What is an atrium in ancient Rome? The most amazing atriums on the planet. Atrium houses as an example of eco-architecture
With the beginning of the era of luxurious skyscrapers, a kind of “race” began for primacy among atriums - amazing halls, whose vaults go tens and tens of meters into the air... LifeGlobe will introduce you to the most outstanding examples of this interesting architectural element
For a long time, skyscrapers were built according to a general template - ordinary high-rise buildings with a bunch of monotonous floors. Until, at some point, in someone’s bright head the idea was born to use the colossal internal space to give the halls of buildings a luxurious and breathtaking look. This architectural element is mainly used in luxury hotels, so it makes sense that they make up the majority of our list of buildings with the most amazing atriums
The first on our list is the atrium of the Shanghai Grand Hyatt 5* hotel, occupying the 53-88 floors of the 421-meter Jin Mao Tower in Pudong - the new financial and business center of Shanghai
The atrium's diameter is 27 meters; oval projections on each of the hotel's 35 floors spiral down, creating an interesting illusion of rotation.
An even more interesting atrium can be seen inside the famous Dubai Sail - 5* hotel
The atrium vault of this Dubai hotel is barely visible at 180 meters in height, making it the tallest atrium in the world.
In the lobby of the Burj Al Arab there is a picturesque fountain, the jets of which reach a height of 42 meters
Our next stop will be in Atlanta, at the amazing Atlanta Marriott Marquis hotel, whose 143-meter atrium was considered the tallest on the planet from 1985 until the grand opening of the Dubai Sail.
The atrium of this American hotel literally hypnotizes visitors with its regular symmetrical shapes and calm, harmonious lighting of the balconies.
Empty space permeates the building from top to bottom, and the glass shafts of two elevators and the balconies crossing the atrium will help you see every detail in detail. Of course, this spectacle is not for the faint of heart)
As mentioned earlier, beautiful atriums are by no means the prerogative of chic, bright hotels, although, of course, most of them are located there. But the next atrium on our list is not like that. Of course, it doesn’t look particularly exciting, but it’s still no less interesting - we’re talking about the atrium of the Hong Kong complex “Sincere House”, which houses many residential premises, hotels and even factories
Such architectural elements are also used today by some large department stores. For example, the Marshall Field building in Chicago has an amazing 11-story atrium that creates a luxurious view of the vintage interiors of this old building and attracts many visitors just by the spectacle that opens from the upper floors into the interior of the building
The department store itself was founded back in 1852 and even then was a magnificent sight - the modern atrium, included in the design of the building during its large-scale renovation in 2004, only complemented the former grandeur of this historical building, unfaded by time
Another interesting example is located in Vietnamese Saigon - the atrium of the local Renaissance hotel rises from the bar on the 4th floor up to another 22 floors, up to the very ceiling of the building, and is distinguished by its comparatively cramped and straightforward forms in comparison with other examples of this unusual architectural design presented on our list. element
In appearance, it seems as if this building was simply turned inside out - the main internal wall resembles a facade so much
Now let's move to Atlanta - to the building of the 4-star Georgian Terrace Hotel, whose former appearance was added new distinctive features in 2001, including a huge “airy” atrium, designed in such a way that it does not require artificial light sources - there is plenty of sunlight, to illuminate it
Thanks to the interesting layout, the atrium structure turned out to be very bright
The hotel building itself was erected back in 1911, and it was here, at the Georgian Terrace Hotel, that the stars of the old film "Gone with the Wind" - Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh - stayed during the premiere in 1939
Our next stop is London, namely the Park Plaza Westminster Bridge hotel, the view of the restaurant from a 12-story height is involuntarily breathtaking. As you can see, the windows of some rooms also face here, revealing a rather unusual “landscape” to the residents.
Bright and spacious during the day, the atrium of the Park Plaza Hotel presents a completely different spectacle at night, turning into a real kaleidoscope of strange prisms, the light of which, reflecting off each other, creates even more interesting geometric shapes
It feels like you're in the atrium of some hotel from the distant future.
Another dizzying view is worth looking for in the very heart of New York - in Times Square, or more precisely, in the New York Marriott Marquis hotel towering above the square, which opened here back in 1985. The hotel's lobby atrium is one of the hotel's defining features, an open space that extends 45 floors into the air. A stunning sight...
Another feature of the Marriott Hotel is its high-speed elevators - 12 spacious glass cabins, lifting visitors at a speed of 300 meters per minute. The hotel's rooftop features New York's only revolving restaurant, offering breathtaking views of the surrounding area.
