Curvilinear Glass Technologies In The Historical Urban Environment. A New Approach To Rehabilitation Of The Urban Tissue And Its Elements - Selected Examples.

The paper is deals with Glass Structures, used as a component of nonlinear shaping architectural forms in historical urban environment. These forms are treated as a city-event per analogies to Bernard Tschumi's theory of „event cities”. In this theory, the essence of space is to animate the movement and actions, which strengthens the social and ecological or political dimension of architecture. In the first part of the paper the possibilities of glass technology now and historically is discussed. Buildings with non-linear shape force relationships between geometry and material which are different than before. Virtual free surface imposes such technical solutions which question the traditional thinking about glass components in architetcure. A few selected examples glass city-events will be presented and discused. The second part presents of the academic research program undertaken at West Pomeranian University of Technology in Szczecin by Krystyna Januszkiewicz. The program was focused on designing an city-event with using freely curved glass panels (3D). This is an innovative spatial product invented in Poland. In conclusion it is emphasized that when dealing with transparent surfaces, is not only rooted in the geometrical definition of the surface, but depends on the correct coupling of the glazing technology with the structural constraints. Curvilinear glass technologies opened into the new territories for the study of the cognitive form, its tectonics and space, changing the existing axioms design.