04 August 03 11:00

480
 beijing 3955'N 11626'E

The Enemy BY REM KOOLHAAS

....Suts, wth mustaches,

recedng harlnes, and suspect
wastlnes, huddled n a collectve
pose of preemptve servlty,
archtects from a cty that was put
on the map by a sngle outrageous
buldng when t was nothng -
grown up preemes of the Blbao
effect - they peddle ther soulless
wares wth shameless calculaton -
Anglo termtes of pragmatsm -
or tell reassurng fary tales lke
the Skyscraper as a Ctzen,
as f to 4 year olds....

481
482 In the sixties,the Metabolists were the first to think beyond the skyscraper; they imagined
CCTV
Saved by a Fortune Cookie
Early 2002 We received two invitations, one to apply to consider what should happen at
Ground Zero, the other for the headquarters of China Central Television in Beijing.
We discussed the choice over a Chinese meal. The life of the architect is so
fraught with uncertainty and dilemmas that any clarification of the future,
including astrology, is disproportionately welcome. My fortune cookie read,
Stunningly Omnipresent Masters make minced meat of memory.>

metaforms that would express the new values of future communities. 483
 Politics

2003
2002

484 One of architectures great virtues is its complete immersion in a totally unpredictable sequence
 To a layman, we were told; the plaster model that had apparently seduced the jury would seem just a
sculpture. In four days in a computerized sweatshop, with ample child labor, by half-naked workers,
partly in alleyways we made a new one, transparent and modern, that was apparently put in a van that
would visit leaders at their holiday resorts a journey that culminated somehow in a contract signing at
the state guest house in December, for a building to be completed before the Beijing Olympics (2008).

2008

Summer in the City

Six months later, in Beijing, I spent a month-long hiatus at 38 degrees Celsius. The city was the opposite
of what I expected organized around the Forbidden City, planned and still very Chinese. A mist of
desert dust revealed mostly contours, not details. The city seemed serviced by a single highway that
connected any point X to any point Y; in fact, three ring roads unlock the city circular zones of
modernity projected on the citys many pasts: idyllic 50s workers housing, retrofitted with concrete
armature, hardcore 60s slabs, amalgamations of late Stalinist/American modes equipped with Chinese
features, impressive modern fortresses that exude confidence and competence, refined, Spartan party
palaces all embedded in a default tissue of hutongs: an informal crust of urban courtyards fit, somehow,
for all activities known to man. Flitting through it on scooters young men and women carrying Cyclopic
burdens that they unveil anywhere through efficient power point presentations on their laptops.

of radically different subcultures. 485

 Saved by a Fortune
The new China Central Television Station will be located in Beijings new
Central Business District, close to the intersection of Changan Avenue and

io
d
the Third Ring Road, and will be completed for the Olympic Games in 2008. FF52

tu
S
9

y
F4

k
51

S
The project is located in the north of the Central Business District on a F50
F4 8
site of four blocks with a total area of 180,000 m2. The 558,000 m2 of F4
9
Ca
F4
8 nt
program are distributed in two major buildings and a series of F 47 ee
n
F4
secondary and underground facilities CCTV, which accommodates F4
6
n
5 ee
nt
aspects of TV making, and TVCC, a theater-hospitality center with a F4
F4
4 Ca
3
hotel. On the block in the south-east, the Media Park is conceived as F4
2
F4 Ex 38
an extension of the proposed green axis of the CBD. It is open to the F4
1 ec
ut
ive
Sk F
0 Re
public for events and entertainment, or closed, so that it can be used F39 Flo
or F3
8
F3
for outdoor filming. F3
7
8
Sk
y
VI LF
In the market, architecture = real estate. Any complex P o3bb
7
F3 Lo y
6 un 2
F4
F3
organization is dismantled each part put in its place for the least F 5 ge
34
amount of money. All media companies suffer the subsequent F3
3 F3
8

