Freakitechture

Curving Escalators at Star Place

How about this challenge: design a ten story escalator that must curve?

It proved to be no problem for UNStudio. They created Star Place, a department store in Taiwan that has a curved shape and glows like a star. Inside is a 10-story atrium where the architects created spiral, moving stairs by putting escalators around the center axis.

Technically acting as a sunscreen and weather barrier the curved façade is fully glazed and combines the curtain wall glazing with horizontal lamellas and vertical glass fins. The position and size of each of the façade elements are derived from a twisted frame system, which is related to the interior organisation of the building. The concave front of the building displays different fluent forms when seen from varying distances and directs the visual field of the customers.