Foster + Partners is a British Architecture office based in London. It was established in 1967 by its chairman Norman Foster, and renamed to Foster + Partners in 1990, to better reflect the conceptual influence of the other lead architects.
All images are property of Foster + Partners
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| Foster + Partners' headquarters in London |
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| Norman Foster |
"The only constant is change - and change is about evolution, is about innovation, is about new ways of doing things." - Norman Foster
New Wembley Stadium
London, UK
Descriptive memory by F+P (in fosterandpartners.com):
"Originally built for the British Empire Exhibition of 1924, and in turn
the site of the Olympic Games in 1948 and the football World Cup Final
in 1966, the old Wembley Stadium was the most important sports and
entertainment venue in Britain. The challenge in reinventing it for a
new century was to build on that heritage and yet create a venue that
would be memorable and magical in its own right. With 90,000 seats,
standing almost four times the height and covering twice the area of the
original, the new stadium is the largest covered arena in the world.
Facilities are designed to maximise spectator enjoyment; seats are
larger than the old ones, with more leg-room; the highest tiers are
easily accessed via escalators; and the concourse that wraps around the
building provides catering for up to 40,000 spectators at any one time.
One of the things that make the stadium special is the retractable roof,
which ensures that the spectator experience is comfortable in all
weathers. When the roof is open it ensures that the turf gets sufficient
sunlight and air to maintain perfect condition, while in poor weather
it can be closed to cover the entire seating bowl. The roof is supported
structurally by a spectacular 133-metre-high arch that soars over the
stadium, providing an iconic replacement for the old building’s twin
towers; conceived as a triumphal gateway, floodlit at night it is a
strong symbol for the new Wembley and a new London landmark.
The stadium is designed to be ideal for football. Its geometry and
steeply raked seating tiers ensure that everyone has an unobstructed
view. To recreate the intimate atmosphere and the distinctive ‘Wembley
roar’ for which the old stadium was famous, the seats are located as
close to the pitch as possible. Yet the building has also been
consciously ‘future proofed’, with the ability to host a variety of
events, including international track and field events to Olympic
standard if required."
Beijing Airport
China
Descriptive memory by F+P (in fosterandpartners.com):
"Beijing’s new international terminal is the world’s largest and most
advanced airport building - not only technologically, but also in terms
of passenger experience, operational efficiency and sustainability.
Completed as the gateway to the city for athletes participating in the
twenty-ninth Olympiad, it is designed to be welcoming and uplifting. A
symbol of place, its soaring aerodynamic roof and dragon-like form
celebrate the thrill and poetry of flight and evoke traditional Chinese
colours and symbols.
Located between the existing eastern runway
and the future third runway, the terminal building and Ground
Transportation Centre (GTC) enclose a floor area of 1.3 million square
metres and will accommodate an estimated 50 million passengers per annum
by 2020. Although conceived on an unprecedented scale, the building’s
design expands on the new airport paradigm created by Stansted and Chek
Lap Kok. Designed for maximum flexibility to cope with the unpredictable
nature of the aviation industry, like its predecessors, it aims to
resolve the complexities of modern air travel, combining spatial clarity
with high service standards. Public transport connections are fully
integrated, walking distances for passengers are short, with few level
changes, and transfer times between flights are minimised. Like Chek Lap
Kok, the terminal is open to views to the outside and planned under a
single unifying roof canopy, whose linear skylights are both an aid to
orientation and sources of daylight - the colour cast changing from red
to yellow as passengers progress through the building.
The
terminal building is one of the world’s most sustainable, incorporating a
range of passive environmental design concepts, such as the south-east
orientated skylights, which maximise heat gain from the early morning
sun, and an integrated environment-control system that minimises energy
consumption. In construction terms, its design optimised the performance
of materials selected on the basis of local availability,
functionality, application of local skills, and low cost procurement.
Remarkably, it was designed and built in just four years."
Swiss Re HQ, 30 St Mary Axe
London, UK
Descriptive memory by F+P (in fosterandpartners.com):
"Londons first ecological tall building and an instantly recognisable
addition to the citys skyline, 30 St Mary Axe is rooted in a radical
approach - technically, architecturally, socially and spatially.
