Environmental Feasibility ASSIGNMENT 1 ESTHER KIRUBA 19171NB002
PROJECT 1
Seattle Central Library The architects conceived the new Central Library building as a celebration of books, deciding after some research that despite the arrival of the 21st century and the "digital age," people still respond to books printed on paper. The 11-story Central Library has a capacity for over 1.5 million books
THE PROJECT Type of Project
Geographical Location
Area
Civic Architecture
Seattle, WA, USA
33,722.6 m2
THE PROJECT Cost & Funding
Starting Date
Completion Date
$165.9 million (₹12,05,79,43,800) Government Funding with large donation from Bill Gates
2002
2004
FEATURES This 11-floor, 362,987-square-foot library, a dazzling avant-garde symphony of glass and form, has many innovative features, including: A "Books Spiral" that displays the entire nonfiction collection in a continuous run; A towering "living room" along Fifth Avenue that reaches 50 feet in height; A distinctive diamond-shaped exterior skin of glass and steel. The new Central Library's unorthodox shape, unlike any other building in Seattle, is the result of its use of five platform areas to reflect different aspects of the library's program; its form indeed follows its function. It includes a 275-seat auditorium and parking for 143 vehicles.
Planning
Problems & Solutions
The problem of traditional library organization is flatness. Departments are organized according to floor plans. Each floor is discreet; the unpredictable fits of growth and contraction in certain sections are, theoretically, contained within a single floor.
Structural Reinforcement Three solutions wings par interior areas requiring reinforcements were developed: Steel grille is reinforced with an additional layer as reflecting the pattern and location of stress. There was a lack of inclusion of transverse angles in columns intervention, allowing carry loads more directly from the points of maximum stress to the nearest support columns. Gravity columns were used in slope, in line with the plane of seismic cudrícula.
Planning Designed with continous paths taking through the collection
Structure Two Structural Systems without any vertical columns