Research Facility

Curved Wall Structure

This project consists of a large lightweight portal frame spanning 30m with a clear height of 18m to house a new free standing curved wall structure, with a surrounding lab and office space.

We designed the internal curved wall structure to be isolated from the main building whilst designing it for dynamic and seismic loading. 

The front curvature in both vertical and horizontal directions with a vertical back provides adequate inertia and stiffness as a free standing wall to counteract dynamic movement during the use of the building whilst providing the client with space for operational use.

Large spans and subsequent vibration issues were controlled in the laboratory and office spaces with the use of lean steel beams designed compositely with the concrete floor slab to provide an efficient design.