Dissecting Diagrid
A legacy of R. Buckminster Fuller, this diagonally based structural system is quickly becoming a hallmark of 21st-century Modernism.
This is the moment of diagrid.
“I think the one person that really popularized it in the last 20 years or so has been Norman Foster,” observes engineer Guy Nordenson, founding principal of Guy Nordenson and Associates. In 2001, Foster, Hon. FAIA, and his firm started work on two high-profile projects, in London and New York, both sporting a unique diamond patina running up their glassy façades—the Swiss Re building at 30 St. Mary Axe, and the Hearst Tower at W. 57th St. and Eighth Avenue. -- ARCHITECT Magazine
 |
| Source: pcf-p.com |
Bank of China Tower, Hong Kong, China, 1987 designed by Pei Cobb Freed & Partners
The faceted prism is clad in reflective glass that mirrors the changing sky, anchoring the expanding business district and providing a distinctive vertical axis to Hong Kong's towering skyline. The whole is supported by an innovative composite structural system that not only resists high-velocity winds, but does so with significant savings of construction time and materials. --
architect's web site
 |
| Source: fastcompany.com |
Prada Store (Epicenter), Tokyo, Japan , 2003 designed by Herzog and de Meuron
its signature diamond-shaped glass panes, which vary between flat, concave and convex “bubbles”.
Jacques Herzog describes these glass panes as “an interactive optical device. Because some of the glass is curved, it seems to move as you walk around it. That creates awareness of both the merchandise and the city—there's an intense dialogue between actors. Also, the grid brings a human scale to the architecture, like display windows. It's almost old-fashioned.” -- galinksy
More from
architect's web site
Anatomy of Inspiration: Louis Vuitton's Concept Handbags Steal from Prada's Architecture --
FastCompany
 |
| Source: Trevor Mein archdaily.com |
South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute,North Terrace, Adelaide SA, Australia designed by Woods Bagot
The SAHMRI’s sculptural, iconic form is characterised by a striking
transparent facade that unifies the organic diamond-shaped plan while
showcasing the two atria inside the building. Inspired by the skin of a
pine cone, the building’s unique triangulated diagrid facade responds to
its environment like a living organism. Both functional and aesthetic
in nature, the facade is designed to improve access to daylight, reduce
heat and glare, and maintain vision for a healthy internal environment. --
ArchDaily
Read another post from
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Te-Ming Chang |
Swiss Re HQ, 30 St Mary Axe, London, UK, 2004 designed by Foster + Partners
its energy-conscious enclosure resolving walls and roof into a continuous triangulated skin. Here, the towers diagonally braced structural envelope allows column-free floor space and a fully glazed facade, which opens up the building to light and views. --
architect's web site
 |
| Source: wikipedia.org |
Seattle Central Library, Seattle, Washington, USA, 2004 designed by OMA
The library's various programs are intuitively arranged across five platforms and four flowing "in between" planes, which together dictate the building’s distinctive faceted shape, offering the city an inspiring building that is robust in both its elegance and its logic. -- architect's web site
 |
| Source: Te-Ming Chang |
Hearst Tower, New York City, New York, USA, 2006 designed by Foster + Partners
Structurally, the tower has a triangulated form - a highly efficient solution that uses 20 percent less steel than a conventionally framed structure. With its corners peeled back between the diagonals it has the effect of emphasising the towers vertical proportions and creating a distinctive facetted silhouette. --
architect's web site
Read a post from
ArchDaily
Ices Fall, a glass installation, in the lobby designed by
James Carpenter Design Associate
 |
| Source: archdaily.com |
Ex Ducati, Rimini, Italy, 2006 designed by Mario Cucinella Architects
The 50 m arc of the roadside elevation is the key distinctive feature of the building, expressing our intention of creating a “green urban corner”. The external facade is composed of a ‘green skin’ made from a steel grid where climbing plants grow that creates an uninterrupted screen over the entire length of the building, embracing the lateral elevations and connecting to the rear courtyard façade. This system is permeable to air and light so the walkways can be used as veritable outdoor spaces. -- ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Roland Halbe archdaily.com |
The Jewish Center, Munich, Germany, 2007 designed by Wandel Hoefer Lorch + Hirsch
The synagogue, as the main building, is oriented towards east and stays free in the public space, with an closed stone base and a filigree glass steel construction, rising form its center. While the base reminds metaphorically of the temple Salomons , staying symbolically for the constancy, as a portative shell surrounding the prayers room, the metal mesh, glass and the construction network of the lantern relates to the filigree, portative “Stiftszelt” and the construction disbands in the transcendency the light. -- ArchDaily
Atlas Building, Wageningen, Netherlands, 2007 designed by Rafael Viñoly Architects
The building’s precast concrete latticework doubles as a structural exoskeleton and renders it almost entirely column free. --
architect's web site
 |
| Source: Åke E:son Lindman archdaily.com |
Garden house, Södermanland, Sweden, 2008 designed by Tham & Videgård Hansson
With one of the long facades facing south we also managed to eliminate a pure northern façade. This further helped the idea of plants climbing high on the oversized trellis that cover some of the windows so that in time they will become hidden within the greenery. --
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Stéphane Chalmeau archdaily.com |
Quimper City Council, Quimper, France designed by Guinée et Potin Architects