af
e
F fC y
paranoia: each sector talks about the others as them, distrust is F332 af
St obb
1
rife, motives questioned. There is no whole. F3 yL F3
8
0
F3
8 Sk
F2
In China, money does not have the last word (yet). There is a F2
8
9

conceptual space that could accommodate the construction of F2

F2
7 F3
7

6 Ca
CCTV as a whole a single entity in which all parts are housed F 25 fe
+
Me F2
5 7
F2
permanently aware of each others presence. A collective. F2
4 et
i n g
3
F2
2
F2
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486 The draconian schedule actually provokes a liberating efficiency of the imagination - an ac
e Cookie
Beijing Manifesto
After the announcement, apart from excitement,
our project created two kinds of reserve, if not
disappointment: was it merely a landmark, one in
an endless sequence of alien proposals of meaningless
boldness? Were its structural complexities simply
irresponsible? On August 5, 2003 at Tsinghua University,
P
re

an afternoon was organized to vent criticism. It was not

s
id
e
n
t
S

easy, I realized, for the assembled intelligentia to see the

u
it
e

r
loo difference between CCTV and any of the other foreign extravaganzas that were on their way
8
F3
v eF 0
fe uti F4
Ca xec
E F3
9 or were still in the pipeline. There was surprise at my reading of the building as a collective, a word
F3
8
7
with complex associations. There was relief when the meta-form, which had been considered in
F 3

2
isolation, was embedded in a project for prospective preservation and a competition for a low rise
F3
CBD, revealing an interlocking hypothesis for Beijings future land use... the beginnings of a Beijing
F3
0
Manifesto.
9
F2
7
A younger generation questioned the allocation of such means to prestige, while the west of
F2
8 China was ravaged by poverty; the older generation of engineers was shocked seeing the
8
9 F2
11 F2
6
objective purity of their profession at the service of the unusual. I sensed that a pact between the
5
F2
4
two sides a coalition of the unwilling, no matter how sincere could easily close a perspective
F2
3 that had just been opened, a refusal of the Promethean in the name of correctness and good
F2
F2
2
1
sense foreclosing a maximum China, particularly if it were triangulated by foreign skepticism.
F2
0
0 F2
F2
et ing F1
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accumulation of straight forwardness leads to a new exhilaration. 487

 Loop

F46 to F37 (refuge)

F45 (roof) to F37
F44 (roof) to Ground
F5
2
F5
1
F5 8
0 F4
F4
9
F4 Can

Refuge to Ground
8 nte F4
F4 en 3
7 F4
F4 2
6
F4 F4
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F4 te F4
F4
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F4 F3
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F3
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9
F3 ur
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To
F3 0
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F3 St 7
1 F2 F2
F3 8 5
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9 F2
F2 F2
8 5 3
F2 F2
7 4 F2
F2 F2 2
6 Caf F2 F2
F2 e+ 5
F2
3 0 1
5 F2
F2 Mee 2
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F2 g 1 F1
3 F2 9
F2 F1
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8
F2 0
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F2 tin F1 F1
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F1 +M F1
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Service Elevator

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F4 2 F0 F0
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F4 1 F0 F0
1 F4 7 7 6
F4 F0

Stair F1/F10
0 0 F0
F4 6 6 F0
F3 9 F0 5
9 F3 F0
F3 8 5 F0
5 F0
8 F3 4
F3 Sk F0 4
7 y Lo F3
7 4 F0 F0
3

Stair F1/F10
bb F0 3
F3 y 2 3 F0 F0
6 F3 F0 2
2
F3 2 F0 F0
5
F3 F0 1 1
1

Stair F1/F10
4 0 F0 B0
F3 F3 B0 1
3 1 B0 1
F3 9 B0 2 B0
2 y
F2 2 B0 2
F3 bb 7 B0 3 B0
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F3
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F2 F3
6
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F2
8 5

Stair F1/F10
F2 F2
7 4
F2 Caf F2 F5
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F2 e+ 5 3 F5
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F2 Mee 2 F5
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B0 TO bb TO bb 3 3 F2
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2 F1
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F1 0
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9 F0
F0 8
8 F0
F0 7
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6 0 6
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F0
F0
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5
5 F0
F0 4
4 F0
F0
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1 B0
3
3 2 B0
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Stu

