Three swooping entangled sculptural steel pieces celebrate the Bavarian marque's centenary. A hollow monocoque steel shell construction delivers an astonishingly lightweight and rigid structure pushing all the boundaries of form, curvature, span and slenderness. For the client brief the aim was for the sculpture to be flawless, with perfectly smooth curves and not so much as a single ripple in the steel to break the spell.
The new sculpture for the Goodwood Festival of Speed comprises three curved triangular sections, each of which supports a car at their tip. The sections are constructed from rolled steel. The geometry has been conceived so that all of the section sides are developable surfaces that can be fabricated from flat sheets which are rolled into curves to achieve the final form. The steel sheets were laser cut and welded together into the triangular section which provides all of the required strength and stiffness for the structure.
The sculpture is a fusion of art and engineering, and shows an understanding of structural design and manufacturing technology, along with the practical knowledge of efficient construction.