LOVELY PROFESSIONAL UNIVERSITY
Presented by:
AR. TRILOK KUBDE
27th Aug, 2022
CANTON TOWER

INTRODUCTION
 The tower is located in Guangzhou’s Haizhu district at the
intersection of the New Central Axis with the Pearl River.
 The design of the building was chosen through an international
architectural design competition in 2004. Famous senior
architectural offices and firms participated in the competition
and Information Based Architecture (IBA), a Dutch architecture
office based in Amsterdam won the contest with a design that
symbolizes the trend of Guangzhou city towards challenges
and modernity.

Building Background
 The design competition did not only call for a tower’s design
but also the design of a 17.9 ha park and a 56.6 ha master
plan that includes an elevated plaza, pagoda park, retail
facilities, offices, television center, and a hotel.
 Construction Commission of Guangzhou Municipality chose
IBA’s design for its elegance, beauty, and its hi-tech features.
IBA’s initial concept design was simple. Its cylinder was tapered
and twisted counterclockwise to model a feminine graceful
sculpture.

 The tower rises 600 meters with 454-meters height
allocated for 37 storey's and 146 meters for the
antenna. The building has a multifunctional program,
which includes exhibition spaces, a conference center,
a cinema, several restaurants, cafes, and observation
decks. It is divided into three main zones:
Building Background

Historic Research

Planning
1. Base Zone
It contains all infrastructure services of the tower, in addition to metro
and bus stations. The entrance has two levels, one opens to the park
and the other serves the underground transportation and the 600-
vehicle parking lot. This zone also includes a museum, food courts,
stores, and slow and high-speed lifts.
2. Middle Zone
It starts from the height + 80 m to + 170 m and contains a 4D
cinema, play areas, restaurants, coffee shops, and outdoor
balconies.
3. Top Zone
It includes technical services and mechanical equipment such as
Dampers. It also contains a two-storey rotating restaurant and an
observation deck.

Building Context
The purpose of the IBA design of the tower was to have an
unfamiliar geometry for a TV tower. They wanted to design a
funky skyscraper that is friendly and welcomes the people of
Guangzhou city to visit and have fun. They made the tower a
place of pleasure and enjoyment by providing it with
entertainment services such as the Skywalk. The skywalk is
hanging gardens vary in terms of atmosphere, lighting, and
views. They also designed an open spiral staircase between
+170 m level and +350 m. the visitors can enjoy the scene of
the lattice structure from inside and the beauty of the waist’s
shape.

The tower was also provided with
observation boxes at levels + 32,
+116 as outdoor gardens, and at
levels +168, +454, +459 as
indoor gardens. They are glass
boxes that extend out of the tower
geometry to give the visitors the
ability to enjoy the scene of the
city under their feet.
The roof of the tower is used as an
observation deck. It has a sloping
oval shape that was
tapered diagonally towards the
North-West axis. The visitors can
sit on this slope and enjoy the view
of the old city from 460 high. They
can take a ride on the world’s
highest horizontal Ferris wheel
Bubble Tram that is moving along
the perimeter of the deck.

Overview of Parametric Design
The designer’s Mark Hemel and Barbara Kuit were determined to design the tallest,
most feminine TV tower in the world. “Where most skyscrapers bear ′male′ features,
such as being, introvert, strong, straight, rectangular, and based on repetition, they
wanted to create a ′female ′ tower being complex, transparent, curvy and gracious.
there aim was to design a free-form tower with a rich and human-like identity that
would represent Guangzhou as a dynamic and exciting city. They wanted it to be
non-symmetrical so that the building would look as if ′in movement′ and ′alive′.

Qualitative Research

TWISTING TOWER

The Structural Design
The Canton Tower’s structure consists of two tubes, one inside the other. The inner
tube is represented in the elliptical reinforced concrete core. The core contains the
lifts, fire emergency elevators, stairs, and shafts. It consists of 37 reinforced
concrete floors varying in design, area, height, and functions. Whereas the outer
tube is defined with the lattice grid that consists of columns, diagonals, rings, and
nodes. They also differ in their horizontal sections, shapes, and designs, which
gave the tower its feminine distinguished form. Here is a detailed explanation
about the structural elements:

Historic Research

The Structural Design
:
Columns
There are 24 hollow steel pillars filled with concrete. At the tower base, the diameter
of the columns is about 2 meters with a 50 mm thick steel plate. The length of each
piece of the columns ranges about 3.7 meters, which are then bolted and welded. At
the top, the diameter decreases to 1.1 m and 30 mm thick steel plate.
Diagonals
The diagonals are the structural elements that intersect diagonally with the columns to
create the lattice web. The diameter of the diagonals is fixed at 800 mm
Rings
The rings were added to the structure as supportive elements for the lattice web. They
were inserted and hide inside the structure to reinforce the columns and the diagonals
through the nodes. The rings were tilted 15 degrees to be more consistent with the form.
They also vary in their horizontal profile according to their positions on the web
.

Nodes
The design of the nodes was the biggest challenge for the designers. There are 1100
nodes for the 600 m height structure and each node is unique with different sizes and
details
Foundations
Twenty-four piles were dug at 40 meters in the ground with a 3.8 m diameter
6. The Antenna
The antenna rises 150 meters above the observation deck. It has an octagonal cross-
section, and it was manufactured into two pieces; the thinner piece rises 80 meters, and it
was constructed inside the wider one. The complete installation of the antenna was
accomplished with the positioning of the upper piece in May 2009.

7. The Outwear
The outwear of the tower was made of a high-strength anti-explosion laminated glass.
Each piece of the glass has its specific design and size and was all gathered to create the
ruled surface.
8. The Fabrication
Because of the curved surface, none of the 10,000 structural elements are the same. This
made the construction process difficult and required a high level of accuracy. All nodes,
columns, and diagonals were prefabricated at a factory in Shanghai. They were all
delivered by trucks and installed on site. In the beginning, the tubes of the columns were
bolted. After completing the assembly operation, the columns were welded, and then the
bolts were burned off. For more stability, the concrete was poured inside the steel hollow
columns. It also provides more protection against fire accidents.