@livinzlife: I think ice is the real issue. In Chicago every year I read about someone at least being injured by falling ice.

mhlaxp

A movie called Dark City comes to mind.

skulldriveshaft

Imagine taking a date home.

"Here it is, 30th floor, and I live down this way... wait, that's not right, maybe it's over here... no... ok, we go around the elevator column and- YES, I really live here! Where are you going?"

mhlaxp

I've always wanted to live in a building where my upstairs neighbours can position their living room so it casts a shadow in my bedroom!

bailey_ca

@Sora57: i doubt a magnificent amount would fall given the speed. also the snow would be spread across a large surface, not all collected right on the edge,AND it has to fall a bit too so itll just be like snowing snow that already snowed you know?

livinzlife

@prouted: No. Not at all.

The Magnificen7

Is this a new attempt to reproduce the Pisa Tower, 2008 style ?

prouted

Let the Tuning commence.

DeadWriter

@oyumurtaci: One of the pages on the link shows different "phases" of the building shape. Several look like a vagina labia.

When it rains either the building will look like its either taking a piss or feeling horny.

Sora57

That sounds like a really bad idea, Now is the time someone should step in and say: "no, bad, bad, you smoke to much crack, bad, your not building that, bad, bad"

I just know this is a bad idea, its going to fall down, or kill someone with its design.

HawkSkater0

@wild homes: LOOKING safe and BEING safe are 2 different things. Not all engineering in this world looks safe. It may in fact surprise you as to how safe it turns out to be.

Annex1

It's always Dubai. Dubai is where it's at. I need to get there. BAD.

CutePuppyz

did anyone actually understand where exactly between each floor there's a wind turbine and how that one actually works?

mumin

I understand the need to avoid converting an office into a centrifuge, but 3 hours to rotate? While I'm sure 'amusement park ride' isn't what they were aiming for, 'abysmal boredom' and 'crap, I missed the sunset again' can't possibly be high on their list. I just hope some day all the inhabitants circulate an internal memo resulting in the worlds largest phallic sculpture. Kinda like building-light tetris but on a more complex level.

oyumurtaci

Lame - Hogwarts did this years ago...

Hiphopopotamus

A whole load of people are going to die in these things. I know they CAD the hell out of buildings, but this does not look safe. Not even remotely.

wild homes

put a daruma statue on top. daruma 80! unbeatable banzuke rules!!!!

enchantedgoose

Extremely ambitious. What crosses my mind is the difficulty of keeping out wind-driven rain (apartments leak now without having fancy rotating roofs that sometimes are protected from the weather and sometimes not) and snow (particularly the Moscow location). Even if it takes 3 hours to turn, during a powerful snow storm your floor could shovel off a good amount of snow onto the floors below, or onto unsuspecting passers-by 80 stories below.

Talk about getting hit by a snowball.

Sora57

@The Magnificen7: You are correct.

MastaFalse

God, I pray this business takes off >_

MastaFalse

The most difficult part of construction is that the entire tower must be first assembled in Italy to make sure it is stable before starting to move it to floor by floor to Dubai. Only one floor may be in transit at a time and when not in transit can a floor can only be stored on the original tower, on the tower in Dubai, or on a third temporary tower. The trick is that you may never store a larger floor on top of a smaller floor. You can move floors back and forth between the three towers as often as you require.

mrnitro

Wow, just ... wow. I had an idea like this in a design class a few years ago, and the teacher laughed, saying it was unrealistic. Goddamn public schools.

The Magnificen7

Well Super Duruma Extreme 80 to be exact...

valekeyes46

Coolest.Building.Ever!!

Simpsons-Movie-ruled

Jenga!

LA_Longhorn

Duruma Extreme!

valekeyes46

I'll take 1. Square foot, that is.

monkeybars

I saw the picture and thought someone was playing Jenga with lives at stake. And I read the article, and found that it was even better.

I want a car elevator with a big enough building to justify it...

