Planning and Design

if each building movement takes upto nine seconds to complete.As a designer cannot fight natureby building an uninhabitablestructure with immense columns thatwouldn’t bend, a damper tanksystem was designed tocomplement the building'sstreamlined form. Although typicallyapplied in shipbuilding to stabilisehulls, damper systems have beenapplied to minimise buildingmovements in Japan. However,while the systems in Japan arecomputer controlled the project teamdecided to design a passive andmaintenance-free system forHighcliff.Under a system designed by USbasedconsulting engineerMagnusson Klemencic Associates(formerly Skilling Ward MagnussonBarkshire), a rooftop damper tanksystem with the same coverage asthe building floorplate features watertanks in layers and compartmentspositioned in a grid form. Withopenings strategically placedwithin the system, the flow of waterautomatically counteracts theeffects of strong wind. Inexperiments, the system hasproven capable of reducingmovements from eight secondseach to just 4.7 seconds. Thedifference in residents’ comfort issignificant: by the time someonenotices any movement it hasstopped. The damper system is thefirst of its kind for a residentialbuilding in the world.Residents and visitors enter thebuilding at the ninth floor, havingapproached via an access road fromthe rear. The atrium reinforces theellipse as a theme in the design,featured not only in the shape of thefloor plan but also in the ellipticalglass staircase leading from thelobby to the podium carpark below.Elevators to the units above do notfeature a high-zone and low-zone