Overview
The world’s largest membrane roof at completion: 65,000 m² of high-strength PTFE-glass fabric spanning 100 m across the entrance and central boulevard of the Shanghai 2010 World Expo. Conceived by SBA with Knippers Helbig, the roof is suspended from 19 internal and 31 external masts and complemented by six funnel-shaped steel-and-glass ‘sun valley’ shells. Total gross floor area: 280,000 m².
Scope
This work pre-dates OnceMore. Dr. Milos Dimcic carried it out as an employee of Knippers Helbig Advanced Engineering. Structural relaxation methods were used for form-finding — actively designing the final triangular grid across the six free-form Sun Valley funnels — and the resulting grid was exported automatically for structural analysis.
Outcome
The relaxation-driven grid produced a smooth, statically efficient triangulation across all six surfaces, comprising roughly 30,000 unique structural members and 10,500 unique joints.
Capabilities Applied
