A Study On Lightweight Design Of Works Of Shigeru Ban

This dissertation is going to study lightweight structure architecture through cases studies of Japanese architect Shigeru Ban, who was the laureate of the 2014 Prizker Prize. Firstly, this article will introduce the development of lightweight structure buildings around the world, then conclude and define three types of lightweight design: Lightweight design on materials, Lightweight design on structures and Lightweight design of performance. After that, works of Shigeru Ban will be classified in these three types: Paper buildings with lightweight design on materials, wooden buildings with lightweight design on structures and Skin buildings with lightweight design of performance. Moreover, specific cases studies will be combined with studies on educations and practices to conclude the design theories and strategies of Shigeru Ban.Shigeru Ban’s creative lightweight design on different materials have great significances on Chinese architectural design development. His studies on paper tube buildings represent research and application of new raw cheap materials, which combine ecological and economic design to use on humanitarian assistances. These kind of design strategies have reference significance to the domestic development of lightweight design status quo, which is limited in light steel structures. And Shigeru Ban’s design on wooden structures, including furniture house system and large spatial woven wooden structure, have deep significances to China, which was the headstream of wooden architecture but totally abandon wood as structural material today. Lastly in Shigeru Ban’s skin architectural design, he used lightness as a kind of architectural aesthetics performance to represent extremity of structure technology. These cases are introspections to the pure expressionism today both in China and other countries.