"The Architect who is trying to create a masterpiece must study nature
just as the aircraft engineer studies flying beings............
side by side with changing forms of Nature
and
life there is something eternal that are the laws of beauty harmony
which prove to be the same in nature and human beings life."

A. S. SCHUSEV
 

"Hydraulic Transmission? We have it in sand.
The jack hammer? We might find it in wasps.
The ultrasonic radar? Bats have it.
The jet engine? It functions in squids.
The precision barometer? Frogs and leaches utilise it, Medusas can predict upcoming storms.
The Geiger counter? Look for it in snails.
Bees use a polarised solar compass.
A desalinisation plant? In the beak of an albatross.

Live nature finds in itself all the outstanding qualities of clairvoyant builders, engineers and architects."

I. B. LITINETSKY ("About Bionics" - 1972)

 

THE VERTICAL CITY BIONIC TOWER

The origin of this prototype is the will to answer with an innovative architectural proposal (Bionic Vertical Space) various questions that are in the mind of every architect and urban planner at the time of resolving the numerous problems supposed by high-rise buildings.

  1. Are there physical limitations in the conquest of vertical space?
  2. Beyond what height limit is the traditional tower type inappropriate?
  3. What role does man, as an inhabitant of these spaces, play in the design of vertical architectures?
  4. Is the traditional Urban model appropriate for mega-cities?

The Bionic Tower is the fruit of seven years of work conducted by the firm "CERVERA&PIOZ, wpa", the first in Spain to attempt applying the principles of Bionics to the problems facing tall buildings. A comparative investigation on the growth of vegetable species of varying sizes (from a blade of grass to huge tree structures) discovered important innovations that can be applied to the BVS Project and Mega Structures in architecture in general.

The challenge was not to conceive the highest possible tower, a task in itself stimulating and deeply rooted in the physical spirit of every architect, but rather, it has been to find similarities between the logic of vital growth of organisms and the architectural, mechanical, and structural logic normally applied to the design of tall buildings.

A blade of grass, measuring scarcely a few centimeters and a tree ten meters high, are two organic systems which must respond to similar biological, physical and chemical demands. Though these living organisms solve their respective existential problems differently, both need light, air, water and the context in which they flourish. They have the same need to rise from the ground,

support their own weight, resist wind forces, channel internally the movement of fluids, realise complex chemical processes, temporarily set in motion sophisticated systems of acceleration or delay, enable growth through structural and mechanical transformations which tend to insure its present and future survival. All of this is achieved while guaranteeing the survival of the

species through the clever production, offering and distribution of its precious seeds. It would seem that vegetation holds great promise as a vertical growth model and general analytical reference, with their vertical organisation space, to the architectural design of tall buildings.

 

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