With
four hundred twelve meters is claimed as the highest tower with stone on the
outside, we present to Al Hamra!
Hi, if you do not have in mind a place to
go on this holidays that are coming, I'm going to advice one: Cunda Island, in
Turkey, specifically in the Aegean Sea, I, Rodolfo, was there recently, and I
had to include it in the list of future locations where to place my next
construction, I stayed at the Ortunc Club where
they received me with the open arms (as it could not be otherwise).
It is always nice to admire the Wellington
arch in London, designed by the architect Decimus Burton, son of the architect
James Burton (the family together, stays in the same guild), I went
to Hyde Park Corner, by exclusive invitation from David Beckham to test Haig
Club, and, while there, among guests so illustrious and distinguished, it
occurred to me I had to urgently visit Kuwait because I wanted to play again in
my favorite game: the comparison of buildings (or portions thereof) with other
objects, organics or inorganics. So the next day, I was in the country, to see
what I call the stone trophy.
The
first time that I saw the Tower I thought in a trophy, one of those trophies
made in gold or silver, which give them to people who have managed to do
something extraordinary, or have managed to stand out above others. Nothing
wrong in highlight, I tell you that I do it often, among other things because
there are always persons who overcome me and this it motivates me enough to
reinvent myself. But we let the philosophy and we go to the action: I was not
wrong with my first impression. The Tower of Al Hamra is a true trophy for the
Kuwait City and its creators, Skidmore, Owings
and Merrill, or as I call them SOM.
The building completed its construction in
2011 and occupies an area of 10,000 square meters, has 74 storeys high with a
constructed area of 195,000 square meters, reaching 412 meters of height, making
it the tallest skyscraper in Kuwait, is nothing. Designers used the traditional
clothing of Kuwaiti and the logical intend to enjoy the largest possible
spectrum, for, with this and lots of imagination, create a strange and
ephemeral design. Explained to us SOM that the intention is to maximize the
views of the Persian Gulf, hence the corners of the building are curved; they
also wanted to minimize the heat in the area so the South façade, it made of
limestone, and with a figure asymmetrical, as if they had given him a great cut
above down to the tower.
The
building is composed of a luxury shopping center, where brands such as Hugo
Boss, Samsung, Carolina Herrera, Hermes París, Vera Wang, Behbehani Luxury and
others offer their space; It also has various restaurants and the best movie
theater in the Persian Gulf, with the most advanced in this kind of
entertainment services, although the main use is that of offices in 70 of the
74 floors of the complex.
The Structure
The
building is accessed by a very special lobby: one of 20 meters of high that
welcomes users to and leave them of stone, as in its southern facade. But this
is only one of its characteristics, another is that to be able to shape the
structure they used the reinforced concrete instead of the steel structure
(more practice in the carrying out this type of towers). This, and the peculiar
shape of the building unbalanced the load and this affected more in the south
east that in any other orientation. How
do they fixed it? With a huge foundation of 4,200 square meters and four meters
high (were pumping concrete for four months!), this foundation is supported
by 289 piles (a pile is a pillar that it is introduced in the earth until it
touches firm or until it can endure the efforts to which it is subjected by
friction) between 20 and 27 meters long.
The facade of Limestone
The
company Juma Marble Suppliers (JMS) was
commissioned to supply all the parts of limestone from the outside and inside
the building. The outside in the form of platelets from 1.37 x 0.76 meters and
four centimeters thick, supported by a system of metal anchors on the
rectilinear side of the facade; on the wings of the building, whose surfaces
are curved in two directions and make impossible the use of rectangular
platelets, they used the company's system Trecandis Innovation, which is based
on slabs of two inches of limestone in a glass fiber mesh, adapting perfectly
to any curvilinear shape.
The limestone, in this case, acts as a shield against high temperatures,
absorbing these temperatures during the day and preventing that affect the
inside and at night expelled the heat, avoiding a sudden change. The
limestone is of sedimentary origin, i.e. that it has occurred as a result of
long periods of accumulation of minerals that have been subjected to the action
of atmospheric agents. It is a stone very suitable for the outdoor because it
is extremely resistant, insulate very well the temperature and their prices are
affordable because your extraction is not overly expensive. The limestone has a
density of between 2,000 and 2,500 Kg/m3, it is not heavy compared to other
stones used in exterior coatings.
Errors
During
my "limestone journey", I've encountered two "hoaxes" which
called my curiosity, and I want to share. The first is that the Trecandis
system was used to "lighten" the facade because, supposedly, the
engineers were very concerned about the weight of the stone, which would
endanger the structure. Nothing is further from reality, as I have said
earlier, the system has been used by practical purposes due to the curvature of
certain areas of the building.
The
second, rarer still, compares the surface of 258,000 square meters of limestone
from the facade of the building with the area of Central Park. This is a
"folly", firstly because the facade boasts little more than 50,000
square meters, and secondly because the
Central Park covers 341 hectares... three million square meters!
