This week sees the opening of the Serpentine Pavilion, designed by Mexican architect Frida Escobedo and engineered by Aecom.
The courtyard-based design, which resembles a jailhouse, draws on the domestic architecture of Mexico and British materials and history, specifically the Prime Meridian line at London’s Royal Observatory in Greenwich.
Harnessing an interplay of light, water and geometry, the 3.2m-high pavilion contains a 52.6m2 pool with a 5mm deep reflective layer.
The walls are made up of steel rods, the equivalent of two kilometres in length, attached to which are more than 10,000 horizontally placed tiles, each of which weighs 4.3kg (totalling 43.3t).
The roof is made of up 43 1.5mm stainless steel soffit panels with a mirror finish, while mild steel roof panels make up the top surface of the roof.
Comments are closed.