The work and the technique: palazzo Lombardia. Italy

The Palazzo Lombardia project was the result of an international competition involving nearly 100 designers from around the world, which was won by the group formed by Pei Cobb Freed & Partners of New York and Italians Caputo Partnership and Sistema Duemila.

The complex consists of a group of nine-story curvilinear buildings around the main tower, creating partially covered plazas in the built-up areas. The main one, developed according to an ogival shape it is covered with a modular structure of transparent Texlon Etfe cells, pneumatic membranes of polymer-modified foils, attached to a lattice structure of steel tubes characterized by a high degree of elasticity due to a pretensioning system that makes it very similar to a tensile structure. 

Energy saving guided the building's construction. Some of the tower's facades are equipped with photovoltaic panels that provide some of the energy needed to operate the activities within it; a climate wall, consisting of a cavity between the façade's outer and inner glass panes, collects solar heat, allowing it to be reused; and a chilled beam system using groundwater heat provides both heating and cooling.

The effort to create a project that managed to combine design, innovation and environmental sustainability was awarded by the Council of Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat in Chicago, which awarded Palazzo Lombardia the title of best skyscraper in Europe for the year 2012.