INNOVATION July-August 2014

2O13 2O14 PROJECT HIGHLIGHTS The 2013/2014 Project Highlights pictorial showcases the engineering and geoscience work of APEGBC members in BC and around the world. Innovation thanks all the individuals and companies that responded to our annual call for project photographs.

Skies Painted with Unnumbered Spark

Artist Janet Echelman installed Skies Painted with Unnumbered Spark at the 30 th � Anniversary TED Conference in Vancouver. The sculpture was a collaboration of artists Janet Echelman of Studio Echelman and Aaron Koblin, Creative Director of Google’s Data Arts Team. Arup is the engineering designer for the pre-stressed net sculpture that spanned 745 ft between the roof of the 24-storey Fairmont Hotel and the new Vancouver Convention Centre West. This is believed to be the largest pre- stressed rope structure in the world. Arup’s primary role was to create the geometric and structural design for the pre-stressed rope network that supports and forms an integral part of the sculpture. The firm developed custom software, implementing an “adaptive form-finding” algorithm to optimize the geometry and structure of this 3,200-lb sculpture. The netting was created by knotting almost one million feet of braided fibre.

Owner: Janet Echelman. Project team: Hans-Erik Blomgren, P.Eng. Struct.Eng; Cormac Deavy P.Eng. Photo credit: Ema Peter.

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