0
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Stu
F1 1 0
B
2 25dio
15
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0 0
40dio 25dio
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0
25dio
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0
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488 All technical aspects are mobilized to reinforce the metaphor/reality of the loop.
F48 (roof) to F37 (refuge)

F49 (roof) to F37 (refuge)

F50 (roof) to F37 (refuge)

F50 (roof) to Ground

1
F5

CCTV combines administration and offices, news and broadcasting, program production and services the entire
0
F5
9
F4
8
F4
7
F4
6
F4
5

process of TV-making in a loop of interconnected activities. Two structures rise from a common production
F4
4
F4
3
F37 to Ground

F4
2
F4
1
F4
0
F4

platform that is partly underground. Each has a different character: one is dedicated to broadcasting, the second to
9
F3
8 7
F3 F3

6
F3
5
F3

services, research, and education; they join at the top to create a cantilevered penthouse for the management. A
4
F3
3

1
F3
2
r F3

we
1
F3
0

To
F3
9
F2

new icon is formed not the predictable 2-dimensional tower soaring skyward, but a truly 3-dimensional
8
F2
7
F2
6
F2 4
5 F2
F2

experience, a canopy that symbolically embraces the entire population an instant icon that proclaims a new phase
F2
2
F2
1
F2
0
F2
9
F1
8
F1

in Chinese confidence. The consolidation of the TV program in a single building allows each worker to be
7
F1
6
F1
5
F1
4
F1
3
F1
2

permanently aware of the nature of the work of his co-workers; a chain of interdependence
F1 0
1 F1
F1

9
F0
Stair F1/F10

8
F0
7

promotes solidarity rather than isolation, collaboration instead of opposition. The

F0
6
F0
Stair F1/F10

5
F0
4
F0
3
F0
2

building itself contributes to the coherence of the organization.

F0
Stair F1/F10

1
F0
1
B0
Stair F1/F10

2
B0
3
B0

CCTV is a secured building for staff and technology. Public visitors will be
admitted to the loop, a dedicated path circulating through the building and F5
1

connecting to all elements of the program and offering spectacular

F5
0
F4
9
F4
8
F4
7
F4

views across the multiple facades towards the CBD, Beijing, and
6
F4
5
F4
4
F4 3
F5 3 F4
F4
2 2 F4
2

the Forbidden City.

F5 F4 1
1 F4
1 F4
0
F5 0 F4
0 F3
9 9
F4 F3
F3
9 8 F3
8
F4 F3 7
8 7 F3
F4 F3
7 F3
6 F3
2
F4 5
6 F3
F4 4 0
5 F3
3
F3
F4 F3 9

F4
3
4
HEAT REJECTION F4
3 F3
F3
1
2 F2
F2
7
8
F4 2 0 F2
2 F4 F2
9 6
F4 1 F2 F2
1 F4 8
F2
5
F4 0 F2
7
0 F4 F2 F2
4
F3
F3
9 F3
9 COOLING F2
F2
5
6
F2
3
8 2
8 F3 F2
4 F2
F3 7 3 F2
1
7 F3 F2
2 0
F2 F2
F3 2 1 9
6 F3 F2 F1
F3 0 8
5 1 F1 F1
F3 F3 F1
9
F1
7
4 0 8
F3 F3 F1
7 F1
6
3 F1 5
F3 9 6
2 F2 F1
5
F1
4
F3 7 F1 F1
1 F2 4 3
F3 F1 F1
8 3
0 F2 F1
2 F1
2
F2 6
9 F1 1
F2
8
F2
5
POWER COMMUNICATIONS F1
0
1 F1
F1
0
F2 F2 F0
F2
7
F2
4 HEAT SUPPLY F0
8
9 F0
F0
9
8
6
COOLING SUPPLY
3 F0
F2 F2 7 F0
7
5 F0 6
F2 2 6 F0
4 F2 F0
5 F0
5
F2 1
3 F2 F0
4 F0
4
F2 F0
2 F2
0 3 F0
3
F2 F0
2 2
1 9 F0
F2 F1 F0
1 1
0 8 B01 F0
F1 F1 B01
9 7
B02
F1 B02
8 F1 B03
B03
F1 6
7 F1
F1 5
6 F1
F1
5 4
F1 F1
4 3
F1 F1
3
F1 2
2 F1
F11 F11
F1 0
0 F1
AIR CONDITIONNING F0
9 F0
9 AIR CONDITIONNING
F0 8
8 F0
F0 7
7 F0
F0 6
6 F0
F0 5
5 F0
F0 F0
4
4
F0 3
3 F0
F0
2 COOLING 2
F0
F0 1
1 F0

