The end of the XXth century was marked with the architectural boom. Grand erections similar to ancient constructions classified as the wonders of the world began to arise one by one all over the globe. Many of them became the places of tourist pilgrimage even while not being completed. Ten of such projects have already gained the worldwide fame.
Great Egyptian museum in Giza.
Great Egyptian museum in Giza is about the same architectural wonder as the Giza pyramids themselves. As a matter of fact, it is the basis of architectural development of modern civilization. It is a massive row of chambers enfolding the scenery, with triangular roofs like in pyramids. The space of the largest archaeological museum in the world exceeds thousands of square meters.
The Tate Modern art gallery in London.
The Tate Modern art gallery in London is the largest-scale gallery in the world. And now the construction of the second 11-story glass building with 23 thousand square meters of space has been started. It is planned to complete the construction in time for the 2012 Olympics. The use of new areas will allow to solve the problem of over-crowding of the gallery that was visited by 4.9 million people in the year 2006.
The cost of the project, designed by Swiss architects, is 215 million pound sterling. The expenses for extension to gallery are expected to be comparable to the main construction bill.
Burj Dubai.
The skyscraper in United Arab Emirates pretends to be the tallest building in the world.
There will be the fastest elevators and the “highest” communications. When the construction is completed the final height of Burj Dubai will be more than 700 meters, it will have more than 160 floors. Now the builders work at 484.1 meters height. Interestingly: the weight of concrete used in building construction equals approximately the summarized weight of 100 thousand elephants.
Simon Wiesenthal Museum in Jerusalem.
Simon Wiesenthal Center suggested an idea to create the Museum of Tolerance in Jerusalem in the year 2002. Famous American architect Frank Gehry developed the model of museum complex. It is situated on the plot of land between “Gan Ha’atzmaut” park and Nahlat Shiva in the West Jerusalem. 120 million dollars were invested in this construction. The museum that is officially called ” Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Museum of Tolerance in Jerusalem” occupies the territory of 14 thousand square meters. It has been built from Hierosolymitan stone with the insertions of titanium allays that is Gehry’s favourite construction material.
The third terminal of the Capital International Airport in Peking.
The country that builds the biggest dam, the longest bridge and the greatest shopping mall just ought to have the most immense construction plot while erecting the largest airport terminal in the hugest airport. The future third terminal will occupy 17 tiers, will stretch for nearly 4 kilometres, will require 35 thousand builders and will be capable of handling 53 million passengers in a year.
Olympic stadium in Peking.
Huge complex will be constructed by the year 2008. Its sizes are impressive: 330 metres lengthwise, 220 metres widthwise, with 62 meters in height, it will hold a 100 thousand persons. Though it is still unclear whether there will be as many lavatories there as for example in the famous Wembley stadium.
Ground Zero Memorial in New York.
Ground Zero is the memorial on the site of the former World Trade Center towers destroyed during terrorist attacks on the 11th of September. The huge construction with the slabs on which all the witnesses and sympathizers sign, now yields in size only to Holocaust memorial. The Tower of Freedom will be as tall as 1776 foots – 541 meters.
MAXXI – National Museum for Contemporary Art in Rome.
Zaha Hadid, the only one lady-architect in the world who won the Pritzker Prize, has designed MAXXI – the Roman Centre for Contemporary Art, it is a sophisticated concrete erection that simultaneously impresses with extravagance and monumentality. It is impossible to measure the length of the building since it has an extremely odd shape; it is even compared to spaghetti.
CCTV – the Chinese Television building in Peking.
CCTV – the Chinese Central Television building – is to be completed by the year 2008. This building – the skyscraper – is impressive due to its unusual shape. Chinese television head quarter will have 500.000 square meters of total space and will become one of the 300 skyscrapers that are to be constructed in the down town of Peking. The estimated cost of the project is 600.000.000 euros. Its infrastructure includes restaurants, hotels and theatres.
The Bishopsgate Tower in London.
It is another skyscraper of unusual configuration. Today it is the largest construction in London’s history. Its height is going to be 288 meters – it was originally proposed to be 307, but civil aviation authority prohibited such height. The tower will become one of the tallest buildings in the whole Europe. Recently the project was renamed The Pinnacle. The date of the construction first phase is planned for the beginning of the year 2008. The building will also be ecological – it will be covered with the solar cell panels.