The building is clad in a light wood skin with a geometric pattern, bringing back to an imaginary, and reminding the half-timbered houses from the historical city of Quimper. -- ArchDaily
 |
| Source: archdaily.com |
Quingpu Pedestrian Bridge, Quingpu, Shanghai, China, 2008 designed by CA-DESIGN
The elevation of the bridge adapts itself to the resulting asymmetric diagram of bending momentum. Trying to minimize the amount of different steel sections, we design a pattern that becomes denser according to the diagram of shear stress. -- ArchDaily
More images from
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Bernard Khoury Architects |
Achrafieh 732, Beirut, Lebanon, 2008 designed by Bernard Khoury Architects
A criss-crossed mesh of wooden stems mounted onto the east facade is alternately pinned down by jar planters. A jasmine plant climbs out of each jar and spreads onto this secondary skin allowing the building to transform seasonally along with its vegetation. --
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: archdaily.com |
NZI Centre, Auckland, New Zealand, 2009 designed by Jasmax
The concept began as a unique response to the complex urban environment that surrounded the site. The challenge was to create an internal environment that captured the energy of the busy intersection and the city, but which also provided a quiet sanctuary that a single tenant could use as a diverse workplace. --
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Jens Weber archdaily.com |
Bio Mass Power Plant, Schwendi, Germany, 2009 designed by Matteo Thun & Partners
A cube-shaped glass and steel core forms the case holding a visible technological heart that hides no secrets; a cylindrical coating made of planks of larch wood, woven around the core like some kind of craft texture, provides a natural, suspended filter with the outside environment; a semi-spherical dome made of zinc acts like a heavenly vaults on the roof; a sheet of water, on which everything rests, is a dematerialised rendition of what has been built: earth, air, water and fire set in the pure forms of a cube, cylinder and sphere. -- ArchDaily
 |
| Source: arup.com |
CCTV Headquarters, Beijing, China, 2010 designed by OMA
The building’s primary support is achieved through the irregular grid on its surface, a visible expression of the forces travelling through the tube structure; the smaller the diagonal pattern, the stronger the load and the greater the support.
The braced tube structure also gives the building the required robustness to withstand the likely seismic activity in the area and therefore provides an extra level of safety. -- Arup
Read a post from
ArchDaily
"CCTV Headquarters Named “Best Tall Building Worldwide” from
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: archdaily.com |
Northwest Corner Building, Columbia University, New York City, New York, USA, 2010 designed by Rafael Moneo, Davis Brody Bond Aedas, and Moneo Brock Studio
The irregularity of the pattern of diagonals in the façade is a direct response to the distortion of the otherwise symmetrical loading patterns extent in the simple, prismatic form of the basic structure, distortions exerted by anomalies in the building’s exterior form and interior disposition of structural reinforcements. --
ArchDaily
Read an article from
New York Times another one from
ARCHITECT Magazine
Read structural detail from
ARUP
 |
| Source: archdaily.com |
CBC Building, IJburg, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 2010 designed by BNB Architects + B06 Architect
In the end the choice was made to rotate the window frames by about 45 degrees, crossed by diaphragm ribs creating a triangular pattern. This grid covers the entire façade. On a sunny day throughout the building an array of shadow-lines appears. The only exception is a cut-out at ground level accommodating the entrance. Because the diaphragm ribs are situated outside of the façade an exciting view of lines is shown, changing from every angle you look at it. Also, the ribs are being reflected in the glass creating even more plasticity. --
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: MZ Architects archdaily.com |
Al Dar Headquarters, Al Raha Beach, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, 2010 designed by MZ Architects
The striking shape of this building is achieved through the use of an external structural triangular diagrid – a diagonal grid of steel. The first of its kind in the UAE, it allowed the creation of structural efficiency and stability appropriate to the circular building with greater flexibility than a conventional rectangular form. The system not only helped minimize the impact of the steel frame on the façade but also served as an architectural element that blurred all sense of scale and inflated the structure, moving away from the typical horizontal stratification of the facades that influenced most high rises in the area. This diagrid system eliminates the need for internal columns which would compromise the aesthetic appeal as well as the views from within. This improved the building’s efficiency, providing layout flexibility for tenants. Although there are just 23 floors, the building has the same floor area as a typical 40-storey tower. -- ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Sergio Pirrone archdaily.com |
Hong Kong Institute of Design, 3 King Ling Road, Tseung Kwan O, Hong Kong, 2010 designed by CAAU
The overall stability of the towers is ensured by a vertical steel trellis structure called “diagrid”, equipped with a conventional beam-slab floor system in reinforced concrete. This “diagrid” system in steel offers excellent lateral rigidity supporting both the floating platform and the framework of the escalator which spans a length of 60m. -- ArchDaily
 |
| Source; Philippe Ruault archdaily.com |
Romainville Multimedia Library, Romainville, France, 2011 designed by Philippe Gazeau