SINGLE DECK

DOUBLE DECK LOCAL

CCTV Elevator System TRANSFER LOBBY

DOUBLE DECK EXPRESS

4 single deck overhang locals

6x2 double deck
overhang local
4 single deck overhang locals

4x2 double deck express

6x2 double deck express

6 single deck high rise

6x2 double deck high rise

4 single deck mid rise

4 single deck low rise 2 single deck 2 single deck

low rise low rise 3 single deck low rise

lobby

489

Dissecting the Iconic
Exosymbiont:
The CCTV Headquarters,
Beijing, as Built Organism
By William B. Millard
Gross anatomy: defiance of disaster
The procedure of characterizing the
CCTV begins with gross or macro-scale
observation before advancing to
dissection. The apparent simplicity of the
structure, combining symmetries and
asymmetries, suggests that a substantial
amount of this initial level of observation
will be useful.
To the naked eye, the entity consists
of six approximately rectangular or
rhomboidal blocks (two at the base, two
vertical, two forming an overhang)
arranged in L-shaped pairs to suggest a
superimposition of geometric forms. The
CCTV-structure is a single irregular
rhomboid hollowed out at the center, a
cornered loop. When viewed from the
northeast and above, it displays a rough
radial symmetry, while containing no
actual circles or arcs. It is none of the
common geometric forms, while
gesturing toward many of them; it
appears, like so many ostensibly
haphazard natural phenomena, to mock
the simplistic precision of ideal forms by
approximating them. Composed entirely
of straight lines, it nonetheless
generates sinuous motion. Right angles
exist only in its horizontal dimension,
and externally only in the plane where it
touches the Earth; above that plane,
deviations of a few degrees from plumb
imply a relativistic warping of space.
The CCTV-body is both dense
(horizontal and bricklike when viewed
from afar) and ethereal, with pervasive
plate glass, substantial exposure of
internal features to the external view,
and panoramic views from every level
within. Its macrostructure is tubular and
ouroboric. Moreover, its salient feature is
a visually intuitive instability. Its
cantilevered overhang section casts an
impressive and ominous shadow; this
weighty component appears poised to
pitch the entire structure over onto its
southwestern point at the slightest
provocation by wind, seismic force, or
490 Now that even critics are obsessed with media and celebrity,what if we asked medical writers
Anatomy
any other form of shock. Flagrantly
centerless, the CCTV implies a center of
gravity that bears no reassuring relation
to its center of mass.
That a structure should pose such a
basic problem for itself (if not an
apocalyptic collapse, then a steady
entropic retreat into structural fatigue
and eventual insupportability) and
proceed elegantly to solve it defying
not only common gravity but a set of
expectations so commonly held that
they are as transparent as air to most
observers marks the CCTV as an
exceptionally perceptive and adaptive
organism. To stave off the tipping-point
topple that overimaginative eyes cannot
resist projecting, the CCTV-system offers
a strategy familiar to many biologists.
Immediately beneath the CCTVs
deceptive facade lies a visible rigid
exoskeleton, an adaptation borrowed
from the arthropod phylum, that
strengthens structural resistance to
either the acute or the chronic form of
collapse, dramatic shear or gradual
Pisan decline.
Due to its unusual form, certain areas
of the CCTVs surface (generally joints
between major block units, and
particularly the overhang segment
compressed by the weight of the
inwardly leaning towers) appear to bear
dangerously disproportionate loads,
while others remain relatively spared.
The adjustment that apparently evolved
in response was to discard uniform
density of diagonal members and
embrace irregularity. The CCTVs visible
and tangible framework in its final form
features a varying scale of density in the
arrangement of angular struts, so that
more bracing appears in areas subject to
greater stress. This Adapted Pattern
guarantees that the prima facie
collapsibility of the entire organism
remains an optical illusion, a gesture
toward impracticality on the part of a
structure that is both unconventional
and surprisingly practical.
The CCTVs gross shape is the
physical expression of a set of
interlocking ideas (and, broadly, of the
idea of interlocking): counterpoise,
complementarity, reciprocality. Its
rhetorical trope is chiasmus, the reversal
of an initial form in the next iteration by
an inversion of that form. Weight
distribution appears based on a dynamic
interdependence: of the six component
blocks, four can maintain structural
integrity only in the presence of all four;
only the two
contiguous
with the
Earth,
forming the
L-shaped
base, are
stable in
isolation.
The
towers
press
their
overhanging
heads together, as
if each were wearied
by the effort to remain
upright. Neither would stand if
the other gave way.
Hierarchy in any high-rise structure or
large organization is unavoidable, yet
the CCTV-loop levels this perception and
bends hierarchy into reciprocality:
everything that rises must quite literally
converge. The skyscraper genres
relentless vertical thrust becomes an
archaism, an icon of one-dimensionality,
a plaintive assertion that only one
direction, Up, ultimately matters. The
CCTV brings other dimensions into view
and requires the horizontal and the
vertical to negotiate a treaty of mutual
recognition and interdependence.
Surface inspection and histology:
texture, mutability, attraction
After studying the gross appearance,
