Foster + Partners have released designs for the biggest building ever built: Crystal Island in Moscow will be 450m high, cover an area of almost half a million square meters and contain a total floor area of 2.5 million square meters.The Crystal Island has already earned the reputation of the most ambitious building project in the world. The construction is evaluated at four billion dollars.
The city within the building will house 900 luxury apartments, 3,000
hotel rooms, a theater, a fitness complex, a cinema, a museum and an
international school for 500 students, not to mention countless stores.
The exterior facade will be solar responsive and will include solar
panels which, along with wind turbines, will generate electricity for
the huge tower. Natural ventilation will be provided thanks to numerous
strategically placed large atriums. The internal environment will also
have dynamic enclosure panels slotted into the structural framing that
will allow daylight to penetrate deep into the heart of the structure;
the panels will also be controlled to modify temperature inside the
building – closed in winter for extra warmth and opened in summer to
allow natural ventilation.
Most likely, the skyscraper is built about ten kilometers far from Moscow’s center. The project is set to be completed in 2014.