Projects
Caja Madrid
[ pdf project sheet - 1.8 MB ]
Madrid, Spain
Office, High-rise
completed
Working closely with Foster + Partners, an astonishing column-free base was created by supporting the entire weight of the building on only its two end cores, a design that helped Caja Madrid win the 2008 Best Large Structure Award from the Structural Engineers Association of Illinois. The heavily loaded cores allow the slender tower to efficiently resist wind loads. With a height-to-width ratio of 12 to 1, this 820 foot (250 m) tower is the ultimate in structural efficiency. To achieve this unique structure, steel trusses at intermediate mechanical levels channel loads from the floors above to the cores and serve as beams in a 'mega-frame' to stiffen the tower. Special attention was given to redundancy, insuring structural stability should localized damage fail components of these trusses.
