Construction on 1000 Museum Tower to Break Ground in June

Architect Zaha Hadid chose 1000 Museum Tower in Miami, Florida to be the first building she designed in the United States. The 62-story, 706-foot structure will be a super-luxury condominium that will sell units for $5 to $15 million. The unique exterior design combined with the open space in each unit has many Miami residents wishing they could move into the building. Construction will break ground in June.

Zaha Hadid Architects designed the residential skyscraper and DeSimone Consulting Engineers, PLLC provided structural engineering services for the project. The building has a concrete exoskeleton that forms a web of flowing lines that integrates lateral bracing within the lines of structural support. The building's rigid frame makes the structure highly resistant to Miami’s strong wind loads, and the interior of the building is almost column free. Also, due to the geometry of the building’s exoskeleton, each floor has slightly different dimensions from the one above and below it. 

Project Director Chris Lepine has discussed the combination of architectural design and structural engineering that went into designing the structure. He stated, “The tower represents a line of research in high-rise construction that explores a fluid architectural expression consistent with engineering for the entire height of the structure. The emphasis is on expressing the dynamism of the structure in an integrated whole that avoids the frequent typology of a tower resting on a base.”  Lepine also went on to say, “The structure itself is ‘purposeful’ in that it is rigid, stiff, and hurricane resistant. It's not a diagrid structure—but its curving lines allow a diagonal bracketing action. We had this idea of a fluidity that is both structural and architectural.”

The tower is located on Biscayne Boulevard and has views of the Biscayne Bay and Miami Beach. The bottom two-thirds of the tower has two units per floor, but the upper one-third will have just one unit per floor. The top two residential floors will feature a duplex penthouse, and an aquatic center and event space will be located on the top floor of the building. One Thousand Museum will also be home to Miami’s first helipad on a residential condominium. The building is currently over 50 percent leased and expects to be completely leased by the time it is finished. One Thousand Museum Tower is one of many new residential towers being built in the Miami area. The focus of high-end buyers in the area seems to be shifting away from just having waterfront property to living in a building that has luxurious architecture.