Skyboat Cafe and WalkOn Glass by Xin Yuan is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2022 Golden A' Design Award in Architecture, Building and Structure Design Competition Category.
GoldArchitecture· 2022
Skyboat Cafe and WalkOn Glass
by Xin Yuan
Client: XinY structural consultants
Golden A' Design Award Winner in Architecture Category
Verified Award Winner
Verify Award Status for #137741The Design
About Skyboat Cafe and WalkOn Glass
Skyboat is a two-storey building set above a 613 metre deep sinkhole in Leye, China. Hotel rooms are placed on the ground floor, a cafe on the first floor and a viewing platform on the roof. The platform includes a walk-on glass floor measuring 10 by 12.5 metres. The building spans the narrow passageway at the top of the sinkhole and cantilevers 34 metres and 22 metres to each side of the mountain ridge. A low centre of gravity allows the structure to balance itself. Only five supports are used, which limits damage to the local plants.
The Recognition
About the Golden A' Design Award
Skyboat Cafe and WalkOn Glass is a Golden A' Design Award winner, an immensely prestigious recognition granted to first-rate, marvelous, and outstanding designs. Golden winners are exceedingly innovative, visionary, and glamorously dazzling creations that reflect the prodigy, wisdom, and prowess of their designers. Skyboat Cafe and WalkOn Glass is expected to be a highly praised, trendsetting, and monumental invention that delivers unprecedented value. This Golden A' Design Award-winning design is a spectacular, respected project that highly benefits and advances the boundaries of art, science, design, and technology. Skyboat Cafe and WalkOn Glass creates intense feelings of desire, evokes passion, encourages creativity, and fascinates us.
Where to Get It
Innovative Structural Engineering Solutions
We specialize in boundary-pushing structural engineering, creating elegant solutions for complex architectural challenges. Our award-winning team combines technical expertise with creative problem-solving to realize ambitious visions. From dramatic cantilevers to site-specific innovations, we transform constraints into opportunities.
Contact UsBehind the Design
Press Kit
Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.
- Unique Properties
- The structure cantilevers 36m over the 613m deep sinkhole. The top of the sinkhole is extremely narrow which can only accommodate a small passageway. Skyboat is proposed to span over the passageway and cantilever out to each side of the mountain ridge. Similar to the tumbler toys, it is proposed to lower the structure centre of gravity and utilize the minimum area (10metres by 30metres), in which way, the self-balance of the structure is therefore achieved.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- two-storey building consisting of hotel rooms at the ground floor, a café at the first floor and a roof viewing platform which contains a 10metre-by-12.5metre walk-on glass floor. The building comprises a construction area of 495m2 and covers a plan dimension of 10metres by 80metres. Both ends of the building cantilevers out by 34metres and 22metres respectively. The total steel weight used is 438 tonne.
- Tags
- Skyboat, XinY, Glass floor, Cantilever, Leye, Dashiwei
- Production Technology
- There are only five supports proposed. This minimizes the damages to the local vegetation.
To protect the local plants and rivers, hanging falsework was used during the construction stage and to have the structural members installed by pieces. - Design Challenge
- The structure cantilevers 36m over the 613m deep sinkhole. The top of the sinkhole（the site）is extremely narrow which can only accommodate a small passageway.
A long crack at the site indicates the site is not stable. Apart from grouting the existing crack, it is also proposed to have the key struts at each ends of the building inclining towards the ridge, the horizontal component forces from which then provided the embracing forces to the ridge and hence improved the stability of the site. - Research
- The structural system and component arrangements were adapted to the force distribution, perfectly aligned with the elegant architectural geometry.
By increasing the key strut lengths, the pre-cambering of the front cantilever structure is then achieved, which can compensate the deflections under the dead loads and some of the live loads. This also protects the glazings from large deformations. - Inspiration
- A big goose, a e tumbler toy.
The long crack at the top of the ridge indicates the site is not stable. Apart from grouting the existing crack, it is also proposed to have the key struts at each ends of the building inclining towards the ridge, the horizontal component forces from which then provided the embracing forces to the ridge and hence improved the stability of the site. - Project Duration
- The project started on 2018 in Leye China and finished on 2019.
- Operation Flow
- Visitors can enjoy coffee in the beauty of nature, or they can walk on the glass floor above the 600-meter deep pit to experience the shock of their heartbeats.
- Team Members
- Structural Engineers:XinY & Yuanlizhu
Client:Guangxi Leye DashiWei
Architect:Zhong Huaying Studio
Codesign:LiLi & Shanghai ZhongJian Architectural Design
Principal Contractor:China Railway 25th Group 6th Company - Image Credits
- Image#1: Photographer Li Jin, Yongheng,2019.
Image#2: Photographer Yongheng, Yongheng,2019.
Image#3: Photographer Yongheng, Yongheng,2019.
Image#4: Photographer Xin Yuan, XinY,2019.
Image#5: Photographer Yongheng, Yongheng,2019.
Video Credits: Yongheng
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