Reilaos~

@mrnitro: You are confusing that with the Tower of Hanoi. these will be in Moscow, Dubai, and Italy. No Hanoi

Camaro02

Hey, so what if there's a 20% chance this building will fall and everyone in it will die? We need to get it wrong a few times to perfect it. And we need to perfect it by 2050 when I'm finally a billionaire (you know, because everyone will be millionaires by 2050) and can actually afford it.

Tonicboy

@DJJS: It revolves around a central core, that doesn't move. I think. That makes sense, and everything wold go through there. There would be some unique challenges but nothing impossible.

The Magnificen7

@DeadWriter: Wow - Dark City reference FTW!

FredicvsMaximvs

What about Pipes? gas Lines Ect? Wires, Electricity.. Plumbing..?

DJJS

This will make window washers life hell.

Y2KGTP

@The Magnificen7: Lol....just...l o l....

Take this article back to 3rd grade [or where ever] and smack 'em with it...

Then youtube.

Obviously.

doobiebros22

Jenga!

takashimiike 3G edition

How does the plumbing work? Why do you want your car in your apartment?

If they taught architecture in the sixth grade, I'd be tempted to say this was a school project...

formicae

people is going crazy.

dc67021

Voice-activated, huh? Does a "Don't you bloody dare!!" activate a movement lock by chance? I'm pretty sure at least one unlucky acrophobe'd like that feature!

Mr.Wilson

I'm an architect in beijing and i see lots of things that most people would just consider as insane.
This project is technically not really a problem as all the different aspects of this concept had been done before,even though separately, on smaller scales.
The only problem would be the high cost of getting it built, so it is no wonder that they chose a Ferrari in their 3D rendering, as they'd actually need to sell those units to people who can afford ferraris...

mumin

@mhlaxp: ahh yes ice is a good point..a big sheet will definately not disperse like some snow would..well we should hope for safety precautions, proper floor spacing, and maybe even locking the floors in place during poor weather conditions and certain times of the year

livinzlife

Every floor rotates... meaning the entire structure is supported only by single axis the floors rotate around? Umm... is it just me, or does that seem like a very, very structurally unsound?

danson

So judging from the cars in the floor plan, I'm assuming the central column has got a car elevator. I know it takes three hours to rotate and all, but I'm just waiting to hear about some fool who's got his Enzo squinched in half 'cause he wasn't paying attention to where he park.

JStrulleh

From the position of the cars that thing's parts are spinning VERY FAST.

Denver80203

I want to know what the birds will look like when they get caught in that... Squiiiiiish.

photophile

@The Magnificen7: It's still unrealistic. Whether it's effective or not ;)
Don't let laughter affect your choices, most poeple don't think before they speak you know.

The illest wind

Wont it always look like the image on the right shortly after everyone moves in? Unless it automatically resets the position every night or the tenants throw a "Lets all face the same direction" party, it would look a mess real quick like.

N@tedog

So if you have more the one person on each floor. What happens when your neighbor always wants the best view and swings your view over to the landfill in the distance?

CaptCaveman

Each pod needs an ejection command button that is activated and launches the pod into the air away from the building with a parachute and some inflatable pads all around it.

SinAmos

I hope this has a big iron ball.

strider_mt2k

What happens when your in the elevator and the floor your going to is rotating or starts to rotate when you get to your floor; does the elevator rotate also

utube2007

@The illest wind: All state of the art engineering and architecture is unrealistic until it's proven otherwise. The Brooklyn Bridge, the longest suspecnsion briidge at the time, is a prime example. People were afraid of it for years because they didn't understand who it could be kept up.

Of course, on the flip-side there are feats of engineering that were thought to be sound that weren't. Titanic is a prime example.

Leonard Nimrod

sorry, otherwise very cool

sdgmcdon

umm, like, who decides via voice command when and where this thing rotates too?

sdgmcdon

This is going to be a parkour magnet. The tenants will be spending so much of their time shaking their fists at all the annoying French kids jumping from from unit to unit that they won't be able to enjoy the sunsets.

