the combined storm water and greywater after passage through a central ultraviolet filter system. A public route connects the subway into the Social Bracket, linking directly to all four towers. Connecting across the Stock Exchange Plaza, the new elevated bracket acts as an urban interface between the business-centric district to the south and the residential area to the north. The design for the four towers as Shade Machines utilizes circular building footprints to maximize the interior space and open views while minimizing the exterior envelope. The optimized office floors are connected via double-height and triple-height social spaces on alternating sides of the towers. Automatic solar tracking screens made of perforated PV cells make one full rotation per day around the circumference of each building, collecting enough PV energy to cool the towers completely. Always oriented towards the sun, the moving shades harvest solar energy and block solar heat gain, their louvered sections tilting to horizontal orientation at noon to gather maximum sunlight. The one-meter deep louvers block high-angle solar gain and bounce diffused natural light onto the ceilings deep into the floor plate. The screens' full rotation per day allows the towers to act as an urban clock with synchronized rotation in time even on cloudy days. ITA Il master plan riguarda un complesso di quattro grattacieli destianti a sorgere nei pressi della Borsa Valori di Shenzhen (Cina) nel distretto commerciale di Futian. Un’unica piastra di forma affusolata collega le funzioni pubbliche collocate alla base di ciascuno dei quattro grattacieli, creando continuità tra gli imponenti edifici e, contestualmente, tra ciascuno di essi e le vie cittadine. Lungo la piattaforma sono collocate caffetterie, palestre e attività commerciali, ma anche funzioni culturali quali gallerie d’arte, auditorium e un cinema. A protezione della piattaforma, un tetto - giardino allestito secondo la tradizione orientale con tanto di flora locale, giochi d’acqua e stagni, viene irrorato utilizzando acqua piovana e/o reflua (quest’ultima proveniente dalle stesse torri), opportunamente raccolta e poi filtrata da un sistema centralizzato a ultravioletti. Un itinerario pubblico collega la metropolitana alla grande piastra sopraelevata, destinata a fungere da cerniera tra il distretto commerciale a sud e l’area residenziale e nord.