Applied R+D

In 2017 Foster + Partners redesigned the 2007 proposed scheme for the Lusail Towers in Qatar. The form-finding process for the towers attempts to maintain the twisting aesthetics of the original design, by introducing a morphing of the footprint from the ground floor to the roof giving it a new contemporary look. At the same time the overall form bulges inwards to accommodate structural efficiency, while the 8-arc floorplate ensures efficient space planning and standardization. The cladding system has an inherent sustainability sensitivity as it is spiralling around the buildings in one direction responding to the sun path, covering more where radiation reduction is needed, achieving a ground-breaking wall-to-glass ratio for the location. The Lusail Towers geometry is a result of series of interoperable parametric models using our internally developed software Hermes, where design data were exchanged in real time between disciplines and consultants in a vertically integrated fashion.

Foster + Partners is designing the first of the three signature pavilions for the Dubai Expo based on the sub-themes of Mobility, Sustainability and Opportunity. The façade features a series of horizontal stainless-steel fins that wrap around the building. These fins lift up to form a canopy for each of the three entrances. The Applied R+D team was involved in the computational design of the louvers, ensuring that the geometry has a continuous flow across the whole façade.

The starting point for the chapel’s design concept was to take three symbolic crosses set in the landscape, draped with a tent-like membrane. As the design evolved, the crosses became a tensegrity structure of cables and masts, whilst the membrane developed into a wooden latticework attached to the structure. The Applied R+D team provided comprehensive parametric modelling and design-to-production support for the project. Changes to the structural model were reflected automatically in the cladding model and fabrication documentation. This efficient workflow supported strong collaboration between architects, engineers, fabricators and computational designers. 

Since inception, the design of the pavilion was intended to evoke the undulating surfaces of sand dunes in the Emirates. The Applied R+D team worked closely with the design team to deliver glass reinforced concrete (GRC) wall panels that used a pseudo-random ripple pattern to balance randomness with the need for repetition. The precision of the digital models allowed the contractor to use them directly for computer-controlled fabrication. 

London’s first ecological tall building and an instantly recognisable addition to the city’s skyline, this headquarters designed for Swiss Re is rooted in a radical approach − technically, architecturally, socially and spatially. The tower’s diagonally braced structure allows column-free floor space and a fully glazed facade, which opens up the building to light and views. 

To deliver this radical design, members of the Applied R+D team created bespoke parametric design software that was well ahead of its time. All critical aspects of the building's form were numerically controlled by members of the design team and changes to key parameters would automatically regenerate the design model and documentation. 

For each iteration of the design for the Smithsonian Institution Courtyard, powerful bespoke software generated dedicated models for structural and acoustic analysis, visualisation, and eventually fabrication information. Optioneering allowed for designers to make informed choices about the combination of physical characteristics of the design. 

The new terminal for Queen Alia International Airport broke new ground for the practice in modular design and the use of concrete as the predominant material. The Applied R+D team helped to solve the complex geometric challenges in ensuring smooth curvature across the enormous roof shells. Custom drawing extraction software allowed for providing thousands of sections for the formwork direct to the fabricators. 

At 743,000 square metres, Mexico City International Airport was slated to be one of the world’s largest airports revolutionising airport design. The entire terminal is enclosed within a continuous lightweight gridshell, embracing walls and roof in a single, flowing form, evocative of flight. The Applied R+D team assisted with the development of the roof for the competition-winning entry. The roof was form found using computational methods and then dynamically relaxed. 

Completed as the gateway to the city for the twenty-ninth Olympiad in 2008, Beijing Capital International Airport is the world's largest and most advanced airport building − not only technologically, but also in terms of passenger experience, operational efficiency and sustainability. Three kilometres long, BCIA remains one of the largest computational generated roofs in the world. Custom software was written by the Applied R+D team to generate the geometry of the spaceframe roof and facades in an extremely compressed timeframe. 