Ragnaroknroll

@sdgmcdon:

"umm, like, who decides via voice command when and where this thing rotates too?"

Some rich guy and his kids from 3 different rooms, so over the course of the day since it takes 3 hours to reach it's destination and it's constantly changing it's direction I guess it will just slowly twitch back and forth and never give anyone the view they wanted. All for the poultry price of.... God how pointless is this thing?

Pretty pointless I would say.

T1nd0g

@Ragnaroknroll: You sir, are a genius. Traceurs, assemble! We're off to Dubai!

Z4N5H1N

That's it. Tomorrow I'm going to watch the sun rise for free from my back porch and then later on that night from my front porch.... I'll watch the sun set.

For free.

T1nd0g

@DJJS: Have you ever seen the brake cable assembly on a BMX bike? You can turn the handlebars endlessly, with the brake levers attached to said handlebars, but the cables still always manage to connect to the brakes on the wheels.

Z4N5H1N

@mrnitro:

Um... What? How long is that going to take? Are you saying that when you want to get the top floor down from the temporary tower you need to remove the other 79 down and then put them back up? I'm really not seeing what your saying because if that were true then wouldn't you technically be storing those 79 floors somewhere wile you retrieve the one on top or are you removing them from the top some how?

PS: the more I think about this design the more pointless it seems to me. Why would anyone want to live there? Why buy into this so you can what? watch the sun set wile on the toilet... in three hours... ... cloud cover willing... unless your wife overrides you... and you don't have to go to early...

T1nd0g

@mrnitro:
I got about halfway through this before I caught on...

Purple Dave

@trrosen:
it's actually the biggest turkish Doener Kebab in the world :-)

mumin

Welcome to Vomit Tower!

VakeroRokero

@mumin: Look at the picture of the wind turbines. It shows a 5-bladed turbine between each floor, looking to be about 6 feet high. The stress on each scoop would be huge, so it's made of carbon fibre. The close-up shows a big gap between each floor for the turbines, while all the other pictures and videos show the floors close together. I bet the turbines will vanish in construction, so Mr. Fisher will never have to solve the daunting engineering problems. But the developer will put a few on top generating 1% of the electricity consumed.

Another environmentally green element of the Dynamic Tower is the photovoltaic cells that will be placed on the roof of each rotating floor to produce solar energy, approximately 20% of each roof will be exposed to the sun So every time your upstairs neighbor rotates and blocks your panels, you'll have to rotate your own floor or energy generation goes to zero.

Each villa includes "demotic control systems". ??!

skierpage

Notes

Despite the pretty picture of the Ferrari in front of the window, the floor plans show that cars never leave the central tower.

I believe it was already been said that occupancy will be one renter per floor

The technic of stacking floors around a central spire has been around for many hundreds of years its the main reason pagodas are so earthquake resistant.

The slow rotation should also help deal with one side being cooked by the sun while the others in shade...a giant solar rotisserie.

trrosen

if its always twisting
how would the stairs and elevator work?

thomusvoo

kick ass but heavy on the cost

JackMatt

God gets to play Jenga and a lot of people are going to be part of that game!

altus

@T1nd0g: Are you saying that when you want to get the top floor down from the temporary tower you need to remove the other 79 down and then put them back up?

"Tee hee"

recklessinoz

I'll believe it when I see it

UniComp

@strider_mt2k: the architect apparently has two big ones, so i'm sure he can spare one.

Accelerata

Looks like someone took Stephen King's Dark Tower (the axis upon which all realities spin) a little too seriously. Every world in the story was another level on the Tower. Of course, the levels existed in different dimensions, but the tower was a constant between all of them.

gadjitfreek

$3,000 sq ft for this building is actually cheap. There are tons of plain boring condos in Hong Kong that sell for well over $5,000 sq ft.

pj737

@gadjitfreek: All things serve the beam.

strider_mt2k

LOL I can just image tell someone to meet you at your suite.

