TOKYO BIG SIGHT
Tokyo Big Sight - Tokyo International
Exhibition Center - Tokyo Big Sight is one of the largest convention
centers in Tokyo and a very iconic design.
Tokyo Big Sight (東京ビッグサイト, Tokyo Big Sight) is the popular
nickname for the Tokyo International Exhibition Center (東京国際展示場, Tōkyō
Kokusai Tenjijō), a Japanese convention center that opened in April 1996.
Located in Odaiba of Tokyo Bay, the center is one
of the largest convention venues within the city, and its most iconic
representation the visually-distinctive Conference Tower.
Tokyo Big Sight - Overview
Located within Ariake of the Kōtō special ward in Tokyo,
the Big Sight's most distinctive feature is the unique architecture of its
58 m-high eight-storey Conference Tower. The site utilizes steel frame with
reinforced concrete construction, boasting a total floor area of 230,873 mē
which outsizes Makuhari Messe's floor space by half, and of which 35% is
indoors. The convention center is divided into three main areas, each with
their own supporting facilities such as restaurants: The East Exhibition
Hall, the West Exhibition Hall and the Conference Tower.
Tokyo Big Sight - Conference Tower
The thing most associated with the Tokyo Big Sight name,
the glass and titanium-panelled Conference Tower appears as a set of four
inverted pyramids mounted upon large supports. The first floor comprises of
a 1100-seat reception hall and four conference rooms of varying size. The
second floor comprises of the Entrance Plaza which is the main access area,
the glass-roofed Event Plaza, the Entrance Hall which leads to the
exhibition halls proper, and the Exhibition Plaza. There are no floors three
through five due to the structure's above-ground stature.
Floors six and seven can be directly accessed via escalator from the
second-floor Entrance Hall, and comprise the main convention facilities of
the Tower. The sixth floor houses ten conference rooms of small to medium
size, some of which can be merged into larger spaces by removing intervening
partitions.[6] Floor seven houses the 1000-seat International Conference
Room as well as three conference rooms of much smaller size. Floor eight
houses five conference rooms.
Scattered around the Tower's vicinity are public art pieces, most of which
are works by international artists such as Claes Oldenberg and his wife
Coosje Van Bruggen, Michael Craig-Martin and Lee U-Fan. These include a
giant sculpture of a saw, a large stylized pond and three marble beds.
Tokyo Big Sight - East Exhibition Hall
The East Exhibition Hall's main layout consists of a
central 600 m-long two-tiered galleria, flanked on both sides by three
mostly-identical exhibition halls, and has underground parking available.
The overall height of the structure is three storeys, with the galleria
reaching two storeys. The glass-roofed galleria is equipped with moving
walkways for easier movement, food outlets, escalators, electronic
signboards and a host of other relevant facilities.
Each hall has a mobile roof that enables exhibitors to control the amount of
sunlight coming through, recessed electronic and control service pits at
regular intervals (six meters), a show office, four meeting rooms and a
dressing room. It is possible to merge a hall with adjacent halls on the
same side, allowing for a maximum continuous floor space three times the
capacity of a single hall, or a grand total of 26,010 mē.
Unlike its West counterpart, the East Exhibition Hall is not located next to
the main Conference Tower area.
Tokyo Big Sight - West Exhibition Hall
The West Exhibition Hall's layout consists of four
internal halls surrounding a central two-tiered Atrium. Halls one and two
occupy the first floor, and are each equipped with a single meeting room,
two show offices and seven meeting rooms. If necessary, they can be merged
with the glass-roofed atrium area to maximize all available exhibition
space. Halls three and four are individually smaller than the first floor
halls, as the rest of the space not taken up by the Atrium's upper area is
largely the rooftop exhibition area.
Adjacent to the West Exhibition Hall is an outdoor exhibition area, which
like the rooftop area overlooks the waterfront. Like the other exhibition
areas in the Tokyo Big Sight, it is possible to combine both upper halls and
both spaces together to create a single continuous floor area. All in all,
the West Exhibition Hall boasts in total six show offices, twenty-three
meeting rooms and three dressing rooms. The gross total floor area of the
Hall stands at 46,280 mē.
Tokyo Big Sight - Construction
Contracted by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government's Bureau
of Finance, the construction of the entire site was handled by eight
contractors in total, among them companies such as the Hazama and Shimizu
Corporations. Construction efforts began in October 1992 and were finalized
in October 1996, the contract in total worth no less than 40,392 million
Yen.[2] A considerable 45% of that sum went towards the sole handler of the
Tower segment, the Hazama Corporation.
The Former Governor of Tokyo, Shunichi Suzuki, had the honour of commencing
the 1994 lifting-up ceremony on June 30th, which initiated the operation of
raising the Tower's 6500-ton main structure above ground, a process which
took three days to complete using a computer-guided system that precisely
jacked the structure up into place. A 250-ton aerial escalator was installed
later to formally link the raised structure to the ground floors.
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(Article
based on
Wikipedia article and used under the
GNU Free Documentation License)
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