Commissioned by Swiss Re, one of the worlds leading reinsurance
companies, it rises forty-one storeys and provides 76,400 square metres
of accommodation, including offices and a shopping arcade accessed from a
newly created public plaza. At the very top of the building Londons
highest occupied floor - is a club room that offers a spectacular
360-degree panorama across the capital.
Generated by a radial
plan, with a circular perimeter, the building widens in profile as it
rises and tapers towards its apex. This distinctive form responds to the
constraints of the site: the building appears more slender than a
rectangular block of equivalent size; reflections are reduced and
transparency is improved; and the slimming of its profile towards the
base maximises the public realm at ground level. Environmentally, its
profile reduces the amount of wind deflected to the ground compared with
a rectilinear tower of similar size, helping to maintain pedestrian
comfort at street level, and creates external pressure differentials
that are exploited to drive a unique system of natural ventilation.
Conceptually
the tower develops ideas explored in the Commerzbank and before that in
the Climatroffice, a theoretical project with Buckminster Fuller that
suggested a new rapport between nature and the workplace, its
energy-conscious enclosure resolving walls and roof into a continuous
triangulated skin. Here, the towers diagonally braced structural
envelope allows column-free floor space and a fully glazed facade, which
opens up the building to light and views. Atria between the radiating
fingers of each floor link together vertically to form a series of
informal break-out spaces that spiral up the building. These spaces are a
natural social focus places for refreshment points and meeting areas -
and function as the buildings lungs, distributing fresh air drawn in
through opening panels in the faade. This system reduces the towers
reliance on air conditioning and together with other sustainable
measures, means that the building is expected to use up to half the
energy consumed by air-conditioned office towers.
In 2004, 30 St Mary Axe won the RIBA Stirling Prize. Accepting the award
from George Ferguson, the President of the Royal Institute of British
Architects, Norman Foster thanked the jury for acknowledging the
significance of its design. Winning the Stirling Prize is a great
honour, he stated, It is a credit to the commitment and vision of an
exceptional client and a talented team. 30 St Mary Axe is an embodiment
of the core values that we have championed for more than thirty years:
values about humanising the workplace, conserving energy, democratising
the way people communicate within a building, and the way that building
relates to the urban realm."
Apple's New Campus
Cupertino, CA, USA
McLaren Production Centre
Surrey, UK
Descriptive memory by F+P (in fosterandpartners.com):
"The McLaren Production Centre is the second building designed by Foster +
Partners at McLaren’s rural site on the outskirts of London. The
32,000-square-metre facility is intended for the manufacture of a range
of high-performance road cars and is located to the south-west of the
existing McLaren Technology Centre. The two buildings will be connected
by a subterranean walkway, lined with interactive exhibition spaces.
Sharing a common language of details and materials, the new building is
clad in aluminium tubes, the rounded corners of its rectilinear plan
reference the curves of the Technology Centre and the entrance, echoing
the existing building, is a circular glass drum beneath the overhang of
the roof canopy.
The MPC further develops an approach to
industrial architecture that was first explored in some of the
practice’s earliest projects for Reliance Controls and Renault. The roof
canopy is supported by a series of slender columns based on a standard
grid with repeated components and services are integrated with the
painted steel structure. McLaren’s manufacturing processes are closer in
spirit to an operating theatre than a factory and the new building,
with its ceramic tiled floors, is designed to showcase this technology.
The linear arrangement of the two-storey structure mirrors the flow of
the production line: components are delivered; the cars are assembled,
painted and tested, and then pass through a rolling road and car wash,
before leaving the building. Below this is a basement level for storage
and above is a mezzanine floor with views over the production line.
The
expansion of the campus is a similarly discreet intervention in the
landscape. Rising to just over 7 metres in height and embedded in the
gentle incline of the site, the MPC is sensitive to its rural setting
and will not be visible from the nearby road. Further screening will be
provided by the extensive planting of trees and excavated material will
help to conceal the building within the hill. The new building is also
designed to be sustainable – the Technology Centre uses the lake for its
cooling system, so the roof of the MPC supports this by collecting
rainwater and implementing a low-energy system of displacement
ventilation."
Photos:Nigel Young
Jameson House
Vancouver, Canada
Descriptive memory by F+P (in fosterandpartners.com):
"Rising above two existing art-deco buildings, Jameson House is a new
tower located at the heart of Vancouver’s heritage district. The scheme
continues the practice’s investigation into contemporary interventions
within historic structures, explored previously in a high-rise context
with the Hearst Tower in New York. The project is also an example of a
building that combines living and working in one location, encouraging
social activity and balancing energy consumption between its mix of
daytime and night-time uses.
