Architecture

Fantastical skyscraper competition lets designers' imaginations fly

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Climate Control Skyscraper, by South Korea's Kim Gyeong Jeung, Min Yeong Gi, and Yu Sang Gu, won the eVolo 2022 Skyscraper Competition. It imagines multiple towers that would convert seawater into rainclouds to address drought caused by climate change
eVolo
Climate Control Skyscraper, by South Korea's Kim Gyeong Jeung, Min Yeong Gi, and Yu Sang Gu, won the eVolo 2022 Skyscraper Competition. It imagines multiple towers that would convert seawater into rainclouds to address drought caused by climate change
eVolo
Climate Control Skyscraper was designed by South Korea's Kim Gyeong Jeung, Min Yeong Gi, and Yu Sang Gu. Multiple towers would be built above oceans and convert seawater into rainclouds to address drought caused by climate change
eVolo
Tsunami Park Skyscraper was designed by China's Wang Jue, Zhang Qian, Zhang Changsheng, Li Muchun, and Xu Jing. Its design is inspired by mangroves and would be used to protect nearby communities from tsunamis
eVolo
New Spring: Agro-ecological Skyscraper was designed by Michał Spólnik and Marcin Kitala, from Austria and Poland, respectively. It would be made from timber and host different types of plants and animal species that would be used help solve food scarcity
eVolo
Regenerative Highrise was designed by UK- and Singapore-based Haptic Architects, Ramboll Tomas Stokke and Shonn Mills. It envisions an adaptable timber skyscraper that could be easily changed to suit different needs in the future
eVolo
Urban Bypass Surgery was designed by China's Yi Liu, Baichao Wang, Hao Zhang, YiHui Gao, ZongHao Yang, and Shiliang Wang. It envisions overhauling the Chinese city of Changchun's overwhelmed transport system with cable cars, while also adding new parks and even movable buildings
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Tree Skyscraper In South Sudan was designed by Israel's Ron Krakovski and Talia Tsuk. The idea is that it would collect rainwater and condensation to ensure a steady supply of drinking water is available to Sudanese people
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Connecting Skyscrapers In Hong Kong Through Infrastructure was designed by China's Zheng Xiangyuan. The proposal envisions utilizing the unused spaces between skyscrapers by adding connecting pipes to serve as living spaces
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Urban Condenser was designed by China's Yunheng Fan, Baoying Liu, Rongwei Gao and Junliang Liu. It imagines a unique community for migrant workers
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City Healer Skyscraper, by Wang Changsi, Guo Fang, and SiYuan Zhang from China, is a futuristic residential tower that would be self-sufficient and keep residents safe from disease
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FUNG(S)I: The Vanguard Of Habitat Restoration was designed by Indonesia's Christopher Tanihaha, Vincentius Kevin Aditya, Arnetta Hamijoyo, Christina Putri Larasati, Evan Januar, Gavrila Mandy Kahuni, Eugenia Jessica, Felia Alexandra Linoh, Luciana Augusta, Gregorius Christian, and Reynaldi Daud. It imagines a floating community that tackles rising seawater levels and sinking land
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Cure For Desertification Skyscraper was designed by China's Wanjing Wang, Zhenhao Chen, Minghui Sang, Xiaoran Xiong and Kaifeng Fan. It would tackle desertification with a range of ideas, including a wall to physically block the expanding desert and the planting of forests to re-green the surrounding areas
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Hyper-Mask Skyscraper was designed by Yu Liu, Junjie Hou, Jiaxi Shi, Hailin Wu, Ronghui Yang and Jiang An from China. Taking inspiration from the face masks that are ubiquitous in many cities since COVID-19, the proposal envisions a mask-like membrane that would cover the tower and improve interior air quality
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Air Purification Skyscraper was designed by China's Zelun Wang, Shengwu Fan and Manqian Lin. The proposal consists of a greenery filled tower that would purify the surrounding air
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Skyscraper For Open Pit Mines was designed by Switzerland's Sacha Cudré-Mauroux, Nils Hayoz, Bart Oosterhoff and Thomas Wenzel. It was designed for the pit mine of the Australian city of Kalgoorlie and would transform the former mining wasteland into a vibrant new area for the city
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Residential Flying Unit Nest Skyscraper was designed by Portugal's Mohammad Pirdavari. The blue-sky proposal imagines a skyscraper that hosts self-sufficient flying vehicles that double as living spaces
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Skyscraper Injects New Life To Tiankeng was designed by Shuzhan Liu, Siang Duan, Yimin Gao, Jingyi Li, Shiliang Wang and Daxu Wei from China. It imagines a futuristic residential development for people in Tiankeng in Shaotong City, China, that would be interconnected
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Adobe Farm Skyscraper was designed by Sweden's Hamidreza Esmailnazari, Hosein Mosavi, Amir Hossein Saeedi Majd, Hossein Amery, Hossein Arshadi Soufiani, Ali Jamali and Maryam Baharvandi. It imagines a huge self-sufficient skyscraper that incorporates urban farming in Iran
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The City Chloroplast: A Skyscrapers That Absorbs CO2 And Converts It Into Starch was designed by China's Kaiyu Chen, Yong Lin, Ziyi Li and Zhipeng Tao. It would help purify the atmosphere by collecting CO2 and transform it into starch, which could then be used for other purposes
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Sanctuary Above The Tomb: Inhabiting Radioactive Marshall Islands was designed by China's Xueer Wang. It would protect residents from potential radiation leaks on the former US nuclear test site
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MERU: Center For Organic Parallel Development was designed by Karan Jain, and Vishwal Ram Gowda from India. The tower would be used as a base to help recycle the huge amounts of waste in and around Delhi
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Beeswax Skyscraper: A Tower Made By Cooperating With A Swarm Of Bees was designed by Chien-Ching Su of Taiwan. It would serve as a massive new habitat for bees
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OASIS-Æ2030: Desertification Restoration Protective Membrane was designed by Taiwan's Han-Yu Lai, Wei-Qun Cai, and Chun-Yi Yeh. It would help mitigate the effects of climate change and food scarcity by creating a rich vertical garden for producing large amounts of food
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Adapting Obsolescence was designed by Ahmed Helal from the United States. It imagines converting aging New York City office skyscrapers that are no longer needed into new residential towers, rather than demolishing them to make way for new towers
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View gallery - 24 images

