Cloud laboratory

  • Location: Leipzig
  • Client: Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research
  • Realisation: 2003 – 2005

A building shell was needed for large-scale equipment that can be used to simulate cloud formation in a laboratory under realistic conditions. The architectural concept of the building reflects this use: The special laboratories and offices of the institute are grouped on the ground floor around the 16-metre-tall tower in which the cloud simulator is located. The uniqueness of the experimental arrangement of the cloud simulator gives the building its unique appearance.

The cloud simulator consists of an up to eight-metre-long vertically positioned double-walled flow tube through…
The cloud simulator consists of an up to eight-metre-long vertically positioned double-walled flow tube through which the cloud flows. The tube stands in the middle of a windowless cylindrical tower in which highly stable environmental conditions are generated. Researchers study the formation of a cloud in a test tube and most of all the changes to it due to human influence.
The other peripheral laboratories and offices are arranged on the ground floor around the 16-meter-tall…
The other peripheral laboratories and offices are arranged on the ground floor around the 16-meter-tall tower in the centre housing the cloud simulator. The symbolic typology of the building as well as the design elements such as the blue and yellow skylights are derived from the world of cloud research.
In order to reduce the cost-intensive field tests used for cloud research the Leibniz-Institut für…
In order to reduce the cost-intensive field tests used for cloud research the Leibniz-Institut für Troposphärenforschung (Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research) developed a method for drawing clouds into the laboratory. This was done using a cloud simulator completely newly designed by researchers from the institute that reduces natural clouds to a linear particle stream (the pink tube left in the photo).
The Stockholm Public Library by Gunnar Asplund (1928)
The Stockholm Public Library by Gunnar Asplund (1928)
The architectural form was not found by following the emotionalised concept of ‘clouds’ to create…
The architectural form was not found by following the emotionalised concept of ‘clouds’ to create a ‘cloudy’ amorphous building. Rather, the cloud laboratory is more of a visual expression of a highly technical machine focussed solely on cloud mastery in a test tube.