Geometrical patterns for diagrid buildings: Exploring alternative design strategies from the structural point of view

Diagrid structures for tall buildings are very popular among engineers and architects, thanks to the inherent qualities of structural efficiency, decorative attributes and morphological versatility. However limited academic research have been developed with focus on the structural behavior, design criteria and performance assessment of this structural system; further, the scientific contributions in literature mainly concern regular diagrids, i.e. patterns characterized by constant geometrical attributes of the base module (width and height, angle, scale). In this paper, a first step toward a systematic and comprehensive study of geometrical patterns for diagrids is provided. For this purpose, diagrid structures characterized by regular patterns are compared to alternative geometrical configurations, obtained by changing the angle of diagonals (variable-angle, VA) as well as by changing the number of diagonal (variable-density, VD) along the building height. Eight different diagrid patterns are generated and designed for a 90-story model building, according to procedures either provided in the literature or suggested by the authors. The resulting diagrid structures are assessed under gravity and wind loads and various performance parameters are evaluated on the basis of the analyses results. The comparison in terms of structural weights and performances finally allows for discussing efficiency potentials of the different patterns.