Critical Practices › 2022 › Double Curved Stressed Skin Structures

Double Curved Stressed Skin Structures for Architecture

Advanced parametric tools and fabrication equipment give us the ability to design and build novel geometries. In the structural system showcased here, these advanced approaches are combined with the traditional ‘stressed skin’ structure and the material wood to create a structurally efficient and architecturally useful construction.

The stressed skin wood structure is a historically known form of wood construction used to make double curved surfaces. Stressed skin structures have primarily been used in engineering applications of moving objects such as boats, planes and spaceships because of the necessity for curved lightweight, strong and aerodynamic shapes. The double curvature is achieved by the same mechanism that was used by the Eames elephant: since plywood bends only in one direction then one direction of curvature is used as the first direction of curvature and the second direction of curvature is provided by the ‘tabs’ which allow localized bending in the secondary direction.

This prototype aims to be a proof of concept that demonstrates the ability of the stressed skin wood structure to deal with double curvature while exhibiting its great design flexibility. It demonstrates an adaptive architectural system with unique potential for wood.

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Contributors

A. MeyBoom
D. Correa

University of British Columbia & University of Waterloo
Canada

Presented at ICSA2022, Aalborg University. Critical Practices 2022 booklet (PDF)