Supersam Warsaw
Coordinates: 52°12′46″N 21°01′12″E / 52.21278°N 21.02000°E
Supersam was a modernist supermarket in Warsaw, at Mokotowski Square, built in 1962 and designed by Jerzy Hryniewiecki, Maciej Krasinski and Ewa Krasińska with structural engineer Wacław Zalewski. It was the first self-serve supermarket in the country and one of the greatest achievements of modernism in Poland. Supersam was demolished in 2006 and replaced by a new architectural complex built between 2013 and 2015.
The Warsaw supermarket was built in 1962 at the Lublin Union Square (formerly also Mokotowski square,) on the site of the former Polish Radio building. Historically (1770-1818), this place was called Rondo Mokotowskie and standing here was the Southern Gate to the city. The supermarket building was an innovative design with a roof on the principle of tensegrity suspended and kept in place by steel girders and cables, designed by three architects: Professor Jerzy Hryniewiecki, Maciej Krasinski, Maciej Gintowt and three engineers: the Professor Emeritus of Massachusetts Institute of Technology Waclaw Zalewski, Professor Stanislaw Kusia and Andrzej Żórawski.
Although a campaign was carried out to save the building from destruction as an architectural monument valuable PRL and unique construction design for its time, Supersam was demolished in December 2006.
A hanging roof was desired from the beginning, but this would require sloping roof mainstays that would take up valuable real estate and would make the building structure vulnerable to catastrophic failure due to accidents or vandalism. Through progressive designs, a method was developed, by structural engineer Wacław Zalewski, employing the principle of tensegrity, to eliminate the backstays by alternating cables and arches of similar curvature. The outward thrust of arches at their highest points exactly balances the inward pull of the cables at each end. This whole structure was supported vertically by columns.
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