The atrium of the futuristic Lloyd Building in London, also known as the "Inside-Out Building" or "Inside Out Building", looks no less amazing. The building looks like it was built by some giant child using appropriately sized parts from a children's construction set.
The spacious atrium of the Lloyd's Building rises 60 meters, and the glass roof, galleries and escalators allow light to flow freely into the building. The upper floors can only be accessed via external elevators - another design decision that allowed the atrium to be preserved in natural light.
An even more breathtaking view opens from the upper floors of Singapore's Marina Mandarin Hotel. Surprisingly, the low, “only” 21-story atrium of this luxury hotel looks simply huge. Such an amazing visual illusion is achieved thanks to the building's inclined facades.
The view from the upper levels of the atrium gives the deceptive impression that we are in a giant casino or, better yet, in a huge pinball machine) Special three-dimensional structures of the lower floors of the atrium help us believe in this self-deception
The hotel itself was built in 1987 and renovated in 2005. “Some” $25 million was spent on redevelopment and modification of the external and internal appearance of the hotel
We are transported again to the USA, this time to Michigan, where an amazing high-rise building appeared in 2007. We are talking about the JW Marriott Grand Rapids hotel, whose atrium is supposedly created in order to make people who are afraid of heights and enclosed spaces suffer)
Yes, the windows offer a wonderful view, but look lower and the narrow “tunnel” of the atrium will create the misleading impression that this 78-meter building actually has much more than 23 floors!
The last amazing atrium, which you should definitely get acquainted with, is located in the 4.5* Pan Pacific Singapore hotel, the pleasant feature of which is that it is a non-smoking hotel
The atrium of a Singapore hotel at night is illuminated with other colors, among which red and blue predominate. This coloring makes it look like some kind of futuristic spaceship
Architectural Dictionary
Atrium
(lat. atrium, ater - dark, black)
a closed courtyard in the middle part of an ancient Italian and ancient Roman dwelling, into which the rest of the rooms opened. In the center of the atrium there was a pool (impluvium), above which a hole (compluvium) was left to drain rainwater.
(lat. ater - dark, black) - the middle part of the ancient Italian and Roman dwelling, which was a closed courtyard with which the rest of the rooms were connected. Wings of the atrium ( ala) - on both sides - were the habitat of the household gods ( lars and penates), their images and masks of their ancestors were placed there. In ancient times, in the middle of the atrium there was a hearth, above which there was a hole in the roof for smoke to escape. From this smoke, the walls and ceiling of the atrium were sooty, which is how it got its name. In the era of the late Republic and Empire, the atrium became one of the ceremonial rooms of the Roman house and received rich decoration; the place of the former hearth was taken by a shallow rectangular pool ( impluvium) above which there was still a hole in the roof to drain rainwater ( compluvium).
(Dictionary of architectural terms. Yusupov E.S., 1994)
A) the central courtyard, the main place of spending time in a Roman house; (b) a courtyard in front of an early Christian or medieval church.
(Architecture: An Illustrated Guide, 2005)
Westminster Dictionary of Theological Terms
Atrium
♦ (ENG atrium)
entrance or front yard basilicas, often open in the center and surrounded by a covered colonnade.
Tourist vocabulary
Atrium
internal light courtyard in the building
The atrium is the central part of an ancient Roman dwelling, an internal light courtyard into which the rest of the rooms opened. The etymology of the word comes from the Latin atrium, which means “smoky”, “black”. In ancient dwellings, there was a constantly burning hearth in the atrium; due to the small size of the courtyard, it could be smoked, which is where its name most likely came from. There was also a reservoir for draining rainwater.
This construction of a characteristic ancient Roman house arose under the influence of the compositions of the folk assemblies of the Greek agora and simple folk dwellings. The influence of Etruscan buildings is also felt. For several centuries the house of the Romans had no further development. Even during the era of prosperity of the empire, the atrium remained an essential part of the house. This predominant type of housing construction is called atrium-peristyle.
The atrium is the center of a Roman house, an open rectangular space, the compluvium. The roof of the atrium, four parts of which dropped towards the middle, left an open space in the very center from which rainwater flowed into an impluvium reservoir built in the floor. The roof was usually based on four columns that stood at the corners of the impluvium.
The atrium gave the Roman house its unique personality. Its layout according to Marcus Vitruvius, a Roman architect, could differ in two types: a cavedium, or open-air atrium, the roof of which ran along a circle, and an atrium with a gallery with a continuous ceiling.
