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ARCHITECT NORMAN NORMAN FOSTER FOSTER

creative colossus The world’s most productive and ambitious architect stands head and shoulders above his peers

FREE UNIVERSITY IN BERLIN One of Foster’s first projects is the Free University in Berlin, in which the design of a new library for the Faculty of Philology is far ahead of its time.

The new library’s four floors are contained within a naturally ventilated, bubble-like enclosure, clad in aluminium and glazed panels and supported on steel frames with a radial geometry. An inner membrane of translucent glass fibre filters in the daylight and creates an atmosphere of concentration, while scattered transparent openings allow momentary views of the sky and glimpses of sunlight. The serpentine profile of the floors creates an edge pattern in which each floor swells or recedes with respect to the one above or below it. Amusingly, the library’s cranial form has already earned it a nickname–The Berlin Brain.

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February 2009 | www.lifestyleliving.in

LL BUREAU NORMAN FOSTER’S attitude matches his attire– cord suit, black polo neck and loafers–relaxed, comfortable and confident. The 70-plus veteran wears his age lightly even as his experience as a pilot and skier lends agility to his movements. The fact that his monumental project–Terminal 3 of Beijing Capital International Airport–reflects his passion for flying, is no coincidence. It’s a project aligned to his interests and this is where he brings his forte into play: the dexterous use of vast spaces.

He has always managed to seamlessly marry the heavyweight art of architecture with the latest lightweight technologies and materials.

His love for flying first saw shape in the most exquisite hangar built yet–the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts in Norwich, completed in 1978 and a salute to creativity.

The colossal project of the construction on Terminal 3 of Beijing Capital International Airport saw the largest covered structure ever built–40,000 workers on site, working eight-hour shifts round-the-clock.

Completed well in time for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the roof of the dragon-like structure covers a space 3.25km long by 785m wide. A train connects various parts of the terminal, along with 175 escalators, 173 lifts and 437 travelators. By 2020, it is estimated, 55 million people will pass through each year.

"To get an idea of the scale," says Foster, "imagine Heathrow terminals 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 together under one roof and then add an extra 17 per cent of floor space. It's so big that under a certain amount of light, you can't see one end of the building from the other." Of course, Foster is a workaholic. He doesn’t know where his work and his persona separate. It’s a passion that has seen him travel for more than 30 years–from Sydney to New York to Malaysia and Kazakhstan–creating landmark structures that include

February 2009 | www.lifestyleliving.in

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ARCHITECT NORMAN FOSTER

Berlin's Reichstag building, the Swiss Re "Gherkin" in London, the Greater London Authority's City Hall, Chek Lap Kok airport in Hong Kong, the Nîmes Médiathèque, the Millau Viaduct... and so on.

Known for his high-tech forms, Foster has a long history of designing thoughtful additions to well-known historical structures, including the British Museum in London and the Reichstag in Berlin. He delights in the quality of steelwork, great rising columns and subtle, compound curves. He bows in reverence before structure, logic, crafts, technologies and engineering processes.

"Since Stonehenge, architects have always

been at the cutting edge of technology.

And you can't separate technology from the humanistic and spiritual content of a building," he comments. His portfolio also includes projects as small as door handles, and as diverse as a new design for a wind turbine, a partly solar-powered electric bus for Kew Gardens, and the sports centre for Aspire, the spinal injury charity.

Foster is awed by the sheer beauty of a bridge or a complex piece of machinery. He fine-tunes and reprocesses his learning, very much like a master craftsman storing his learning, drawing upon it and creating a finer specimen in delivery and efficiencies. And

MECCA IN A NEW LIGHT Pushing Foster squarely into the spotlight is the recent controversy about a multimillion-pound project to redevelop Mecca, Islam’s holiest site. Foster is believed to be among a group of “starchitects” reportedly invited to re-envision Mecca, including an extension around the central Haram mosque that would enable it to accommodate up to three million pilgrims. Homes and hills are to be replaced by about 130 skyscrapers, including the Abraj al-Bait Towers, which is to become one of the biggest buildings in the world. The seven towers will include a 2,000-room hotel, a convention centre big enough for 1,500 people, heliports and a four-storey shopping mall. At the centre of the development will be the redesigning of the mosque and its surrounding areas. The King is understood to have recruited 18 leading architects, engineers and construction companies to “establish a new architectural vision” for the 356,800 sqm mosque complex.

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so, the precedent for the Beijing terminal lies in Foster's earlier work... his designs for Chep Lap Kok Airport, Hong Kong, and the new terminal at Stansted.

Many of his buildings are exciting, like the curvaceous Surrey headquarters of carmaker McLaren. Yet, the best have been the result of rigorous design programmes and engineering logic.

By way of contrast is his latest work in Italy, in Santa Giulia, on the edge of Milan near Linate airport. A 490 m, colonnaded,

February 2009 | www.lifestyleliving.in

central boulevard connects all parts of the development–a complex containing a school, student hostel, hotels, shops, conference centre, a church designed by Swiss architect Peter Zumthor, as well as a housing for 9,000 people. The whole centre, arranged around squares and well laid-out streets, reflects the same layering and density as Italian towns possess, but also offers parks and breathing spaces. “ The Italians have long known what makes a livable town or city," comments Foster.

He sees a connection between architecture, infrastructure, invention and re-discovery.

His extraordinary talent can be seen in

February 2009 | www.lifestyleliving.in

varied works such as his recent Palace of Peace in Kazakhstan–a 62m-high pyramid, a centre for world faiths, including an opera house and a library, and the Wembley Stadium, London–the world's largest, allcovered football stadium, seating 90,000.

Foster’s style is seen as being very much a part of the new millennium–clean, unfettered and environmentally-aware. His buildings are as ecologically sensitive as possible. While renovating Germany's Reichstag, he managed to incorporate in his design a method of fuelling the building with vegetable oils, thus reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 94 per cent. And by eschewing traditional air-conditioning–at least for most part of the year–in favour of natural ventilation in Frankfurt's Commerzbank, he

ensured that fuel consumption was cut. Of that project, he said, "Anything that reduces fuel consumption and cuts down on greenhouse gases, is good news."

Similarly, his fresh approach to each task has rewritten many of the accepted rules of architecture. This is probably most evident in the field of airport design. Foster decided that the traditional exposure of ducts and pipes was not only aesthetically displeasing, but a waste of energy.

Lloyd Wright's maxim, "Form and function are one" , and Le Corbusier's theories of space, light and minimalism, have influenced Foster's outlook. "Great architecture", says Foster, "should wear its message lightly." It is this simple philosophy that makes him the foremost urban stylist of this century.

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