Burj Khalifa

Burj Khalifa

At 802 metres, Burj Khalifa is the tallest building in the world. Do you know the second tallest building? It is China’s Shanghai Tower at 632 metres. Construction of the Burj Khalifa started in 2004, and its official opening was in January 2010.

Until its opening, it was known as Burj Dubai. The name changed to honour Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the president of the United Arab Emirates. His government lent Dubai tens of billions of dollars at a time the state was deep in debt of about $80 billion. Here are some records it holds: the tallest freestanding structure,  building with the most floors at 211 ( 156 usable floors, 46 spiral floors, two below ground parking levels and nine maintenance levels). It has the highest open observation deck, highest nightclub (144th floor) and restaurant (122nd floor). The following are some of the six world records it holds.

The Tower’s Construction

Burj Khalifa

Excavation started in 2004, and by June 2006, the building had 50 levels. By July 2007 approximately 1,325 days since excavation work, the team had achieved 141 floors to make it the world’s tallest buildings.

Over 110,000 tonnes of concrete were used for the concrete and steel foundation, which consisted of 192 piles buried for more than 50 metres. It also took 22 million person-hours to complete the project. Each day there were about 12,000 workers on sight. The number of engineers and technicians involved was more than 380.

The tower also has the highest installed aluminium and glass façade. The team would install about 20-30 panels per day at the early stages of the project, and they progressed to about 175 panels. About 31,400 metric tonnes of rebar went in the tower.

Build Purpose and Design

Burj Khalifa

Planners first aimed to make the Burj Khalifa entirely residential. However, this changed to accommodate mixed use. Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill came up with the original design. Another major contributor was Fazlur Rahman Khan who invented the bundled tube design. This allowed the building to consume about half of the steel used for the Empire State Building. The inspiration for the design came from Islamic architecture.

It spirals from the ground with mass decreasing as it rises. The model underwent numerous wind tests for maximum performance in the wind. The external cladding composed of aluminium can withstand Dubai hot temperatures. During the construction, the engineers added stainless metal fins to highlight its height.

The design team also solved problems of ventilating the tall building by drawing air at the top of the structure. Other innovations include the condensate recovery system, smart lighting, and energy optimisation systems.

For the last six years, Burj Khalifa has played an increasing role in Dubai’s Tourism and skyline. You can see the building 90 kilometres away, and the sun remains visible to the residents at the top for several minutes after it sets. It is home to the five star Armani Hotel that occupies fifteen floors. The building has swimming pools, 900 private apartments, cooperate suits, 57 elevators and more. From the group floor to the 160th floor, there are 2,909 stairs. Overall, the Burj Khalifa is the masterpiece of the 21st century.

The History of Windsor Castle

The History of Windsor Castle

The Winsor Castle is among the most popular castles in the world.  It is the English royal residence, and ever since it was built, it was associated with advanced architecture and wealth. It is the castle with the longest England royal family occupants in the history of Europe. Windsor is one of the most attractive tourist destinations in England.

The castle is in the district of Maidenhead and Windsor, in Berkshire, an England County. Windsor Castle occupies five hectares of land on a small hill above River Thames south banks. Romans and Celts who protected the area with forts used the location in the past.

William I nicknamed William the conqueror developed the Windsor Castle site. He started building a mound using woods in the year 1070, and the castle was complete after sixteen years. Later, Henry, I became attached to the castle and domesticated his quarters in the castle. He then envisioned the castle becoming the English crown royal home.

Upgrades Made to the Windsor Castle

In the 12th century, Henry II reconstructed the castle from its small and simple architectural design to a magnificent castle. He replaced the original building with a stone round tower and an outside stone curtain wall to the east, north, and south. Later in the 13th century, Henry III completed the wall and changed the castle into a luxurious palace. He constructed the royal chapel currently known as the Albert Memorial.

Furthermore, Edward III redesigned it from being a military fortification to a glorious palace. He made it the most expensive building in Europe as he spent £50,000, more than any English King did spend on a building. The king had a plan to construct a castle that had areas for both official and private use. He built the gatehouse and royal apartments on the northern part of the Quadrangle.