"Okay get out of the elevator to the fifth floor and go... hm... lets see what time it is. I think you go left and you'll get there faster, no wait wait, maybe you want to go right. Whatever just keep walking around until you find room 517."

Joseph

@strider_mt2k: this one probably wont have a testicle, it's not big enough to be descended yet.

Joseph

This would drive my plants crazy, with the sunlight doing a 360 all the time.
Do they even HAVE ice and snow in Dubai to even worry about what falls off?

Curves

@strider_mt2k: There will be two: one on either side of the central shaft.

Sora57

@livinzlife: Not only ice, but let's say you are on the 5th floor and you DON'T rotate during the storm. Then after 14 inches have fallen you activate the apartment to rotate and you shovel off all that snow just a few floors down...

Like you said, the building may have to impose a "no spin zone" during a storm and after, until any snow/ice disappears.

@strider_mt2k: nice tie in to other post.

Anybody else look at this building and think "french tickler"?

Sora57

its going to be nicknamed 'The Puke Building'

pharago

Its like something from the Exorcist....

The power of Christ compels you!

The power Christ compels you!

Dormamu

I don't know if I'm a big fan of constantly being disoriented in my home. I like the changing view idea, but getting off the elevator and not knowing which way the bathroom is kind of sucks.

DeanOfAllTrades

I just came here to be the tenth person to say: Jenga!

Bender

@Curves: I was talking about the Mosow project having snow/ice. And if you don't tell your apartment to sit and rotate, it won't bother the plants.

Sora57

another clever idea that will keep us from getting exercise, now we dont have to move at all if we want to catch the view on the east side aswell.

Now if someone could just make a toilet that comes running when you whistle, that would just be awesome..

eventually we will evolve into a lump of meat with no arms and legs(our genitals will still be there of course, we will never stop exercising that!)

zodiacfever

If the wind turbines between floors don't get value engineered out of the project, they should be a pretty effective birdie blender. And, in the event of a plumbing failure they would give the surrounding buildings a nice poo shower.

I'm also not clear about this 'voice activated rotation'. Most of the renderings show the tower rotating with a nice fluid motion which implies that the rotation is controlled by a preset algorithm. "Voice activated" implies that the building will have a random appearance shown in a few of the renderings, although at one rotation every 3 hours you'll have to plan your views ahead of time.

Gann

@Hiphopopotamus:

V funny.

sharmanova

@DJJS: This would only work if there was a single apartment per floor with bathrooms and kitchens centrally located. That would also prevent that one asshole on each floor from rotating the building to where his apartment always has the best view.

As for electricity, they would either have to use a slip ring system or have the turbines and solar attached to the rotating structure.

At $30,000 per squre foot do they describe it as having a 50 Lexus walk-in closet?

JaymzThePooh

@monkeybars: "I'll take 1. Square foot, that is."

I'll split one with you.

@oyumurtaci: "'crap, I missed the sunset again' can't possibly be high on their list."

8 rotations daily should have you seeing the sunrise in the AM and the sunset in the PM from the same room (a little tweaking might be necessary in Moscow). How can it be more boring than not rotating at all?

@mumin: "did anyone actually understand where exactly between each floor there's a wind turbine and how that one actually works?"

Not me.

@HawkSkater0: At least you're consistent.

@Sora57: In Dubai they call that a "Camel Toe."

@DJJS: "What about Pipes? gas Lines Ect? Wires, Electricity.. Plumbing..?"

Shit! I'll bet they never thought of that! You'd better get a hold of them and tell them before they make a huge mistake!

@strider_mt2k: "I hope this has a big iron ball."

I miss the old fashioned "brass balls."