The project involves the restoration of the A-listed 1921 Ceperley
Rounsfell Building – returning the entire internal double-height volume
to its original configuration – and the retention of the facade of the
B-listed Royal Financial Building, dating from1929. The new tower
comprises ten storeys of offices, including shops and a restaurant, and
twenty-six storeys of apartments with underground parking. The
relatively even twenty-four-hour spread of energy demands has enabled
full advantage to be taken of a central cogeneration plant – the first
of its kind to be used in Vancouver. It is planned to run on bio-diesel
as primary fuel and combined with an absorption cooling plant can
supplement both cooling and electricity requirements for the building.
Developed in response to the local climate, the concept for Jameson
House has been sensitive to seasonal sun paths, prevailing winds,
humidity levels, air temperatures and precipitation rates specific to
the location. Directional wind profiles and solar exposure have been
used to help determine the facade design and external building form to
achieve lower thermal loads and opportunities for open balconies and
natural ventilation. Jameson House will also be a green building in a
more literal sense. The top of the tower, the balconies, and a roof
terrace at level 4 will be green spaces, introducing planting and trees
to the precinct area, irrigated naturally via a rainwater harvesting
system."
Photos:Nigel Young
425 Park Avenue
New York, NY, USA
“Our aim is to create an exceptional building, both of its time and
timeless, as well as being respectful of its context and celebrated
Modernist neighbors – a tower that is for the City and for the people
that will work in it, setting a new standard for office design and
providing an enduring landmark that befits its world-famous location. Clearly expressing the geometry of its structure, the tapered
steel-frame tower rises to meet three shear walls that will be
illuminated, adding to the vibrant New York City skyline. Its elegant
facade seamlessly integrates with an innovative internal arrangement
that allows for three gradated tiers of column-free floors. Offering
world-class, sustainable office accommodation, the new building
anticipates changing needs in the workplace with large, flexible open
floor plates. Each of the three tiers – low, medium and high-rise – is
defined by a landscaped terrace with panoramic views across Manhattan
and Central Park. To maximize the Park Avenue frontage, the core is
placed to the rear, where glazed stairwells reveal long views towards
the East River, while at street level, there is potential for a large
civic plaza with significant works of art.”
- Norman Foster
Millenium Bridge
London, UK
Descriptive memory by F+P (in fosterandpartners.com):
"The Millennium Bridge springs from a creative collaboration between
architecture, art and engineering. Developed with sculptor Anthony Caro
and engineers Arup, the commission resulted from an international
competition. Londons only pedestrian bridge and the first new Thames
crossing since Tower Bridge in 1894, it links the City and St Pauls
Cathedral to the north with the Globe Theatre and Tate Modern on
Bankside. A key element in Londons pedestrian infrastructure, it has
created new routes into Southwark and encouraged new life on the
embankment alongside St Pauls.
Structurally, the bridge pushes
the boundaries of technology. Spanning 320 metres, it is a very shallow
suspension bridge. Two Y-shaped armatures support eight cables that run
along the sides of the 4-metre-wide deck, while steel transverse arms
clamp onto the cables at 8-metre intervals to support the deck itself.
This groundbreaking structure means that the cables never rise more than
2.3 metres above the deck, allowing pedestrians uninterrupted panoramic
views of London and preserving sight lines from the surrounding
buildings. As a result, the bridge has a uniquely thin profile, forming a
slender arc across the water, and spanning the greatest possible
distance with the minimum means. A thin ribbon of steel by day, it is
illuminated to form a glowing blade of light at night.
The bridge
opened in June 2000 and an astonishing 100,000 people crossed it during
the first weekend. However, under this heavy traffic the bridge
exhibited greater than expected lateral movement, and as a result it was
temporarily closed. Extensive research and testing revealed that this
movement was caused by synchronised pedestrian footfall - a phenomenon
of which little was previously known in the engineering world. The
solution was to fit dampers discreetly beneath the deck to mitigate
movement. This proved highly successful and the research undertaken by
the engineers has resulted in changes to the codes for bridge building
worldwide."
For more information and more projects visit Foster + Partners'
website.
