Node Housing

Yas Island in Abu Dhabi features a world-class motor sports racetrack straddled by a hotel designed by Asymptote Architecture. The hotel's towers and bridge are loosely cloaked in a skin called the ‘gridshell’, comprising a steel frame and modulated glass panels. The shell has a standard two-grid system with a nodal connector at each intersection. The connections are concealed within ‘node housings’ and it is these that Billings Jackson was commissioned to design. Given that each node adjusts to accommodate the surface articulation, refining the appearance of these junctions was a complex challenge.