Abstract

Shells are impressive structures due to the high load‐bearing capacity they exhibit when appropriately designed. Their construction, however, is usually associated with great efforts. In this paper, a novel approach for shell‐construction is presented that circumvents the necessity for doubly curved formwork. Instead, shells are erected from flat plates to which an eccentric force is applied causing them to bend into a desired curved shape. The form‐activating forces are induced by coupling a system of tendons to a thin—thus flexible—plate made from reinforced concrete. This approach may seem controversial as concrete exhibits a small ultimate strain and a brittle failure behavior. Therefore, it does not appear suited for the large deformations expected during the construction of actively bent structures. The investigations presented in this paper show the suitability of textile‐reinforced concrete for the fabrication of actively bent shells.

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