"An efficient vertical transport scheme'employing double-decker elevator cabs and two intermediate sky lobbies'is combined with an efficient service riser scheme'facilitated by three intermediate mechanical floors'to create a slender structural core.
The core is ringed by 12 m wide office plates on a 1.5 m planning grid and layered 4.2 m floor-to-floor (2.9 m floor-to-ceiling). These parameters meet best practices for office flexibility, daylight penetration, and area efficiency (over 80%).
The resulting office machine is clad in 3 m-wide, mullion-free, triple-glazed IGUs with clear glass spanning floor to ceiling. Combined with dispersed'and therefore small'perimeter columns, the façade provides extraordinarily unobstructed views.
The FAR saved by the offices' efficiency is added to the Observatory, Sky Lobbies, and Podium Lobby as 'outriggers' of extra amenity: auditoria, bar, banquet halls, cafeterias, executive clubs, gift shop, meeting rooms, prayer halls, restaurants, retail, and sky terraces.
Located on the equator, the tower receives direct sunlight from all four sides, with similar north/south and east/west exposure. To maximize energy efficiency, four-sided solar shading is demanded.
In response, the tower is wrapped in a transparent, retractable, PTFE-coated, glass fiber-reinforced fabric sun shade, which protects the offices' unobstructed views from daylight and glare. The sun veil is silver on the outside to reject heat, black on the inside to enhance visual legibility of the cityscape, and segmented into 4.2 m shingles to allow for air circulation and ease of retraction.
During the day, the veil is stretched between the outriggers and the mechanical floors on a tensile cable net, creating a high-performance, lyrical silhouette. If internal roller-shades are installed building-wide for individual control of glare, whole faces of the veil could be retracted when not directly exposed to the sun, or the veil removed entirely on overcast days.
At dusk, the veil is retracted to the mechanical floors to reveal the elegant tower within (and to avoid the veil turning opaque at night). The daily transformations of the 380 m tower will become a spectacle within Kuala Lumpur's skyline."
Links:
- https://vimeo.com/95820247