Skin of Architecture: Double-skin

Source: wikipedia.org

The Gustavo Capanema Palace in Rio de Janeiro was completed in 1943.

It was designed by a team composed of Lucio Costa (future designer of the layout of Brazil's modernist capital Brasília), along with Affonso Eduardo Reidy, Ernani Vasconcellos, Carlos Leão and Jorge Machado Moreira. Oscar Niemeyer, who was to become Brazil's best-known architect, also took an important role in the design process, as an intern in Costa's office. The group invited Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier to oversee the project, which was designed in 1935-1936. Construction was begun by the Getúlio Vargas government in 1939 and was completed in 1943, to house Brazil's new Ministry of Education and Health.

An internal concrete frame allowed the two broad sides of the building to be entirely of glass. Tropical sunshine on glass walls is controlled by Corbusian sun-shades (brises-soleil) made adjustable in a system that was the first of its kind in the world. -- Wikipedia

Source: Daveybot @ Flickr

Mill Owners' Association Building, Ahmedabad, India, 1954 designed by Le Corbusier

The east and west facades are in the form of sun breakers or brise-soleil, one of Corbusier’s many formal inventions, which, while avoiding harsh sun, permit visual connection and air movement. While the brise-soleil act as free facades made of rough shuttered concrete, the north and south sides, built in rough brickwork, are almost unbroken.  -- Wikipedia

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Source: areturnondesign.com

John Deere World Headquarters, Moline, illinois, USA, 1964 designed by Eero Saarinen

What Saarinen designed was a complex of three buildings. The main office building, which is seven stories high, rises from the floor of a wooded ravine and faces two ponds. A glass-enclosed bridge connects the main building to a product-display building and a 350-seat auditorium.

Saarinen satisfied Hewitt's instruction that the buildings look down-to-earth by using Cor-ten® steel for the exterior structure of the building. Cor-ten, a material that resists corrosion by forming a protective coating of iron oxide, develops an earthy color as it ages, much like newly plowed soil. Developed for railroad track construction and other uses, this marked the first use of Cor-ten in an architectural application. -- Deere & Company World Headquarters

Facades are articulated by external louvers hung from extended steel detailing.

Source: Aitor Ortiz archdaily.com

IDOM Headquarters, Bilbao, Spain, 2011 designed by ACXT Arquitectos

An imaginary green carpet has been designed as if simply placed over the roof, hiding all air conditioning units which in most office buildings are visible, with the resulting sound and visual impact. 

.... some “brise soleil” whose design emerges as an imaginary extension of the roof carpet as something that has been stretched over the façades and “folds” in its singularities: an existing balcony facing the canal, the entrance, access points for firemen through the façade and other unique areas. -- ArchDaily