Conceived as a monument and memorial to the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, the founding president of the UAE, the Zayed National Museum will be the centrepiece of the Saadiyat Island Cultural District and will showcase the history, culture and, more recently, the social and economic transformation of the Emirates. The evolution of the design for Sheikh Zayed Museum required a strong collaboration incorporating 3D modelling and computational design from the design team, Applied R+D, and the consulting engineers. Numerous 3D and data models allowed for updating the design and documentation of the sophisticated wing and pod components that will be central to the museum experience. 

The entire shell for the new proposed O’Hare terminal in Chicago was envisioned as a column-free space, comprised of a spaceframe with four landing points on each side - creating the impression of the roof almost floating over the concourse. The entire shell was dynamically relaxed and its panelisation and frame optimised both in terms of structural stability and environmental requirements. 

InnHub La Punt is a new centre for innovation in the heart of the Engadin valley that seeks to bring new visitors together with the local community to increase prosperity, create new jobs, and revitalise local crafts and produce. The roof has been carefully designed to combine renewable energy generation systems, arranged on angled surfaces to avoid snow accumulation, while allowing daylight to enter the deepest parts of the building. A parametric model of the roof was thus developed, in order to post-rationalise and standardise the dome’s geometry for fabrication purposes. 

The South Beach development covers an entire city block between the Marina and Civic District in the heart of downtown Singapore. A wide landscaped pedestrian avenue – a green spine – weaves through the site and is protected by a large canopy, which shelters the light-filled public spaces beneath from the extremes of the tropical climate. The canopy consists of a range of component modules with different angles and overlaps to promote shading, ventilation and rain protection. Custom software written by the Applied R+D group linked design team changes of the undulating canopy surface to the desired mix of canopy components enabling hundreds of iterations and refinements to the design. 

The 40-metre, long-range cruising yachts for the YachtPlus offered a great testbed for members of the Applied R+D group to use cutting-edge technology of the time to develop the design along the team. Parametric tools allowed for the precision-control of the shape, ensuring G1 continuity with the hull, while CFD was employed to analyse the shape. 

The base of the Molteni Arc is a hyperbolic surface, acting solely in compression, allowing it to be manufactured out of thin shell concrete. Creating the formwork for this concrete required exceptional control of digital modelling processes. The Applied R+D group contributed expertise in structural form-finding and parametric design to ensure a high level of quality throughout the design process. 

The Applied R+D group contributed to the design and rationalisation of the MOL Tower's facade – slated to be the tallest building in Budapest. Close collaboration with both design and BIM teams since inception resulted in a design which is not only iconic but also highly optimised for digital fabrication. The complex and challenging form of the building is predominantly constructed from flat and easy to manufactured panels while keeping the curve only where they are truly needed. 

Chesa Futura ('house of the future' in Romansch) fuses state-of-the-art computer design tools with centuries-old construction techniques to create an environmentally sensitive apartment building. Custom software generated a detailed parametric model, closely integrated with the fabrication process to deliver a pioneering timber building on a very constrained site. 

Located in the lobby of the Comcast Technology Center, is The Universal Sphere™, a structure that houses a unique cinematic experience created by Steven Spielberg for all ages, exploring the power of ideas. The Applied R+D group helped design and generate the geometry of exterior panels of the sphere. The panels are designed with repetition in mind, reducing the number of moulds needed for production while having a continuous seamless flow of the geometry. 

Sandbox is the latest generation of interactive design tools developed by the Applied R+D team. It takes advantage of recently developed games engines and is designed to be easy to set up and use in practice by designers. its integrated in the deign process at different scales from interiors and floorplates, through buildings, to masterplans. 

Interoperability describes the use of multiple discrete technologies to create a cohesive digital artefact or workflow. At Foster + Partners our multi-disciplinary integrated design approach demands this tight integration throughout the design process, from conception to completion. Not only have the Applied R+D team developed bespoke software such as Hermes; they have also been working closely with industry partners to test and investigate the use of collaborative platforms that break down boundaries between 3D design and visualisation by enabling a seamless interface between these two disciplines. These tools allow our designers and artists to collaborate on the same scene while working independently on their software of choice. Multiple design changes can be visualised simultaneously in real-time, allowing design options to be reviewed in parallel for faster design cycles. 