Cavedium was divided into 5 types:
- Atrium tuscanicum is the most common type, also known as Etruscan. It is characterized by a concave roof with a rectangular hole in the middle, its slopes descending to the compluvium. The roof rested on 2 transverse beams located along the edges of the compluvium.
- Atrium tetrastylum was used in the construction of larger premises. This type was distinguished by partitions perpendicular to the walls, which formed a series of rooms around a courtyard. The roof of the building was based on four columns placed at the corners of the compluvium.
- Atrium corinthium is similar to the previous one, but had a larger compluvium and, accordingly, a larger number of columns. The Corinthian type was an open courtyard with a colonnade supporting a roof that sloped inward.
- Atrium displuviatum had a roof with a gap in the middle. The skylight was usually protected from the rain by a special canopy.
- Atrium testudinatum - the atrium was completely covered with vaults.
The atrium was open, created in the form of a basilica, with a covered courtyard, bordered by two side porticoes. At the back of the courtyard there was a tablinium (wooden gallery) with an open front facade. The tablinium was connected to the internal chambers by a wide span (fauces).
Initially, the courtyard of the atrium was separated from the street by a door, which, according to custom, was open. But later they began to lock her up. Entrance doors often opened inwards. Opposite them was usually a fireplace. Households gathered in this part of the house. Slaves spun here, with whom the mistress herself often worked.
Later, the atrium is already a kind of face of the house. It began to be divided into an official (tablinum - office, atrium, triclinium), front and private part (cubicula, peristyle - bedrooms). The walls of the light courtyard were decorated with frescoes, the floor was laid out with mosaics, and the hearth was replaced with a pool. Marble columns and statues began to decorate the atrium. The house became more pompous.
The passion for colossal structures that seized the Romans during the heyday of the empire gave them the idea of arranging atriums at public buildings and in temples.
In modern architecture, the meaning of the term “atrium” is somewhat different. An atrium is an open space with translucent ceilings inside a building, several floors high. During the construction of exhibition complexes, hotels, business centers, offices of major companies, this is one of the common elements of architecture.
And the dining room, where the hearth and the loom were located, and at the same time - the sacred core of the home, likened to the central sanctuary of Rome - mundus of Ceres. The latter was a round vaulted pit, according to legend, dug by Romulus at the founding of the city and opened three times a year for sacrifices. In this capacity, the atrium, like mundus, symbolized the cosmic axis connecting the underworld with the heavens. The central place in the atrium was occupied by a pool (impluvium), above which there was a hipped opening in the roof (compluvium), into which rainwater flowed. Behind the impluvium, somewhat further away, the fireplace was placed in such a way that the fire would not be flooded with rainwater, but the smoke would be drawn out. Later the fireplace disappeared from this room. Initially, the atrium was also the place where the mother of the family slept - opposite the entrance to the house there was a deep niche for her bed - lectus adversus (“bed against the door”). In later periods, this niche lost its original function and was preserved only symbolically - as a sign of the sanctity of marriage. The atrium also housed most of the valuable items belonging to the family: a heavy chest with family heirlooms (cash drawer), an altar-type table - cartibule(Varro recalled that they still met in his childhood), a special niche ( tablinum), where the owner's documents and family archive were kept, and a cabinet (niches) for storing wax masks (imagines) and busts of ancestors, as well as images of good patron spirits - Lares and Penates (later a separate sanctuary - lararium). The loom, as an indispensable element of the atrium furnishings in Old Testament families, was preserved until the end of the republic. The atrium then became the public, reception part of the house, the state hall. Here they received guests whom they did not want to bring into the family circle; here the patron received his clients. The atrium became the most richly furnished part of the house. The surviving cornice rings indicate that this hall was divided, if necessary, by curtains and drapes into separate spaces.
The atrium was invariably preserved in other types of residential buildings in Ancient Rome. The role of the atrium in the insulas (multi-story buildings) was played by the light courtyard.
Types of atriums according to Vitruvius
- atrium tuscanium(“Tuscan”) - without columns; the opening in the roof was formed only by the rafters (although such a system was expensive to build, apparently it was the most common type of atrium in the empire);
- atrium tetrastylum(“four-column”) - four columns, one at each corner of the impluvium;
- atrium corinthium(“Corinthian”) - similar to the previous one, but the compluvium is larger in size, and the number of columns increases to 12-16;
- atrium displuviatum(“rain drainage”) - the size of the compluvium was significantly reduced, due to which it looked like a narrow slit, and the slope of the roof was arranged so that rainwater flowed out of it;
- atrium testudinatum(“covered”) - an atrium completely covered with vaults (without compluvium), usually located in small houses.