GadgetPlay

@VakeroRokero: Well said my friend!

thedancingrogue

Looking at the layout, it looks like they have one car elevator for the entire building. That means that at the very least, 80 people are going to have to share that thing at the same time. Just imagine trying to get out in the morning.

lazypiranha

As an architect, I said "OH WOW" and threw up in my mouth at the same time. Oh, and not to sound snobby, but its prefabricated, not pre-made. And 6 days a floor? They can barely build a completely prefabricated house in 8 days.

beatledud

so how exactly do you get from one floor to another? wait 3 hours until the thing realigns and you can step down one floor? I'd hate to work at the top. I'll take an office on the first floor please.

xashinx

What other toys can we use for architectual inspiration?

How about a house shaped like Mr. Potato Head?...

smashingparadox

Could you imagine everyone waiting in their cars for the elevator at 8am? You'd have a traffic jam before you even get on the road.

Ytsejammer03

I need a sugar mama from Dubai. badly.

lambert13

Is it just me or does that look like a giant, extra-large game of Jenga?

zed0

Let me get this straight. Residents park their gasoline-filled cars on the same floor as their apartments?

I guess anyone stupid enough to move in would also be stupid enough to pay $600,000 for the 20x10 parking spot that holds the fuel that will eventually incinerate them.

This architect needs a smack upside the head and FAST.

nikko1221

If I'm supposed to park my car inside, imagine the rush hour elevator traffic. How many cars per car elevator? 1? (OK- 2 Smart Cars)

SuperMacGuy

Bucky would be proud.

senorbelly

@lazypiranha: In Dubai at least, the first 20 floors are planned to be office space, so those people need to get back to work and quit looking out the windows. Floors 21-35 will be a luxury hotel.. I'm going to assume that not every hotel room is an entire floor (based on their own brochure) so who controls the rotation? Same with the multiple apartments on floors 36-70? Their brochure only raises further questions!

Ike_Skelton

So who gets to control the rotation on floors with multiple apartments???

Ike_Skelton

So, seeing as there's only going to be one resident per floor, what's the point of having the building rotate? You already have a view in every possible angle. All this does is prevent you from moving from the kitchen to the living room when you want to look at something specific.

Also, it must suck to live on the ground floor. Do I want to wake up to the parking lot, or the highway? Decisions...

lazypiranha

There are so many inconsistencies in the Dubai Brochure on their website. What is going on here??

Ike_Skelton

What would sand... as well as ice and snow... do to the moving parts?

knickers

@SuperMacGuy: Yeah I was wondering the same thing. What the hell will the car elevator traffic be like? Just to go pick up the kids you're going to have to wait something like 20-30 min just to get a turn to use the car elevator.

Kharnellius

not a very italian name...

superjap

"I had a view of the Hudson River and East River at the same time, it was beautiful..."

I just listened to the Marching Bands of Manhattan this morning, and that's almost the exact lyric from the song...I find that really coincidental.

Karinabob

@photophile: Exactly what I was thinking. I don't believe snow will be a problem in Dubai, but birds will be. I'd be more worried about being pelted with avian guts than snow. I hope for the architect's sake that they have a system in place to repel or otherwise make it impossible for birds to perch there

Ghinn

so this is whey we're paying >$4/gallon...so those arabs can build these huge buildings to compensate for some inadequacies?

wetboxersguy

@Ghinn: "a system in place to repel or otherwise make it impossible for birds to perch there"

It's called "chicken wire."

@Kharnellius: "Just to go pick up the kids you're going to have to wait something like 20-30 min just to get a turn to use the car elevator."

There will undoubtedly be outdoor parking that could be utilized during the day. I hope they're reading this blog, though, as the always intelligent and sensible Giz commenters have put a lot more thought into this than the architects and designers did.

GadgetPlay

@nikko1221: "Let me get this straight. Residents park their gasoline-filled cars on the same floor as their apartments?"

Just as those of us with a ranch home and garage do. Cars don't spontaneously explode much anymore. Except in the movies, where they blow up at the drop of a hat.

GadgetPlay