The IPM system is designed to break down the barriers between physical and digital modelling. By tracking a physical model as it is manipulated in real time, key metrics can be calculated on a linked digital model, allowing intuitive yet informed decision making, and the capture of design options as they evolve. 

The bespoke IME is an application developed in collaboration with the Urban Design team which provides a tangible interface that allows the real time design development and analysis of urban schemes. The analyses include CFD, Insolation, Vertical Sky Component, Pedestrian Simulation and Isovists. 

Hydra is a bespoke tool which takes large geometry generation and simulation tasks and splits them into smaller components which are automatically executed in parallel. Hydra allows to speed up the evolution process and analyse highly complex problems in hours and days instead of months. It allows us to create several thousand options at the early design stages. 

Our Cyclops software accelerates environmental and spatial analyses by distributing computational tasks across the thousands of discrete processors found in contemporary computer graphics hardware. Cyclops integrates directly with the Rhino CAD and Grasshopper parametric modelling software used throughout the practice.

Using our Quality of view analysis tools defining the best location and façade orientation of the pantry level at Bloomberg, giving the users of the pace uninterrupted views of the St. Paul’s Cathedral. 

The idea was to create a reflective ceiling for this triple-height space at the top of the tower, offering excellent views across the city to visitors. The Applied R+D team provided tools for exploring options in both virtual and augmented reality and evaluated options using bespoke software for analysing reflective potential from the horizon to the ceiling to the occupants. 

Glaucon has been used to extend a physical mock-up virtually, using a VR backpack PC and VR headset. The ability to align physical and virtual experiences has enabled Glaucon to be used to augment and extend the physical environment with the virtual at scale to experience projects as if they had been built in-situ. It has been used in a mobile context both as an onsite AR experience and entirely virtual use cases. This increases accessibility and allows users who may not have access to - or be comfortable using - head-mounted XR hardware. Remote app deployment has been used to increase application reach to any user with a compatible device.

Glaucon has been used in an entirely virtual context where users can experience or review an environment as if it were real. This allows multiple users who are not physically present, to engage with the design and be part of the decision-making. By combining the experience of the space with the detailed design models and enabling multiple users to collaborate virtually, the impact of the detailed design could be understood. Several environments have also been developed in conjunction with specialist teams to create the basis for a formalised review environment, allowing live project content to be loaded, cycled and review space states saved for immediate recall at a later point.

Foster + Partners have teamed up with Boston Dynamics as part of their early adopters’ programme for Spot, the semi-autonomous robot, to investigate how cutting-edge technologies can push the boundaries of both design and construction. Using 3D laser scanners mounted on Spot we are capturing and monitoring construction progress on building sites, as well as changes to furniture layouts in completed buildings. These repeated laser scans allow us to compare our digital design models to the reality as-built, and to build 4-dimensional models of space, to understand detailed changes over time. 

The Smart Campus uses smart building technology to gain insight about patterns of visitation, environment, and energy usage. Sensors are installed to monitor temperature, humidity, CO2 and washroom occupancy. An external sensor monitors climate and air quality. The dashboard provides a view of the various data. It can be used to see patterns over the course of a day, as well as during a specific 15-minute interval. 

The Applied R+D team have been conducting research into Post-Occupancy Digital Twins, which are focusing on how a physical space is being used. Here, spatial snapshots are used in combination with other data sources, such as occupancy levels and environmental information which combine to form a digital model of the existing which can engage with other digital tools and services. 

Construction sites are inherently dynamic environments, where changes need to be tracked and measured on a regular basis, capturing errors in time to meet the project timeframe and budget. The Applied R+D team have been hand-on with reality capture technologies, such as laser scanning, SLAM-based lidar scanning and photogrammetry. 

We utilise machine learning techniques to help us sift through current and historical data. Adding a layer of semantic understanding on top of this data - using natural language processing (NLP) - facilitates new ways of exploring our archives. Our objective is to make all this data easily accessible for everyone in the office. Foster + Partners search application is a demonstration showing the potential of such technology and allowing designers to find answers to pressing questions in the design guidelines.