Moreover, the only addition made in the 15th century by Henry VIII was to construct a narrow range on the State Apartments west side, and the gate that has his name. When Elizabeth I stayed at the Windsor Castle, she created an intensive repair program. Elizabeth built a gallery that overlooked the North Terrace. It was later combined with the Royal Library in the 19th century. Both Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, made the palace the heart of the diplomatic entertainment and British crown.

Additionally, the castle was turned into a prison during the English Civil War. It was also the Parliamentary forces military headquarters. In 1660, Charles II reclaimed and rebuilt the castle as a grandest baroque State Apartment. Later on, George III and George IV started the gothic transformation of the palace. They used a significant amount of wealth to redecorate both the interior and the exterior of the castle in a more artistic style.

During World War II, the castle housed the entire royal family. After many years of restoration, the Windsor castle was destroyed by fire in 1992. The fire destroyed the state dining room, grand reception room, private chapel, ceilings, and the Crimson Drawing Room. The rebuilding of the castle started immediately, and some parts were offered to the public.

Landscape Architecture – An Economical Step to a Purified World

Have you ever heard about the amalgamation of landscape and architecture? Well, the concept may although synonymize with beautification, it’s more about the art of unifying man-made structures with natural landscape as well as designs for water, planting, and landform. To be more precise, it relates to the creation of a space, building up an ambiance and developing a brand new public realm within an environmental framework. To make such miracles happen, landscape architects adopt scientific as well as artistic principles in regard to managing, designing, planning, rehabilitating and preserving built and natural environments.

Once a landscape plan is formulated in tune with the architectural sketches, clients get a clear picture of the coming days. In other words, they are assured of not only having developed buildings but several superior end results that would help them do a good deal of cost savings. Landscape architecture, in fact, is highly crucial for the environment, and believe it or not, there are many reasons behind it. Apart from lessening the chances of producing waste and excessive resources, recycling will come into action whenever required. Most importantly, the relationship between environment and its people will be fostered.

With the exorbitant rise of the world’s population, our resources are getting pressurized. Here the landscape architects have a major role to play as they would ensure to reap the following benefits:

Regenerating all polluted areas

Imagine those industrialized areas that have been inflicted with pollution, especially the factories that are actually a key source of economic power. So, even if the factory is gone, it will leave its site unusable for being a bad polluter. However, after the area gets cleaned up, what will fix up things are landscaping and planting.

Preserving nature

Today, the majority prefers living in an environment-friendly ambiance, dotted with trees and plants. In fact, there are several places throughout the world where trees and plants were initially included in their planning. Although the urban areas, nowadays, are found to be set up with wooden decking and concrete flooring, one will always find plants in spaces around them. Where people today have become so much aware of environment preservation, landscape architects can just bring sound solutions to prevalent issues related to environment and can also safeguard ecology along with protecting national treasures.

Ensuring clean water

If there is any prime environmental issue, it is the absence of clean water. In fact, the drastic changes in pollution and climate have largely affected its supply. Wetlands, moreover, have been endangered since they can filter storm-water, regulate floods and comprise biological diversity. So, the benefit of landscape architecture here would be the promotion of more and more wetlands that will result in the provision of managing storm-water naturally.

Purifying the air

It’s true that plants take up all sorts of polluting gases by means of their stomata. With this, the air gets filtered to a good extent and also becomes cleaner. So, where people stay more concerned about the harmful quality of outside air, landscape architecture will take efforts to improve the indoor air quality by filtering it through plants.

 

Letting hot weather disappear

The saddest part of urban areas of the 21st century is lack of trees and presence of concrete structures. As a result, there is more heat generated owing to the absence of open green spaces. What the landscape architects can do here is that they will build pocket parks to make sufficient shade from the sun, helping the little ones play with peace and the old ones relax.

With these benefits of landscape architecture, some beautiful eco-friendly cities equipped with green, invigorating spaces can be created and that also at minimal expenses.