The winners of the annual eVolo Skyscraper Competition have been announced. Featuring a climate-controlling tower and tsunami-resistant high-rises, plus a food producing tower, it offers a look at architectural design unconstrained by practicalities.

For those unfamiliar with the contest, the eVolo Skyscraper Competition is less concerned with plans for towers that could ever actually be built and instead focuses on highlighting interesting ideas. There's no official overriding theme to join them all together, however climate change looms large this year, plus there are a few designs influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic too.

"eVolo Magazine is pleased to announce the winners of the 2022 Skyscraper Competition," said eVolo. "The Jury selected three winners and 20 honorable mentions from 427 projects received. The annual award established in 2006 recognizes visionary ideas that through the novel use of technology, materials, programs, aesthetics, and spatial organizations, challenge the way we understand vertical architecture and its relationship with the natural and built environments."

The three winning projects are shown below, while our gallery has the entire list of 20 honorable mentions, including a beehive skyscraper and a tower designed to host flying cars/homes.

Climate Control Skyscraper was designed by South Korea's Kim Gyeong Jeung, Min Yeong Gi, and Yu Sang Gu. Multiple towers would be built above oceans and convert seawater into rainclouds to address drought caused by climate change
eVolo

First place position went to the Climate Control Skyscraper, which was designed by a South Korean team made up of Kim Gyeong Jeung, Min Yeong Gi, and Yu Sang Gu.

Featuring an unusual futuristic tapering form, the idea behind the design is that a number of the skyscrapers would rise above oceans near coastal areas. The towers would then be used to convert seawater into rainclouds, which would in turn encourage rainfall and help areas nearby suffering from drought. It would run from solar power and include some kind of cloud generator that makes use of pressurized water vapor.

Tsunami Park Skyscraper was designed by China's Wang Jue, Zhang Qian, Zhang Changsheng, Li Muchun, and Xu Jing. Its design is inspired by mangroves and would be used to protect nearby communities from tsunamis
eVolo

Second place went to the Tsunami Park Skyscraper, by China's Wang Jue, Zhang Qian, Zhang Changsheng, Li Muchun, and Xu Jing.

This interesting conceptual design would be built off the coast of Tonga to help protect the country from tsunamis. The skyscraper – really it looks more like a collection of high-rise residences on stilts – would feature an overall form inspired by mangroves. During normal use it would enable people to live on and around it, with the spaces between its concrete columns hosting tidal fishing. However, when a tsunami strikes, its shape, alongside large water cisterns would help reduce the power of the tsunami, keeping the land-based communities safe.

New Spring: Agro-ecological Skyscraper was designed by Michał Spólnik and Marcin Kitala, from Austria and Poland, respectively. It would be made from timber and host different types of plants and animal species that would be used help solve food scarcity
eVolo

New Spring: Agro-ecological Skyscraper was designed by Michał Spólnik and Marcin Kitala, from Austria and Poland, respectively.

The pair's project envisions a mostly timber skyscraper that looks a little like a thin pine cone standing upright. It would be used to help alleviate global food production shortages by increasing the number of crop and livestock species used. The tower would host a number of timber-based modules that serve as experimental gardens, offering scientists and researchers a place to pursue new ideas for reliable food sources in the face of climate change.

Source: eVolo

View gallery - 24 images
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5 comments
FB36
Here is a more general/useful/practical/realistic idea for cities of the future:
Imagine eventually massive amounts of fusion power becomes available to humanity & massive amounts of titanium metal is mined (which is extremely strong/durable/light & Earth has plenty but requires massive amounts of (clean) power to mine/process!)!
Imagine then a standard LEGO-like set of parts designed which allows quickly/easily building cities of any size on land or water!
(Cities which are extremely strong & durable & unaffected by any earthquakes/hurricanes/fires/floods!)
Daishi
I've been down the wormhole of city planning and watching youtube channels like Not Just Bikes lately. I'm pretty convinced building cities that don't require car ownership is the only path forward to sustainability. Getting there in places already built for cars may require something like building a dedicated system of sky bridges for pedestrians and bicycles that is free from cars.
GdB
Build a GIGANTIC mountain like structure that harvests water and/or causes rain. Under/inside it a city can exist. Not exactly Bladerunner.
Dan Lewis
I see many interesting designs, but none that I'd want to live years in.
Joel Smart
I've lived happily in an apartment, but larger pets and kids make you want to have more private outdoor space than they allow. One solution might be to build towers of houses, with yards on the roofs of the units below them. Not quite as efficient as a small apartment, but much more condensed than your typical residential street. Building larger towers with their own grocery stores and parks incorporated into them, as well as more communal spaces, seems like a smart move.