Félix Candela. In memorian (1910-1997). From thin concrete shells to the 21st century’s lightweight structures,

Reading aligned with lecture: 
   Modern-form makers: Moneo, Jean Nouvel, Herzog and de Meuron, Kahn.
04/03/2015


Personal summary of reading: Félix Candela. In memorian (1910-1997). From thin concrete shells to the 21st century’s lightweight structures, P. Cassinello(*), M. Schlaich, J.A. Torroja

This article is celebrating Felix Candela’s contribution to architecture through designing and producing over 800 thin concrete shells that not only push material strength to the limits but also have been described as structural art. Reinforced concrete shells requires the collaboration of architects, engineers and builders to pursue the most ‘efficient, bare, slender and strongest concrete shell possible.

Reinforced concrete was patented when Candela was a young boy and he was not the first to produce reinforced concrete shells, for example the Dyckerhoff-widmann company built the first concrete shell for a planetarium at the University of Jena, Germany. Reinforced concrete could support building of up to 200m, which is over 300% of what was achieved through masonry.

Candela produced his concrete shells form one sheet of reinforced concrete and they never spanned more than 30m. His forms were based upon the geometry, the hyperbolic paraboloid, which in turn generated limitless sculptural forms.

Candela education was vital for his career; structural engineering and material strengths were his strong points.

I enjoyed reading this article and learning about Candela, whom I’d not heard or learnt about previous to this submission. I admire how he has used his engineering knowledge to create beautiful structures that everyone can appreciate and that he would always be pushing his materials and forms as he had no limits. It is apparent that concrete shells are not in fashion of architecture as they once were but the beauty of the shells Candela created is timeless and I think it would be interesting to apply some physics/mathematics towards some of my design solutions in future projects.

https://thepostiteffect.wordpress.com/2010/09/07/the-new-structuralism/-Image reference