Home Upfront Now Up Books Towns Structures People Firms Lexicon

Lexicon Steel Frame _____________________________________________________ Steel frame usually refers to a building technique with a "skeleton frame" of vertical steel columns and horizontal I-beams, constructed in a rectangular grid to support the floors, roof and walls of a building which are all attached to the frame. The development of this technique made the construction of the skyscraper possible. Anthony M DE WITT claims credit for introducing the American Steel Skeleton frame structure for buildings to the Cape, hence South Africa, in the late C19, used in JW Jagger's four-storey building in Cape Town. (See also Wikipedia)