one proceeds with invasive
investigations: incision, removal of
epithelial layers, microscopic tissue
examination, and correlation of structures
with functions. The CCTVs epithelium has
assumed a form resembling that of
certain aquatic vertebrates whose
skin contains little pigmentation
and reveals more about internal
organs than would be possible
above sea level. Apparently
the atmosphere of Beijing
imposes no need to armor
the internal processes of
Chinese Central Television
against either ultraviolet
light or visual inquiry.
Translucent from some
angles and in certain forms
of light, opaque at others,
and bearing a
combination of
permanent and
temporary images and
projections, the CCTVs
facade combines
protective and
communicative
functions in ways not
customarily found in
comparable built
organisms. The
surface is a complex
laminate of tempered glass and
finely woven metal; light passes
through both glass and mesh to reveal
the exoskeleton on which the laminated
panels are mounted, but the texture is
only partially transparent. The icons can
be internally lit, making the surface
function as body armor, weatherproofing,
and thermal insulation.
Skin has obvious and nonobvious
functions in the animal kingdom: thermal
regulation, conveyance of moisture,
containment of internal organs,
enhancement of sexual attraction. In the
built-organism kingdom, skin has
analogues of most of these properties. A
glass skin cannot transmit moisture but
readily conveys light, heat, and
to dissect our projects...
information. A laminated glass-mesh skin
that admits evanescent images from
internal and external sources tells both its
endosymbionts and its external observers
that it can be controlled, that it is not a
monolith, that it will adjust to their
interests, that it is friendly.
Internal exploration: layering, flow,
cascade
Investigating further beneath the
glass and fine mesh, probing past the
coarser mesh of the visible framework,
one finds the inescapably regular grid of
functional floors and vertical supports for
the external panels. The looping structure
around an absent center creates patterns
that organize the behavior of individual
human occupants as well as the
collective functions of the CCTV-
community. Some of the adaptations
sustaining these patterns have been
observed in only small segments of the
built-organism kingdom, or in the CCTV-
species alone.
The base-block and subterranean
levels, the two vertical tower-blocks, and
the conjoined overhanging section form
organic zones of related activity that
complicate, though they do not invert or
deconstruct, the hierarchies inherent in
any large institution. In the case of
Chinese Central Television, the major
functions of a national-scale media firm
(news reporting, broadcasting, program
production, new-media production,
research, training, auxiliary services, and
management), in most other cases
distributed across disparate and
sometimes physically separated
structures, can be integrated within the
CCTV-organism and connected by a
common infrastructure the combined
circulatory, ventilatory, internal
transportation, alimentary, and
communicative organs of the overall
system. Individuals can traverse the
entire structure, and conceivably observe
every facet of news production, decision-
making, and dissemination, in a single
long walk. Executives high in the
overhang operate with the constant
visible reminder that they are supported
by, and are literally dependent on, layer
upon layer of laborers.
The final penetration of an observers
instruments finds a core of practical
infrastructure. The CCTVs services loop
has a serial rather than parallel structure,
but multiple mechanical rooms are
regularly distributed, and modules of
each system are detachable and
replaceable, allowing critical heating,
cooling, ventilation, and plumbing
functions to continue uninterrupted when
components are under repair, blocking
cascading system failures. This design
resembles the modularity and
redundancy of primitive organisms
adapted for difficult environments such
as the subterranean (segmented worms)
or the aquatic (coral and other marine
colony-organisms).
In a structure where over 50 percent
of the floors (stories 11 through 38, or 28
of the total of 55) are discontinuous pairs,
efficient internal transportation is a
challenge. The elevator system has
evolved to solve this problem, not only
through the conventional strategies of
combining local and express elevator
banks, dedicating certain spaces to
transfer lobbies, and limiting the vertical
span of most elevators, but also through
double-deck elevator design, a relatively
recent adaptation among built organisms.
Making fewer stops on alternate floors
during peak use periods, the double-deck
cars help conserve both usable floor
space and human transportation time.
Inferences from multimodal
observations
The CCTV-entity simultaneously calls
for definitions and resists them. Its
materials appear inorganic, yet it displays
characteristics of life, chiefly forms of
change and changes of form. It has
clearly evolved; it shows traces of
adaptation in response to external
conditions and pressures. It performs
myriad functions, responds to its
environment, changes that environment,
and processes the information resulting
from that dialogue. It appears to be still
evolving as it grows; its features reflect
processes improvised in response to
experience, not theories imposed a priori.
It appears capable of defending itself.
We will know whether it is alive only if it
eventually reproduces.
491
 The weaker buildin

