Glass Structures - Design and Construction of Self-supporting Skins.pdf

JAN WURM
GLASS
STRUCTURES
DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION OF
SELF-SUPPORTING SKINS
Birkhäuser
Basel ⋅ Boston ⋅ Berlin
Jan Wurm works for Arup Materials and Arup Facade Engineering in
London as an architect, designer, and project manager.



Translation from German into English: Raymond Peat, Aberdeenshire, UK,
and Elizabeth Schwaiger, Picton /Canada
Library of Congress Control Number: 2007924610
Bibliographic information published by the German National Library
The German National Library lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografi e;
detailed bibliographic data are available on the at -.
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved, whether the whole or part of the
material is concerned, specifi cally the rights of translation, reprinting, re-use of illustrations,
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This book is also available in a German language edition (ISBN 978-3-7643-7607-9).
© 2007 Birkhäuser Verlag AG
Basel · Boston · Berlin
. Box 133, CH-4010 Basel, Switzerland
Part of Springer Science+Business Media
Printed on acid-free paper produced from chlorine-free pulp. TCF ∞
Layout concept and cover design: by, Basel
Typesetting: Continue AG, Basel
Cover photograph: Arup
Printed in Germany
ISBN: 978-3-7643-7608-6
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Foreword by Graham Dodd 5
Preface and Acknowledgments 6
1 INTRODUCTION 9
2 SPANS OF GLASS 17
FROM LEAFY ARBOUR TO CLIMATE SKIN – THE SEARCH FOR PARADISE 18
Early period and Christian sacred architecture 19
The modern era 21
THE GLASS ROOF: FORM, FUNCTION AND CONSTRUCTION 25
3 FLAT GLASS AS A CONSTRUCTION MATERIAL 33
PROPERTIES OF GLASS 34
Flat glass as a load-bearing material 36
Flat glass as a building skin material 39
BASIC GLASS – FLOAT GLASS, ROLLED GLASS AND DRAWN GLASS