City of Dreams, Macau – making the vision viable

Abstract

This article describes how cutting edge parametric-based engineering techniques have been used to achieve the detailed design of 2500 complex steelwork connections for the exoskeleton of the new City of Dreams hotel in Macau, China. It discusses the tools, methodology and strategy employed by the engineering team to automate the difficult and time-consuming process of creating, verifying and documenting the geometrically challenging, large-scale steel connections using finite element methods within an ambitious timescale of just 12 months.