建筑英语题目：德国法兰克福商业银行大厦浅析学院：外国语学院课程名称：建筑英语班级：英语102班姓名：李君学号：20101410772012年10月19日Analysis of Commerzbank Tower------The ecological hi-tech architectural design[Abstract] This paper briefly introduces Foster and partners‟Commerzbank reinvents the skyscraper. Foster used Eco-Tech and Hi-Tech as well as new material in his design which embodies the ideas of sustainable development. And he made the great contribution in ecological and Hi-Tech architectural design.[Key Words]Commerzbank skyscraper, ecologically environment, natural ventilation, gardens in the skyThe new headquarters for Commerzbank in Frankfurt is the world‟s tallest ecological high-rise tower. The design addressed sustainability issues such as: ambient energy used as much as possible to reduce the dependency on fossil fuels by an innovative façade and building system that uses natural ventilation; maintaining health and happiness for the users by daylighting office space and allowing them to enjoy the outdoors by operable windows and planted sky gardens; recycling gray water for cooling and sanitary purposes; and community and connection through careful scaling of relationships with street and surrounding neighborhood. The consideration of these issues reflected by the different building components will be discussed, analyzed and commented on. The Commerzbank headquarters was the first skyscraper to seriously take sustainability into consideration and to allow it to form the basis of the building‟s design; the prototype‟s success or failure will influence how …green‟ skyscrapers will be in the fu ture.Brief introductionAt fifty-three storeys, the Commerzbank is the world‟s first ecological office tower and the tallest building in Europe. The outcome of a limited international competition, the project explores the nature of the office environment, developing new ideas for its ecology and working patterns. Central to this concept is a reliance on natural systems of lighting and ventilation. Every office in the tower is daylit and has openable windows, allowing occupants to control their own environment, and resulting in energy consumption levels equivalent to half those of conventional office towers.The plan of the building is triangular, comprising three petals - the office floors - and a stem formed by a full-height central atrium. Pairs of vertical masts enclose services and circulation cores in the corners of the plan and support eight-storey Vierendeel beams, which in turn support clear-span office floors. Four-storey gardens are set at different levels on each side of the tower, forming a spiral of landscaping around the building, and visually establishing a social focus for village-like offices clusters. These gardens play an ecological role, bringing daylight and fresh air into the central atrium, which acts as a natural ventilation chimney for the inward-facing offices.The gardens are also places to relax during refreshment breaks, bringing richness and humanity to the workplace, and from the outside they give the building a sense of transparency and lightness. Depending on their orientation, planting is from one of three regions: North America, Asia or the Mediterranean.The tower has a distinctive presence on the Frankfurt skyline but is also anchored into the lower-scale city fabric, with restoration and sensitive rebuilding of the perimeter structures reinforcing the original scale of the block. These developments at street level provide shops, car parking, apartments and a banking hall, and forge links between the Commerzbank and the broader community. At the heart of the scheme a public galleria with restaurants, cafs and spaces for social and cultural events forms a popular new route cutting across the site. Interestingly, on the day the Commerzbank opened, the Financial Times adopted it as the symbol of Frankfurt, just as it features Big Ben and the Eiffel Tower as symbols of London and Paris.ArchitectNorman foster was born in Manchester, England in 1935.Hisremarkable buildings and urban projects have transformedcityscapes, renewed transportation systems and restored citycentres all over the world..Many of these aesthetically and technologicallygroundbreaking projects are based on ecology consciousconcepts, setting new standards for the interaction of buildingswith their environment. Among his recent projects are some ofthe most remarkable architectural projects of the last years,including the reconstruction of the Reichstag in Berlin, the design of the great court at the British museum In London, the millennium bridge, and the new Hong Kong international airport - the world‟s largest airport terminal.Architecture1)New high-rise generationThe floor plan of the new tower is an equilateral triangle with rounded corners and slightly convex sides. The approximate width is 60 m. The floors of the building as well as the cores at the three corners are organized around the central atrium. The inside atrium region has a height of 160 m (43 storeys) with a length of 17 m. Each floor has three wings, two of which serve as office space; the third forms part of one of the 4-storey-high gardens.The tower makes an open and transparent impression thanks to the atrium, which is also triangular in shape; natural light and the nine gardens give it its slender appearance. The gardens have an area of 480 m2 and a height of 15 m, and are distributed in a spiral form along the building height.A unique frame construction enhances this impression by spanning the gardens, which are more than 34 m wide, without the use of columns.2) Design of the towerThe stepped top of the building makes a strong visual impact even from a distance. The guiding principle, developed with the city of Frankfurt, was to create a striking symbol for the banking district.3) FacadeFor substantial energy-saving and natural ventilation, the building is enclosed in a two-layerfaçade. The outer skin has slots through which fresh air is able to enter the cavity between the layers.The window of the inner façade, even those on the highest floors, may be opened, ensuring that natural ventilation is possible right up to the 50th floor. The windows on the atrium side can also be opened.Structural system1).Daylighting and Sky GardensThe building‟s structural layout is closely integrated with the spatial qualities of the office and garden. Commerzbank has a rounded equilateral triangular plan. The three apexes house the main reinforced concrete and steel columns as well the service and elevator shafts. The three sections on each arm of the plan are reserved for office space and one section devoted to the sky garden at every floor. This leaves a central triangular atrium in the middle that run the height of the building, only separated by steel and glass diaphragms every twelve floors. The atriums serve as the airshafts that connect airflow between sky gardens. E ach twelve floor “village” is further divided into sections of four floors. Each section holds a four level high open sky garden that changes orientation from one arm of the triangle to the next at every section, spiraling the height of thebuilding until it