Heights, The: Anatomy of a Skyscraper - Hardcover

Kate Ascher

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1594203032 ISBN 13: 9781594203039

Publisher: PENGUIN USA, 2011

Synopsis

From the author of The Works: Anatomy of a City comes a gorgeous graphic tour through the inner workings of skyscrapers.

The skyscraper is perhaps the most recognizable icon of the modern urban landscape. Providing offices, homes, restaurants, and shopping to thousands of inhabitants, modern skyscrapers function as small cities- with infrastructure not unlike that hidden beneath our streets. Clean water is provided to floors thousands of feet in the sky; elevators move people swiftly and safely throughout the building; and telecom networks allow virtual meetings with people on other continents. How are these services-considered essential, but largely taken for granted- possible in such a complex structure? What does it really take to sustain human life at such enormous heights?

Exploring the interconnected systems that make life livable in the sky is the task of Kate Ascher's stunningly illustrated The Heights: Anatomy of a Skyscraper. Ascher examines skyscrapers from around the world to learn how these incredible structures operate. Just how do skyscrapers sway in the wind, and why exactly is that a good idea? How can a modern elevator be as fast as an airplane? Why are skyscrapers in Asia safer than those in the United States? Have new safeguards been designed to protect skyscrapers from terrorism?

What happens when the power goes out in a building so tall? Why are all modern skyscrapers seemingly made of glass, and how can that be safe? How do skyscrapers age, and how can they be maintained over decades of habitation? No detail is too small, no difficulty too big to escape Ascher's encyclopedic eye.

Along the way, The Heights introduces the reader to every type of person involved in designing, building, and maintaining a skyscraper: the designers who calculate how weight and weather will affect their structures, the workers who dig the foundations and raise the lightning rods, the crews who clean the windows and maintain the air ducts, and the firefighters-whose special equipment allows blazes to be fought at unprecedented heights.

More than a technical survey, Ascher's work is a triumphant ode to the most monumental aspect of modern civilization. Saturated with vivid illustrations and unforgettable anecdotes, The Heights is the ultimate guide to the way things work in the skyscraper.

About this title

Review:

-Lavishly illustrated...meticulously and lucidly deconstructs the design.-
─The New York Times
-[An] eye-widening piece of illustrated deconstruction...on the most enduring symbol of city life.-
─Wired

-Images of diaphragm walls, skeletal frame systems and elevator shafts may not sound like a colourful depiction of the high life, but a new intricate detailing of the inner workings of the mighty skyscraper might well be one of the most interesting books published all year.-
─The Independent (UK)

-A remarkably plain-language reexamination of tall buildings in a sustainability-conscious age...a laudable, one-stop summary that goes beyond lists and photographs of tall buildings and gives a rich grounding in vertical basics that all students of cities both need and deserve-
─The Atlantic Cities

About the Author:

Kate Ascher received her M.Sc. and Ph.D. in government from the London School of Economics and her B.A. in political science from Brown University. Ascher worked at Vornado Realty Trust in New York City before taking up her current position managing Happold Consulting's U.S. practice, and she serves on the faculty of Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation.

About this edition

• Publisher: PENGUIN USA
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 1594203032
• ISBN 13: 9781594203039
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 208