Bringing an Icon Into the Future: Willis Tower
Few buildings are as iconic as Willis Tower. Generations of Chicagoans have a collective memory of this building playing a role in their entire lives…
232 results
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Transformation as Movement
In 1888 the art historian Heinrich Wölfflin proposed the notion that the primary characteristic of baroque architecture is the illusion of movement. …
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Carbon-Dioxide-Inhaling Facade
3.5 billion years ago, cyanobacteria created the foundation for life on Earth by producing the oxygen basis for our atmosphere. Should we once again …
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Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
Steven Holl Architects designed two new buildings in the Museum District in Houston, Texas. Knippers Helbig is the facade consultant of both projects…
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Lithic Revival
The recently completed Capital One Hall performing arts center located in the Washington DC metro area is defined by a pleated exterior of glass and …
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Sustainable Retrofit Strategies for an Existing Laboratory Building
This paper analyzes sustainable retrofit strategies for an existing research laboratory building, located in a cold climate. This facility is compose…
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Establishing a Life Cycle Assessment Methodology for Innovative Facade
Life cycle assessment was introduced in the 1970s as an analytical tool to quantify the environmental impact of a product, process, or service. Thoug…
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Facade Games
This paper provides an overview of a course focusing on the façade as taught to architecture students over a twenty-year period. The need for this s…
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Vertical Louvered Solar Control
Exterior shading devices, when typically used, are horizontal planes that are most effective at the south face of buildings in the northern hemispher…
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Patchwork
It may be difficult for modern man to believe that what is known as handicraft was once the advanced manufacturing of the day. These techniques were …
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Low-Carbon Cladding and Shading Design
In the last few years, the design community has embraced the challenge of reducing embodied carbon in buildings. Several tools are now available for …
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Autonomous or Appropriate
This paper examines two profoundly different design approaches: one, herein called ‘autonomous’, where the building’s design is governed by internal …
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The Myth of Simplicity
There were good why reasons early US Modernism first evolved in California– wide open sites with no constraints (physical or zoning), and effectively…
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Designing with Photovoltaics
Photovoltaics (PV) have been utilized in buildings for decades, especially in Europe where legislative support has largely driven the market. With ne…
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Go Big or Go Home!
This paper will focus on the design and detailing of large-format glass enclosures intended to maximize transparency using state-of-the-art materials…
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Structuring Skin
Curtain wall is the prevailing type of enclosure on modern buildings because of its economy, its independence from structure that allows flexibility …
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Facade Mock-ups
Curtain walls and window walls are typically specified to meet a variety of different performance and testing criteria, some of which can be quite st…
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Facade Resilience Evaluation Framework
Resiliency is the capacity of a building (or building component in the case of the facade) to support building functionalities during extreme events …
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Façade Systems and Embodied Carbon
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a methodology used to quantify the impact of building construction supply chains on the environment in terms of measur…
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Facade Expansion Joint Systems
As awareness around the seismic performance of buildings grows, it is becoming increasingly necessary to integrate seismic expansion joint cover syst…