This article was taken from the February 2014 issue of Wired magazine. Be the first to read Wired's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by subscribing online.
This is De Rotterdam, a new "mixed-use vertical city" from OMA, the architectural practice headed by Rem Koolhaas. The single largest building in the Netherlands, its three towers rise 150m above a concrete pediment balancing on the waterfront of Rotterdam's Wilhelminapier.
Project architect Kees Van Casteren translates De Rotterdam's mass into everyday terms: it weighs "as much as a traffic jam from Rotterdam to Milan". This matters, because the Dutch have willed their country into being from boggy, unpromising land -- and historic -- Wilhelminapier sits on particularly poor foundations. Most of this building's movement, explains Van Casteren, happens during construction.
Effectively, the structure is ratcheted up too "tight" as it is built and permitted to sag as it settles. The build was started in 1997 but stopped after 9/11, and the final cost is €340 million (£285 million), which has realised 240 apartments, 285 hotel rooms, 72,000m2 of office space -- and some very tricksy geometry.
A number of columns contain valves with steel plates stacked laterally in between. At intervals these plates are whipped out -- a bit like the magician's tablecloth trick -- allowing the building to sag at a controlled speed.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