492 Against the rigor of CCTV,we needed a fuzzy counterpart a hospitality building that welcomes
ng
TVCC
The Television Cultural Center (TVCC) is an open, inviting
structure. It accommodates visitors and guests, and will be
freely accessible to the public. On the ground floor, two
different lobbies provide access to the 1500-seat
theater and a large ballroom. The hotel guests
enter at a dedicated drop-off from the east of
the building and ascend to the second floor,
housing the check-in as well as restaurants,
lounges, and conference rooms. The hotel
rooms occupy both sides of the tower,
forming a spectacular atrium above the
landscape of public facilities.

visitors,in a way we never dared before. 493

 Team

494 High pressure work in a low pressure city - OMA could never exist without Rotterdam,a city that
has no scene,makes no demands,offers no distractions a laboratory of indifference. 495
 Div. B Cafeteria
550 000 m2
Mechanical

ng Rooms

Div. C Office

Staff Canteen

Kitchen

Sky Restaurant

Senior decision maker office

om

Staff Caf Common Area

Sky Studio
Multifunctional Hall Vice president office

VIP Reception President office

January July

VIP Meeting Vice president office

Div. B Open Office

Post-Production Office

80m2 Studio 150m2 Studio

Terrace

Multifunc

496 In the age of the blob,a paroxysm of the orthogonal; last stand or,inevitably,the future?
top of each other (and were making subtle compromises to the spherical to make it work),
 in 1825 days

