The Water Cube

This building may look familiar to anyone who saw the Olympics in Beijing a few years ago. This is the building that housed the pools for many of the aquatic events. Officially it is the Beijing National Aquatics Center, but it is known better by its nickname "the Water Cube."

As far as I can tell, this is an example of biomorphic architecture, not biomimetic architecture. The bubbles are derived from the pattern that naturally occurs when bubbles form. The building is not really benefiting from the bubbles except that it makes the building nice to look at. It is pretty incredible to look at, especially at night.

Something else that looks like this are the grow-out houses you see on poultry farms. At night, these long buildings seem to glow from within. I've heard more than one architect rave about the lighting effect of these grow-out houses, but I couldn't find any pictures to show what they looked like at night.


www.wikipedia.com


jayday.org


adventure.howstuffworks.com

This last picture is of the Times Eureka Pavilion at the Chelsea Flower Show. The pavilion is meant to evoke the texture of a leaf. The "veins" are made of wood harvested in an eco-friendly manner, and plexiglass has been cut to fit within the spaces. This also looks like one of those chicken houses I was talking about earlier.


http://therayograph.com/2011/05/24/biomimetic-architecture/