Edition 57 (Jan-Mar, 2020)

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Tianjin’s 7th highest glass wonder
A Sustainable Original In Glass And Steel
Reaching toward the heights of where China plans to grow its business fortunes stands the
shiny-new Tianjin Finance Centre in the north-eastern port city.
High-performing glass buildings
are a specialty for the
architecture firm Skidmore,
Owings & Merrill LLP (SOM) based in
Chicago. They have been chosen for
countless projects that bring an iconic
structure into being, enhancing its
surroundings and adding efficiency to
the building’s purpose.
All façade glass for the building was
supplied by CSG Holding, the largest
architectural glass manufacturer in
China.
Integrating architecture and
engineering
The Tianjin Finance Centre is one of
the most recent testimonials to SOM’s
commitment to excellence, innovation
and sustainability. According to SOM
Consulting Design Partner Brian Lee,
the result has been right on target.
The Tianjin Finance Centre represents
a very original concept of what a tall
building should be. This was based
on the fine integration of architecture
and engineering to produce an optimal
form from a structural and building
enclosure point of view, at the service
of very efficient and desirable interior
spaces.
“The worst is when cities often look
so much the same, because buildings
are just copies of each other. So what
we’re trying to do is build a very
original, unique form with each and
every one of our buildings. We want
them to be memorable, functional and
efficient,” Brian Lee emphasizes.
SOM held a workshop with the
client to discover his visions for the
building. The team presented different
models in various shapes to see which
imagery resonated most.
“Each shape represented buildings
we knew would work, from an
efficiency point of view and from how
we felt a tall building should work,”
Lee explained. “In the end, one model
really caught the client’s eye – a more
lyrical form, which was very unusual
and evocative. We knew from extensive
research that it would have a really
strong chance to be a very highperforming
tall building.”
Additionally, the building needed
to fit well in its surroundings in the
Tianjin Economic-Technological
Development Area (TEDA), one of the
first national economic development
areas in the country, gaining approval
in 1984. TEDA is located 50 kilometres
east of the over 15-million-inhabitant
Tianjin port city and 30 minutes by
fast-speed train from Beijing.
Three-part programme
The building’s strict programme
dictated its three sections: office,
residential and hotel. Each space
needed to be of world-class quality,
with a functional floor plate and an
efficient core – and offer a sense of
connection to the outdoors.
“These sectional requirements
actually helped us form the shape
of the building. The client was an
experienced builder. He didn’t want
anything frivolous, but rather was
looking for the innovative. Something
iconic, with a landmark quality – and
at the same time, highly efficient,” Lee
describes.
Efficiency in every detail
Back at the studio, the SOM team
worked on the program in the most
efficient way. By combining the
tapering shape with a visually soft
aerodynamic quality, the resulting
shape fit the program perfectly. A
hybrid stepped-core-in-core structure
design with a sloped perimeter column
system reinforced the building against
earthquakes and high wind loads.
“We knew a tapering tower always
performs well in wind,” Lee says. “Also
rounding off the corners of the tower
helps reduce wind resistance.”
And the team continued finetuning
the design, creating a porous
top and using concave surfaces. Each
element was developed to optimize
the structure’s performance. A
moment frame was selected with an
added brace to form a curving frame,
which also enhanced the building’s
performance.
“So, then we had this beautiful, fluid
lyrical shape. But we needed to think
about what kind of enclosure to use,”
Lee explains.
Extraordinary glass curtain
saves costs, enhances
performance
The unconventional shape of the
building required a unique glass
curtain. The idea was to use staggered
glass panels and aluminium mullions
to create an elegant skin-like texture to
catch the eye and glisten in the sun.
The team started to work on the
surface, mapping it out parametrically.
Then, they tweaked the surface to
reduce the number of unique glass
panels needed, even though readily
available glass panel sizes had been
selected. “Initially, we had over 1,000,
but we got this down to around 476
unique panels for greater efficiency
and ease of replacement,” Lee adds.
SOM presented two different
schemes to the ownership – cold-bent
glass and offset flat glass panels – and
they chose to go with the less risky flat
glass scheme. This added complication
to the design. But Lee’s team was
able to accommodate this by adding
a make-up aluminium piece to the
mullion system and metal frames. This
makes a beautiful effect, looking almost
like the building is sheathed in metal
because of the spectacular way that the
Glass Bulletin | January - March, 2020 89