Structural Awards 2016

The Torre BBVA Bancomer in Mexico City by LegoRogers is the product of a competition win and a collaboration between two international practices to deliver a bespoke HQ for an international bank.

The building is an elegant response to a key site in terms of its urbanism and its solution to the challenges of the architecture of tall buildings, as Louis Sullivan noted a skyscraper "is just a whole lot of floors!".

Torre BBVA is located at the junction of downtown with Chapultepec Park and a dramatic shift in axis of the primary road in Mexico City, Paseo De La Reforma. Conceptually clever, the building resolves its relationship with this complex site by rotating its square plan to the diagonal to address park and the vista shift. A required car park and its ramp - topped by a Dining Hall and an auditorium respectively - are then utilised to deal with the tower's base and its junction with its lower neighbours. A shuttle lift then moves staff from a public ground to a very secure and private sky lobby comprising lift transfer lobby and the dining hall and auditoria.

The challenge of the ‘whole lot of floors’ is dealt with by five triple height sky lobbies that rotate around the four elevations creating nine floor clusters around these external rooms. These are designed to offer amenity to the occupants and superscaled relief to the tower's elevations. A diagonal shading grid ensures the building achieves, and deserves, energy rating accolades and that the mass of floors are abstracted into a simpler geometric form.