reaches the top of the building on the 60th floor.This sky gardens allow daylight to strike the interior face of each office wing, meeting the German building code requiring that all workers be no further than 7.5 meters from a window. Light spills into every interior space of every floor and each place has a view to match. Looking out of the exterior face from the offices, large windows not only allows light and ventilation to enter, but invites views into the culturally well-preserved city of Frankfurt from the tallest building inEurope. From the office space looking towards the interior atrium of the building, your eye is drawn to the greenery of the sky gardens above and below. More views of the city lie beyond the glass wall that encloses the sky gardens, with operable windows on the top of the walls that allow cross breezes. The light, views and ventilation made possible by the building‟s original steel frame design has come a long way from the glass boxes typical of American skyscrapers that deprive occupants from natural light and air. The design has also made the column free sky gardens possible.The freedom of structural columns in the gardens expresses a new and animated form of office management where workers experience a less hierarchical system by sharing the same spaces as their peers. The office partitions are made of glass; encouraging the dissolution of psychological barriers between co-workers. The sky gardens are planted with live trees and plants, and depending on the cardinal orientation of the garden, will house either species native to North America, Asia, or the Mediterranean. These gardens act as outdoor places and function as public spaces: people confer, eat lunch, drink coffee, or simply pause for thought. The community created by the common sky gardens is one of familiarity and intimacy. The director of Commerzbank‟s Central Building Department is sati sfied when they are given praise when office workers of the building leave at night and tell them they don‟t feel tired.Commerzbank is revolutionary for taking aggressive initiative to make the skyscraper more comfortable for its occupants and ecologically friendlier to the environment. The energy reductions are largely contributed by natural ventilation instead of air-conditioning made possible by the innovative design of the Klimafassade.2).The KlimafassadeTranslated as the climate façade, it is a custom made double skin envelope system that mediates the weather between the interior and exterior of the building. It is also this innovative design that allows for individuals to control their surroundings by operable windows and a sunshade system.This invention allows natural ventilation to be viable in a skyscraper. It is composed of a solid pane of laminated glass on the outer layer, which deflects strong winds and rain.The inner layer, a low-e double-glazed unit that is bottom hinged and opens inwards at the top, is the motorized operable window controlled by either individuals or can be overridden by the tower‟s electronic building management system. Based on the preset interior temperature limits (27o C max. in summer and 5o C min in winter) as well as wind, solar intensity and humidity measurements from weather stations throughout the building, the BMS will decide the level of control the building‟s occupants will have over windows and blinds. This will prevent complications of uneven air pressure, overheating, condensation, etc. To minimize the noise generated when air moves through the space on the top and bottom of the fixed outer layer, special aerodynamic transoms allow silent natural ventilation to occur.Although this innovative double skin system has been tested rigorously in extensive computer studies, no one knows quite how the whole thing will work. For instance, there will be times when the cavity air will be warmer than the atmosphere of the office within –the convection effect should still work to ventilate the interior, but will there be unforeseen circumstances?3).Community and ConnectionThe Commerzbank headquarters‟ rigorous integration of environmentally responsible technologies was a product of the unique political and economic climate in the 1990s when the city was governed by a coalition of Social Democrats and “Green,” who resisted large-scale development in the city‟s historic center. However, when they finally bowed down to the economic pressure from the banks, they did not hesitate to impose a range of requirements to make tall buildings not only more sustainable, but more acceptable within the cityscape.The base of the Commerzbank headquarters was directly in the middle of a low-scale neighbourhood which the government required their careful consideration.7The base of the tower had to be wrapped with a seven-story structure containing shops, housing, a 500-seat auditorium and parking spaces for 300 cars and 200 bicycles so that it will preserve the old urban fabric.To minimize the visual and shading impact on the neighboring and original Commerzbank headquarters across the street, the orientation of the new building had to be cleverly orientated; with the south-west vertex facing the 60‟s slab tower so that light may reach it and at the same time opening up views for it. On the other hand, the dark gray somber monolith will also be less of an impression to the new building‟s occupants since the sky gardens at those elevations will not face directly at it but into the horizon of the city.To fit into the city‟s horizon, however, called for the design of th e building to be more transparent. The original concept was a building that evoked abstractions of transparency coupled with the greenery of hanging sky gardens. The impracticality in planting on the outside of the building removed the hint to viewers that the building housed suspended gardens. Although the building‟s skin utilized glass that was radar permeable, 8the overall impression of the building during the day had critics calling it too massive and dominating, less crystalline and transparent than in early renderings, and an arrogant fortress for an elite class. Later lighting of the building improved the transparency of the structure at night, blending beautifully with the surrounding night-scape of Frankfurt.In conclusion, the building nevertheless was the first skyscraper to seriously address all of the ecological and social issues that required innovative designs in building skin and ventilation systems that sacrificed a large profit margin for a more sustainable design. For instance, the building would have been significantly cheaper if it was built of reinforced concrete, but concrete columns would have distracted the sky gardens‟ views. So the clients were willing to spend more of their money to the delight of their employees. It might still be too soon to know if Commerzbank will be the “workplace of the future,” leading others to take the next step. But naturally ventilated double curtain walls are appearing on numerous projects now, for example. So the trend, like the trend for architecture of the future in general, is towards a more sustainable design.。