2008
Div. B Office

Div A Offices/Meeting
Refuge Area

Meeting Rooms

Div. C
Reference Center Training Labs

Mechanical Canteen Network Control Room

Div A Offices/Meeting

Mechanical

UN area Div A Offices/Meeting

Mechanical

Broadcasting Control Area

Broadcasting Control Area

Satelite Antenna Room

Div A Offices/Meeting

Mechanical

Div A Offices

Div A Open office

Meeting 250m2 Studio Post-Production

Sky Studio
Div A Open office

Open meeting area

Staff Lounge Open Post-Production Office

Broadcast Control Area

Div A Offices/Meeting

Multifunctional Hall

rea Div A Offices/Meeting

250m2 Studio
Post-Production Office

Div A Offices/Meeting

ctional Hall Vice president office

As some of our best friends were struggling with the issue of how to stack two blobs on 497
working on an almost Roman model is of scale and planning feels both ancient and new.
 Stress

498 Contrary to architecture,which promiscuously embraces uncertainty and risk,engineering is

 Who says that structure should not be re-invented? Who
says that the regime of gravity that we have suffered from
under capitalism and communism, the one regime that
unites us all, who says that that regime is sacrosanct, who
says that reinventing structure cannot be creative, I simply
ask you to clarify the terms by which you name this
structure unworkable. It is workable... It is simply a way of
supporting and enabling other forms of architecture
to emerge. It is not only
this form, once it is proven
that we can build it, it is
not only this building
which will be realized
with incredible and
outrageous effort, it will
also liberate hundreds
De of other architects, good
and bad as usual, to be more
experimental and to surrender less
to a dictatorship of gravity. Discussion
at Tsinghua University, 5 August 2003

The primary structure of the building is

the triangulated surface of the loop, which acts
as a mega-tube element with all the inherent
benefits of stiffness, redundancy, robustness,
and torsion capacity. It takes all the horizontal loads on the building.
Instead of simply reinforcing the points of greatest stress, we
doubled and where necessary, tripled the dia-grid or we took out
redundant structure

defined through its avoidance of possible/certain failure. 499

 Iconography
While television is a medium that reaches everybody,
television buildings all over the world are mute.
They fail to achieve their iconic and urban potential, remaining lifeless both day and night.
CCTV will be one of the most influential TV stations worldwide.
An active faade will launch a contemporary iconography for the city and the world....
It will bring invaluable business potential for CCTV,
and further integrate CCTVS headquarters with the city.

CCTV
500 In Newwill be one of the
York,entire most influential
buildings tv stations
glow incandescent worldwide.CCTV
with will
the movement of bestock
the one of the most
markets: influential
what is tv sta
most influential tv stations worldwide.CCTV will be one of the most influential tv stations worldwide.CCTV
tations worldwide.CCTV will be one
kept from the past?... of the most
embraced of theinfluential
future? tv stations worldwide.CCTV will be one of the 501
V will be one of the most influential tv stations worldwide.CCTV will be one of the most influential tv
 Splendid

