By Saba khayami- Amirfazel ghahramanpur

Site introducing

Atisaz Residential complex started in 1976 in an area of 131000 m2 in north of Tehran, now the complex is one of the largest complexes in Tehran with 23 blocks and 2290 residential units and it is one of the most beautiful Persian contemporary architectures with its beautiful green spaces.
Atisaz towers which is known as one of the symbols of Tehran and considered as a sign of modernity and urbanization has been selected for this expansion competition.

Ideas

Iran Traditional architecture is an invaluable architecture and we tried to use its internal concepts in our design. The Mogharnas concept has been used for this purpose. The competition title is The city above  The city, in fact we have sky above city, and the second city have to do something with the sky, mogharnas is a seven store component in persian traditional architecture decoration which is used as an allegory of seven sky toward the heaven. Added stores in the design approach the sky with mogharnas shape and form second city above the sky.

The Existing buildings and the extension looks like columns and column’s headers in the Alighapoo’s second floor porch as well as in other valuable persian architecture. 

As mentioned in competition’s¬¬ description the tallest trees in the world grow to forty storeys tall. Entrants are asked to utilize the inherent strength of wood fiber in building’s expansion. Apparently we used the form of forest’s trees; in fact the structural design is inspired by trunk’s splits, stems and foliage which are reminiscent of the leaves crown and pores that can be seen from the bottom. 

We consider any time hosing increase in this design, in a way that cubic modules are empty slots which are just frame structure and could be used any time by adding leno wall panels.

In this design we have farms with different features on the roof to reduce air pollution, increase the visual qualities, create interaction between residents, and satisfy minor needs for each block in a world that population grows every day and we needs lands for food production.

Structure

The Wooden branching structure includes wooden braced frames. Four cores are placed in the middle of the roof edges and braced to each other on the bottom, the middle and top.
All of this structure is made by integration of cubic modules which its components are fabricated in factory and would be assembled in the site. Each of this cubes are fixed modules with 5*5*4 or 5*5*3 dimensions and would be transferred to the  building roof by crane and connect to each other by special connections to form the entire structure. So most of timbers do not exceed 5m in length with the exception of the + form component in the upper part which lay on cores, and the other cubic modules are connected to this structure, its overall length is 75m and is made by integration of three 25m strong member which is the maximum length for metsawood timbers.

Metsä Wood challenged architects and students around the world to push the boundaries of modern wood building design in the urban environment. Entrants from 40 countries created their Plan B to urbanisation using wood (Kerto® LVL – laminated veneer lumber) as the main material. The task was to design a wooden extension to an existing urban building. The entries were designed to 69 cities worldwide.