By: Iuri Tarabanov
To keep pace with population explosion and to provide each and every one with a space to live in, the style of modern architecture was adopted.
The technique adopts the form of simplification and eliminates the ornament form of building styles. This style of conserving space was conceptualized in the early 1920s.
Modern architecture was followed by many powerful architects and architectural pedagogues. But this method gained its popularity only after the Second World War and now it is the dominant architectural style.
The method of modern architecture owes its popularity to three greats namely Le Corbusier of France together with L.M van der Rohe and Walter Gropius of Germany. L.M van der Rohe and Gropius were the managers of schools in Europe which was related with harmonising craft and tradition in addition to industrial technology.
Architects involved in international style adopted the style of simple design and unornamented buildings to accommodate maximum living space within minimum dimensions.
Materials used were glass, steel and concrete. The plans for the flooring were functional and also logical, a style adopted in the planning of skyscrapers.
Modern architecture key principles include:
o Materials and functional needs determine the design
o Artistic designs finalised by machines.
o Ornamentation being completely rejected.
o Adoption of simple forms
o Deletion of unneeded details.
o Expressed structure adoption
o Function precedes form.
Disparagers consider the modern style of architecture as deprivation. Le Corbusier had once said that buildings were machines and human life did not require machines to live in.
Philip Johnson accepted that he was no more interested with the thing called box. Early 80s saw many architects intentionally divert from rectilinear patterns and adopt eclectic styles.
The organic form became popular because of its playful nature. This movement owes its credit to the two prolific architects Alvar Aalto and Eero Saarinen. This movement has aided in influencing the present-day modernization which prevails even today as modern architecture.
Modern architecture has indeed gone a long way and its influence in the lives of people around the world is something that can never be denied. Though there are some critics who believe that modern architecture is just a fad, a great majority however believes otherwise. In fact, modern architecture has pierced into the society where critics dwell.
Modern architecture? A beast you cannot live or love without.
By: J Leason
Architecture is the practice of design buildings and other physical structures. It is often considered a form of art and science due to the massive amount of technical knowledge required to implement a design that has been created from nothing.
Architects have many factors to consider when constructing a building such as mass, texture, materials, light/shadow, cost, construction and technology. All of these factors are manipulated in order to create an end design that appears both functional and aesthetically pleasing.
A very important part of modern architecture is that it is not merely a visual art form. Complete architecture takes into account all of the human senses as well as the environment around the structure, and management of power, water and other utilities. There is also a common concept among architects that the art cannot exist in a vacuum and that it must have context, surroundings and contrasts to be complete.
Although architecture is not widely recognised as an “important” and “popular” profession it is in fact one of the most influential and widely recognised jobs throughout history. Almost everything we know about ancient civilisation is based upon what we have found in and about it’s architecture and there are countless political and cultural symbols known primarily for their structural achievements such as the Pyramids of Egypt and the Roman Coliseum. Even modern cities and locations are both visited and known by architectural landmarks such as the Opera House of Sydney and the Empire State building of New York.
The history of architecture is also extremely interesting, as human technology and scientific and mathematical understanding increases, so to did our ability to build wonderful buildings. Architecture was born out of a combination of needs, such as shelter, security and worship and means, mainly the local building materials and physical ability. Early architecture was mainly vernacular architecture, a special type of architecture which is based around local needs and means. As it evolved the classic civilisations were born and great time and effort put into crafting areas of religious or political significance and even back in these times architecture was more than just a visual product. The roman Coliseum was designed so that all of the thousands of crowd members could see and hear the action at the centre and the way it amplifies sound was no accident.
As time passed architecture developed more and more with medieval structures like the castle and fort proving architecture had a place on the battle field as w ell as he city floor. During this period architects, especially in Europe, began to form guilds (as many craftsman did then). These guilds were design to help architects work together and achieve more monumental things, a practice that is still in society today in the form of architect partnerships.
In the renaissance architecture became a very personal affair and moved quickly away from war and religion. Many famous architects are from this period as this marked the start of buildings recognising their architects with individuals such as Palladio and Brunelleschi going down in history.
Today architecture is everywhere, almost any public building is professional designed and many compete for recognition inside their respective cities. There is massive emphasis on certain elements such as energy efficiency, environmental blending and the use of environmentally friendly construction materials. Design is also becoming increasingly advanced with superstructures like the Burj Al Arab 7 star hotel.
By: Frank Woodford