502 Does the Dutch embassy in Berlin fit in the lobby of CCTV?
10 000 people lobby

503
 An excerpt from:
FORWARD
COMPATIBILITY
A proposition for the future of media integration in China
BY RENE DAALDER
A TV station like CCTV serves as a beacon,
connecting the public at all times with
the rest of the world. It represents the
viewers worldwide eye, ever alert and
encompassing the entire planet. It helps
them fall asleep as well as waking them
up - it is the familiar backbone of their
lives
Historically, the television industry has
not promoted change. Due to TVs
dependency on fail proof technology,
allowing it to broadcast around the clock,
the medium has evolved in small
increments. But with the impending
worldwide introduction of digital
television, TV is about to undergo the
most radical transformation since its
invention. As microprocessors, wireless
technology, fiber optics, satellites, the
Internet, and digital compression
coalesce, the manner in which products
and services will be created, distributed,
and used is about to change in
unprecedented ways, and over time will
radically alter the function of todays
broadcasting organizations.
Instead of being like the production
centers of today, the TV studio of the 21st
century is likely to bear more of a
resemblance to a central bank credit card
processing plant, where terabytes of
information are stored for immediate or
near-real time access. The concept of
video or audio footage will become
obsolete, replaced by generic digital
504 Could the digital revolutionize democracy?
file. No longer will vast amounts of
archived tapes have to be transported
from one floor to the next to be mounted
on acres of video tape machines with
a hodgepodge of different standards
and configurations.
In the future, universal digital
translators will make it possible to access,
update, and store data without losing any
productivity. A tapeless ingest
component managed by software will
allow producers, editors, or graphics
artists to instantly retrieve and repurpose
the content in all possible delivery
formats. Thanks to the user interfaces of
tomorrow, the workforce will be
completely unaware of any technical
issues or even the location in which the
tasks they perform are being processed.
The systems distributed intelligence
accesses computers just as easily in
Beijing as in Shanghai: the stations
computerized resource management
can find intelligence-on-tap in an
online system that extends far beyond
its own premises.
In this fully networked future, the
viewers as well will be connected to a
massive computerized utility that will
dramatically change CCTVs way of
interfacing with the public. Rather than
being broken up into the different
segments of TV, telecommunications, and
the Internet, the new infrastructure will
encompass all of them. Constant uploads
and downloads will give the concept of
interactive programming a whole new
meaning, hinted at by the online gaming
techniques of today. Programs will no
longer be on or off the air, but always
available and automatically updated,
building communities of fans who will
interact with the data stream and each
other in a media world that has truly
come alive.
Due to historical and geographic
circumstance, CCTVs headquarters in
Beijing will inevitably become an
important hub in this evolution of the
global media landscape. Incredible
efficiencies in the workflow will be
realized along with an increasingly bi-
directional relationship between the
station and the public, which will no
longer be bound by the traditional
limitations of time and place. As CCTVs
digital brain becomes ever more
transparent and ubiquitous, it will be
precisely the immaterial elusiveness of
tomorrows networked world that will
give the new buildings presence its
greatest importance.
507
 WTC III, Bin Laden II
In September 2000, the Spanish critic Galiano compared me to the writer Houellebecq. It is not easy, he writes, to feel
sympathy for either of these bitter heroes impossible not to feel admiration for their toxic talent. In October 2001, when I had
just been acquitted of a charge of plagiarism in London High Court, my accuser compared me to the third World Trade Tower,
and vowed to bring me down, yet. Two years later, Galiano, in a terrifying escalation of metaphor, admitted that he felt the
same genre of fascination and repulsion provoked in many of us by Osama bin Laden, a charismatic figure whose lure cannot
be abstracted from his ominous audacity. If Im bin Laden, what is my America? Will failure put a price on my head? Should
we look out for the Dead or Alive cover? Personally, what most strikes me about Houellebecq is his humor. And the
indiscriminate tenderness he extends to all his protagonists, as they scrape a minimum of pleasure from our
flattened, uncivil society.

A telephone conversation, September 18, 2003

My friend, X1, recommended that I talk to you. Weve had a
lot of negative press recently. Disaffected former
clients. Its an avalanche. It seems orchestrated. We have no
idea where it comes from.
Let me think about it for a few days.
Two days later
Hi. Did you think of a strategy?
Yes. First off the bat: your situation is not that desperate.
X is behind you all the way. And I think Y2 likes you too.
But thats exactly the problem: they like us so much they
cant write about us anymore. No one would take it
seriously. You have to think of something new. Apart from
counting our friends, is there anything else we can do?
Yeah, I think we should think of a charity.
. A charity!.
Yeah, theres a few nice ones around. The Robin Hood
Foundation, JFK Jr.s old charity. That would be a good
one for you.
But Im never there. I put all my goodness in our work
try to spread it over the world. Im almost never in Z3 anymore.
Well, you said you wanted to improve your image didnt
you.
I.
1. The worlds most feared critic
2. The second most feared critic
3. The most important city in the world

506 CCTV on its way to becoming a Chinese building....

507