It is a very big day for Rem Koolhaas and the entire OMA team, as their iconic CCTV building in Beijing—OMA's largest project so far—is being officially completed today.
↑ CCTV/OMA, photographed by Iwan Baan
Here is the official release we just received from OMA:
Today OMA participated in the official construction completion ceremony for the China Central Television (CCTV) Headquarters in Beijing, which will start to be used later this year. Designed by OMA as a reinvention of the skyscraper as a loop, construction on the building began in 2004. At approximately 473, 000m2, CCTV – accommodating TV studios, offices, broadcasting and production facilities – is OMA’s largest ever project and its first major building in China.
↑ CCTV/OMA, photographed by Iwan Baan
↑ CCTV/OMA, photographed by Iwan Baan
CCTV defies the skyscraper’s typical quest for ultimate height. Rising from a common platform, two towers lean towards each other and eventually merge in a perpendicular, 75-metre cantilever. The design combines the entire process of TV-making – formerly scattered in various locations across the city – into a loop of interconnected activities.
↑ CCTV/OMA, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA, photographed by Iwan Baan
↑ CCTV/OMA, photographed by Jim Gourley
The structure of the CCTV Headquarters, and the forces at work within it, is visible on its façade: a web of diagonals that becomes dense in areas of greater stress, looser and more open in areas requiring less support. The façade itself becomes a visual manifestation of the building’s structure.
Rem Koolhaas commented: “I am very happy, after years of intense collaboration, that the CCTV building will soon begin to perform its role in the way it is intended.”
↑ CCTV/OMA, photographed by Philippe Ruault
↑ CCTV/OMA, photographed by Philippe Ruault
↑ CCTV/OMA, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA, Image courtesy of OMA
The CCTV project was led by OMA / Rem Koolhaas, former OMA partner Ole Scheeren (until 2010), OMA partner David Gianotten and project manager Dongmei Yao in close collaboration with partners Shohei Shigematsu, Ellen van Loon and Victor van der Chijs. The design team consisted of project architects Anu Leinonen, Charles Berman and Adrianne Fisher together with a team of over 100 architects from OMA.
↑ CCTV/OMA, photographed by Iwan Baan
↑ CCTV/OMA, Time Lapse, Image courtesy of OMA
The structural and MEP design was provided by Cecil Balmond and Arup, while ECADI (East China Architectural Design & Research Institute) functioned as the Local Design Institute. Design Consultants included Front INC, Inside/Outside, DHV, DMJMH+N, Lerch Bates & Associates, LPA, Sandy Brown Associates and Romano Gatland NY.
↑ CCTV/OMA - Loop, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Axon Exploded, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Demand Capacity Ratios, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Facade, Image courtesy of OMA
Project Details:
Completion due: 2012
Competition: 2002
Client: China Central Television (CCTV)
Site: 20 hectares in new Central Business District
Program: CCTV total 473,000 m2: Administration 64,200 m2, Multi-Purpose 54,900 m2, News Production 65,800 m2, Broadcasting 31,800 m2,
Program Production 105,400 m2, Staff Facilities 30,000m2, Parking 61,500 m2, Service Building 15,000m2
Budget: 5 Billion RMB (850 Million EUR)
Tower 1: Height: 234 m, 54 floors, Footprint: 40x60 m, 2,400 m2
Tower 2: Height: 210 m, 44 floors, Footprint: 40x52 m, 2,000 m2
Overhang Bottom: 162 m, 14 floors
Overhang Cantilever: 75 m to the west, 67 m to the south
Base Height: 45 m, 9 floors, Footprint 160x160 m
Basement: 18 m, 4 floors
↑ CCTV/OMA - Elevation North, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Elevation East, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Elevation South, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Elevation West, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Section A-A, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Section B-B, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Landscape Plan, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Ground Floor Plan, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Plan F15, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Plan F25, Image courtesy of OMA
↑ CCTV/OMA - Plan F41, Image courtesy of OMA
12 Comments
wait.. it wasn't finished?
Love the big underpants!
Alex, there is one interior photo, the shot looking out from floor porthole....
Love the big underpants!
LOL!
I guess every firm needs at least one duck in their portfolio.
473,000m2 = 5,091,330sf. Holy moly.
One nation under CCTV
According to Wikipedia, the Mall of America has 4.2 million sf.
$155 per sq/ft...Bravo OMA!
the Walt Disney Concert Hall that opened in Los Angeles in 2003 cost about $935 per sq/ft
the Rem Koolhaas (REX) - library in Seattle that opened in 2004 cost about $273 per sq/ft
(http://blog.oregonlive.com/behindducksbeat/2010/08/university_of_oregon_reveals_p.html)
Alexander has a point, there is a lack of interior photos for this project across the web, perhaps the interior is not quite ready yet? But still, not one image of what it is like to be in one of the offices looking through the facade?!
i'd expect that it's a significant amount of uncommitted space - open office floors. there are probably only a few places where the 'shell' project included finished interior spaces - the bridge may be one, in addition to a lobby of some sort. the rest: probably pretty generic, as office buildings tend to be.
Favorite pastime of mine when I lived in Beijing was to ask taxi drivers what they thought of the building every time we drove by it...
Makes me wonder why I ever left.
we have to do better than this...come on! OMA has lost the sense of S M L XL this one is XXXLLL
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