Project story · Alexandria, Egypt
Structure as identity
Two towers rise from the Alexandria seafront. The taller wears a lattice that is at once its structure, its pattern and its shelter.
By byJOOM · The Jewel of Cleopatra · Mixed-use · Hospitality and resorts
A lattice that does the work
A structural lattice wraps the taller tower and opens at its base into a pointed entrance, so that structure becomes both identity and shelter. The pattern is not applied to the building; it is the building. A diagonal lattice, a diagrid, carries the load and gives shade, so that what the eye reads as ornament is doing structural and climatic work.
Two heights, two readings
The two towers stand at different heights so that they read together from the water and apart from the street. From the sea they are a pair. From the boulevard they separate into two distinct presences, each with its own scale. This is a small decision with a large effect on a skyline that is mostly seen from a moving car or a boat.
An entrance you can read
The building is a hotel with homes and workplaces, and the people who move between them along a busy coastal road. The entrance is a tall, open portal off a palm-lined boulevard, so arriving is clear and unhurried. Where the lattice meets the ground it widens into a gate, and the gate says, plainly, where to go.
The view from the boulevard
Close to the foot of the tower the diamonds of the lattice rise over the palms and the street, framing the pointed entrance. Further off, the pair of towers stands above the waterfront blocks, and the lattice becomes a fine skin of pattern that is visible from far along the coast.
Pattern, proportion and glass that changes through the day. The design relies on structure and light, not on ornament that dates.
Glass that changes through the day
The glass skin changes with the sky, reflecting blue at midday and warm light toward the evening. The design relies on structure and light, not on ornament that dates. Pattern, proportion and glass that changes through the day give the towers their presence without borrowing from any style that will be out of date in ten years.
Nothing that will date
Structure that is also pattern needs no renewal when taste turns. That is the quiet claim of the scheme: if the lattice is how the tower stands, the face of the building is simply the truth.
This article describes design intention. The images are design visualisations, not photographs of a finished building. See the Disclaimers.