Mastering show-stopping exterior designs: Essential strategies for captivating architectural facades
On a chilly October 10th, a crew of architects, engineers, and fabricators gathered in Schuco's London showroom to spill the beans on how they teamed up to knock the Schuco Excellence Awards out of the park. With drinks and hors d'oeuvres in hand, these men and women shared their secrets for mastering award-winning facades. Let's dive into the nitty-gritty of what went down that fateful Thursday.
PhotosArchitecture Today & Schuco
What's the secret sauce for an award-winning facade? How can architects and fabricators sync their heads to ensure facades can be specified right and designed for trophy-worthy projects? Let's delve into that and more, shall we?
The Party of the Year
Schuco's London showroom transformed into the place to be on October 10. Three shining stars from the 2024 Schuco Excellence Awards arrived to enlighten us on their projects and spill the beans on the teamwork that led them to victory. Stephen Newell, Schuco’s national specification manager, was the affable host who kicked things off.
Extending the Exceptional (Reciprocal House)
Gianni Botsford, director of Gianni Botsford Architects, and Kevin Lamb, design manager at MGI UK, were first up to discuss Reciprocal House. This jaw-dropping individual home swept the Individual House category, building upon Foster Associates' groundbreaking work from 1969.
"So we were extending an extension... a rather unusual approach," explained Botsford. Naturally, they kept the existing extension while bootstrapping the old cottage. The primary focus was preserving the historical charm while integrating modern upgrades. They kept structural components like the metal deck, beams, and blockwork but overhauled critical elements like windows and thermal performance, ensuring these updates were as invisible as a ninja in the night.
Embracing the Scenery (Reciprocal House)
The house interacts with its surroundings in a delightful dance, taking into account the nearby homes and dense foliage, which played a crucial part in privacy and letting in the right amount of sunlight. With careful planning, the building's orientation was tweaked to offer optimal light conditions throughout the day and stunning views that change as one ascends from the basement to the upper floors.
The intricate design process was crucial to this project, involving specialists like MGI and countless iterations for the complex facade and glazing details. The project also demonstrated the importance of adapting architectural elements to fit new needs, such as custom-engineered window systems.
From Wreck to Renovated Wonder (Bristol Beacon)
Next up was Bristol Beacon, the Health, Culture, and Leisure Buildings category winner, with Mark Fineberg, senior architect from Levitt Bernstein, and Dan Hilder, director of Apex Security Engineering, at the helm. This project represented a considerable transformation of a historic concert venue, which has undergone various alterations throughout the years, including two major fires and a lot of structural changes.
The team dealt with the building's structural irregularities inherited from the past. Our man Hilder explained, "We found that there wasn't an opening that was level, plumb, or square." Without the luxury of original blueprints, they relied heavily on high-resolution photographs to preserve as much of the building's history as possible.
Sounds like Music (Bristol Beacon)
Acoustic engineering played a massive role in the renovation. The building needed to accommodate an array of musical acts—from whisper-soft string quartets to ear-splitting amplified concerts. To achieve this, they installed a floating concrete floor to isolate the venue from the restaurant below. This ensured that dishes wouldn't be going flying during a string quartet (talk about precision!) and let low notes resonate beautifully during a quartet performance, without those pesky slap-backs.
They also incorporated specialized materials, like double-glazed windows and custom blackout blinds, designed to meet the acoustician's lofty standards. These measures guaranteed that no obnoxious low-frequency soundwaves from tour buses would spoil the party for concertgoers. Furthermore, they preserved and restored the historic plasterwork and daylighting, maintaining the building's original charm, while lovingly integrating modern elements.
From Yesterday to Today (The Parcels Building)
Last but certainly not least, we had The Parcels Building, the overarching winner of the 2024 Schuco Excellence Awards, with Manny Patel, CEO at Structura, Mark Brighouse, tp bennett’s associate director, and Arup’s Paola Sammarco, senior engineer, facade engineering, taking us on a tour of their triumph.
tp bennett served as the delivery architect for Grafton's design for this project, which involved retrofitting a five-decade-old building next to Selfridges on Oxford Street, London. That's prime real estate, baby. The objective was to modernize the building while keeping its integrity intact. Approximately 92.5% of the original structure was preserved, including a single-storey extension and an all-new facade created to harmonize with Selfridges, using materials such as enhanced stone and precast concrete, aiming for a marriage of aesthetic and energy performance improvements.
Saving Energy While Keeping it Classy (The Parcels Building)
The design team concentrated on maximizing energy efficiency through the clever use of high-performance solar control coatings, which boosted the thermal and acoustic properties of the building and optimized natural daylighting. This radical shift reduced the U-value of the walls from an estimated 5 W/m2K with the old cladding to a lightning-fast 0.3 W/m2K, creating substantial energy savings and boosting user comfort. The U-value for vision glazing was brought down to 1.4 W/m2K, achieving significant energy savings.
From the get-go, the team worked closely during the PCSA (Pre-Construction Services Agreement) phase to perfect the design and ensure feasibility. The compact Oxford Street location added to the complexity, requiring precision in material deliveries, logistics, and the dance of construction. Cooking up some detailed 3D modeling in Revit was essential for streamlining the design and construction processes, allowing them to tweak their plans rapidly as obstacles popped up.
While the project encountered some unexpected structural challenges, like deteriorating concrete or non-compliant elements that necessitated reinforcement, they didn't let it faze them. The team maintained a steadfast focus on winning industry recognition, snagging certifications such as EPCA and BREEAM Outstanding for its eco-friendly design. The secret to their success? The thorough design and testing process, including the development of mock-ups and their use of lightweight steel frames to cut down on the structure's weight and carbon footprint.
1. With the secrets of award-winning facades unveiled at Schuco's London showroom, it's evident that a blend of history and modernity is key, as demonstrated in the Reciprocal House where historical charm was preserved while integrating modern upgrades healthily.
2. The fusion of culture and technology was also prevalent in the refurbishment of the Bristol Beacon, where data-and-cloud-computing was crucial in the restoration process, ensuring the preservation of the building's history while meeting acoustic standards for various musical acts.
3. Lastly, the Parcels Building showcased how technology, specifically data-and-cloud-computing, played a pivotal role in the project as the team utilized it to optimize energy efficiency, ensuring the building's aesthetic and energy performance were improved, making it a technology-driven beacon for the future.