It is a building ‘hierarchized’ on the basis of 3 superimposed horizontal sequences: a base on the ground floor, a large metal covered hall on the first floor cantilevered on both the street side and the garden side, lastly a topographically undulating vegetated roof. These three main elements structure and bring together the building’s architectural and functional image. -- ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Aryeh Kornfeld archdaily.com |
FEN Building, Santiago, Chile, 2011 designed by Marsino Arquitectos Asociados
The building is projected in Z shape within the narrow constrains of the site looking for the maximum exposure perimeter in order to make the most of the sunlight and natural ventilation. The structure is thought to be an exoskeleton, which means is completely exposed to the exterior, creating an open and transparent building in all its facades, as well as allowing an open layout for greater spatial flexibility, helping to preserve the architectural volume over any changing programmatic layout. -- Archdaily
 |
| Source: 1st Image archdaily.com |
Hotel Kapok Shenzhen Bay, Shenzhen, Guangdong, China, 2011 designed by Goettsch Partners
The hotel’s exterior expression is unique, clad entirely in
high-performance glazing that is overlaid with a perforated metal scrim
that provides shading and references the similar diamond-shaped pattern
on the enclosure of the adjacent sports center. --
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Didier Boy de la Tour archdaily.com |
Mont de Marsan Mediatheque, Place de la Caserne Bosquet, 40000 Mont-de-Marsan, France, 2012 designed by archi5
The Media Library stands in the middle of the Bosquet barracks, and care
has been taken to augment the dialogue with the place’s strong
architectural whole. With its clean envelope of pure geometric lines, a
197 ft x 197 ft square, the building complies with the classical layout
yet contrasts with its austerity by offsetting the system with a corner
opening onto the city. Its facades reflect the surrounding barracks like
a respectful, deferential mirror. --
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: MTF Proje archdaily.com |
Varyap Merıdıan H Block, Istanbul, Turkey, 2012 designed by MTF Proje
Repeating, concentrated and dilute “V forms” ensured the control of sun lights necessary for a quality Office working environment. Aluminium profile transverses were manufactured in six different sections as specific to this building. -- ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Marie Caroline Luca archdose.org |
Jean-Claude Carrière Theatre, Montpellier, France, 2013 designed by A+ Architecture
Wood is immediately visible on the exterior of Jean-Claude Carrière Theatre as a diamond-shaped lattice that is variable across the solid facades of the theater. But the use of wood goes well beyond this applied pattern—the exterior walls (tilt-up construction), floors, roof framing, interior walls, glass framing, as well as the facade are all made from wood. -- A Weekly Dose of Architecture
 |
| Source: Daici Anoarchdaily.com |
SunnyHills at Minami-Aoyama, 3 Chome-10-20 Minamiaoyama, Minato, Tokyo, Japan, 2013 designed by Kengo Kuma & Associates
This shop, specialized in selling pineapple cake (popular sweet in
Taiwan), is in the shape of a bamboo basket. It is built on a joint
system called “Jiigoku-Gumi,” traditional method used in Japanese wooden
architecture (often observed in
Shoji: vertical and cross pieces in the same width are entwined in each other to form a muntin grid). --
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Luc Boegly archdaily.com |
Comedie de Bethune – National Drama Theater, 138 Rue du 11 Novembre, 62400 Locon, France, 2014 designed by Manuelle Gautrand Architecture
To create a soft link with the initial volume, this black is implemented
in the form of a kind of weaving metal panels, which are drawing large
rhombuses, to remind the ones of the purple rounded shape. The rhombuses
thus seem to go from one volume to another; they are declined in two
different forms. Indeed, on the existing building the rhombuses are
drawn using stencils on the concrete, and on the extension, the
rhombuses are drawn in crossed metal cladding, mixing successively
“black mat” and “glossy black” panels. --
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Steve Back archdaily.com |
The Alpha, McGill Street, Lewisham NSW 2049, Australia, 2015 designed by Tony Owen Partners
Its hexagonal pod-like façade creates an environmental screen which
controls light and frames the views, allowing maximum exposure as well
as privacy.
Digital software was use to realise this iconic façade in a highly cost
effective way. Working with the factory in China we rationalised the
façade down to a single aluminium extrusion, similar to a window
mullion. --
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Bruce Damonte archdaily.com |
170 Amsterdam, 170 Amsterdam Avenue, New York, NY 10023, USA, 2015 designed by Handel Architects
The building’s architecture and the exoskeleton that defines the
exterior is derived from its location between these large green spaces
and its immediate context. The intersections of the structure rise to
the top of the building at different heights, giving the appearance of a
façade in motion while also allowing for the prefabricated fiberglass
formwork to be reused with the concrete cycle. --
ArchDaily
 |
| Source: Mathieu Ducros archdaily.com |
Tower D2, La Défense, France designed by Anthony Bechu Tom Sheehan Architects
From the beginning it was part of our architectural concept to create a
building that complies with the French green building standards HQE. It
was also the investor’s wish. And we succeeded. Thanks to our design of
the exostructure and the choice of materials, steel and concrete, we
were able to reduce material consumption by 30 percent. This is in
comparison to other towers the same size.
....an exostructure skin would allow for better structural stability and reduce the section of the structure and core. --
ArchDaily
.jpg?1441863157)
