The construction of the building, designed by a team of architects and engineers, took about one and a half years. The center is located in the Queen Victoria Docklands next to the Emirates Air Line cable car, which was built for the 2012 Olympics and connected the dock area to Greenwich across the Thames. By the way, the road was also designed by Wilkinson Eyre Architects.
The Global Center was created to promote and stimulate the growth of the eco-cities of the future. This is a large technology and innovation cluster, where the world's leading urban experts and specialists in the field of sustainable urban development will work. Therefore, it is not at all surprising that Crystal is currently the most environmentally friendly building in London, having already received the highest scores on the international energy efficiency rating systems BREEAM and LEED.
Thanks to the used renewable energy sources and high-tech systems (heat pumps, photovoltaic cells, etc.), the building needs almost no external energy. Heating and air conditioning of the internal space is carried out by a network of heat exchange tubes with a total length of 17 km and underground energy storage facilities. And the share of recycled water is 90% here, and after cleaning rainwater can be drunk without threat to life and health.
The complex, called Crystal, and outwardly resembles a crystal - according to architects, this is one of the most energy efficient structures ever invented by nature. Pavilion-type building with an area of 6300 sq. m in plan is a figure of two interpenetrating rhombuses. When looking at a building, it is impossible to immediately determine where the facade ends and the roof begins: the glass "multifaceted" membrane covers it entirely.
The architects used glass panels of varying degrees of transparency, thanks to which the facets of the facades amaze the imagination with their depth and rich black and white pattern. At night, the fractured media facades equipped with fantastic illumination can be used as giant screens. The unusual shape of the building allowed the authors to experiment with internal layouts: Crystal includes rooms of different configurations and ceiling heights - offices, showrooms, conference rooms, auditoriums, an innovation center. In particular, a one-of-a-kind exposition with an area of 2000 sq. m, dedicated to the future of cities and cities of the future, that is, new construction, energy and environmental technologies. The center also has a cafe and a charging point for electric vehicles. According to Siemens, investments in this project amounted to more than 30 million British pounds.
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