Curled Steel

Abstract

Pictured is a hand-drawn architectural section drawing that shows the estimated material limits of a steel bending technique we in the studio call ‘curling’. The curled steel tube, like the common structural steel column, transfers loads from the building above downward into concrete footings. However, unlike typical columns, curled steel denies the standard reading of structure as strictly linear, rational, and gridded, and allows it to become an aesthetic tool – structure can be gestural like a brush stroke, can sway like wheat grass, or even make a shape (like a heart). This research was carried out using scale models built of heavy gauge steel wire to roughly establish the terminal limits of the system, in other words what angle of bending the columns could withstand before buckling and kinking. From there a range of architectural possibilities and effects were cataloged in the fashion of the accompanying image.