A History of High-Performance Fabrics
for Architectural Structures

One of the most dynamic applications in the last 30 years has been high-performance fabrics for architectural structures. For example, who would have thought 50 years ago that millions of dollars' worth of inventory could be reliably protected from inclement weather by a building manufactured from a vinyl-coated fabric that weighs less than two pounds per square yard? Or, that 80,000 fans would watch a football game in a stadium covered with an air-supported Teflon coated fiberglass fabric?

Building Systems

Two basic types of building systems have evolved utilizing high-performance architectural fabrics – the air-supported structure and the tension membrane structure.

The air-supported structure utilizes an inflation system, which maintains a positive internal air pressure to establish the structural integrity of the building system. The tension membrane structure does not utilize an inflation system but maintains structural integrity with a frame- or cable-supported system.

Fabrics

Two predominant fabrics have emerged as the preferred materials for architectural fabric structures. The first is a vinyl coated synthetic material, which utilizes polyester yarns as the base fabric. This fabric has the flexibility to be utilized in a wide variety of cost-effective architectural fabric structures. The second material commonly used is Teflon coated fiberglass, which is utilized primarily in expansive, high occupancy architectural fabric structure applications.

The beauty of architectural fabric structures is that the architect or design engineer can take advantage of this dynamic building material to get new, unusual shapes with load stresses and economics far different from those that would be required with more conventional static building materials.

The Future of Architectural Fabric Structures

Public attention focuses on the conceptual aspect of architectural fabric structures, their aesthetics and their dynamic free-flowing lines. However, fabric as a building material is still a relatively new technology and not commonly understood, particularly by architects and engineers, despite its 50-year history.

In addition, this building material concept is not static in nature, such as bricks and mortar, but it is a dynamic building material, one that takes shape, one that reacts to loading and stress. To assure proper performance and long life of these structures, quality performance criteria must be established and specified by the architect, engineer or procurement agency.

Continue to: Applications: Air-Supported Structures