Architect and Builder April 2017 | Page 33

TYPICAL OFFICE FLOOR PLAN Suspended in the main reception, hang the roots. Functioning as receptors, their individual branches carry words related to sensory perception. The suspension of the roots and their consequent reaching into the open clefts of the separate floors, lends to the verticality of the space, and indeed the entire building above. At the heart of the building, stretching up several levels, is the stem of Transpiration I which spans from floor to ceiling, defining the depth of the void by its presence. The trunk’s connection of the floor and ceiling creates tension. It is not a structural architectural element, but instead represents an independent somewhat organic presence expanding Rosebank Towers through the space. Emerging from the seams of the splitting outer husk are lines of text that speak to the process of organising random stimuli into streams of coherent information. Piercing through the floor of the upper atrium, and unfolding upward into the sky, is the canopy, its fronds and branches, defined by the lexicon of human emotion in various stages of becoming. The monolithic solidity of the trunk suddenly breaks as it spreads into bra nches that reach outward and upward, in a motion of liberation. Similar to the way that the suspension of the roots in the lower atrium accent the height of the vertical space, the compression of space in relation to the reach of the canopy accentuates the volume of its surroundings. 33