BRIEF
The brief required large vertical sunshade fins to the east and west elevations, and vertical louvres over the projecting corner window ‘pods’. The purpose of the fins and louvres was not only to provide sun shading, but also to prevent reflection off the windows and remove the possibility of sun-strike for the vehicles on the nearby motorway. Insol were engaged on a design build basis to meet the Architectural intent.
KEY CHALLENGES
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The architectural intent was very specific as the form of the large fins and the ‘picture framed’ look of the vertical louvres.
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The façade panels had to be designed in a way that any of them could be removed without influencing others.
- To adhere to budget limitations, the façade needed to be installed without full scaffolding.
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The large fins had originally been designed as concrete. This had been changed to aluminium to reduce the dead loads and seismic loads on the building structure. The challenge was to design an aluminium fin with the same form that would be robust enough to meet the demanding wind loads.
OUR APPROACH
After in depth evaluation and modelling of the wind loads, and a lot of consideration of installation methodology, we came up with a design for the fins that met the architectural intent, was economic, buildable, and had a simple installation methodology.
The design involved five new extrusion dies and a new hidden fixing system to mechanically attach the aluminium skins to the sub-frame.
Hook rails were bolted into cast-in threaded inserts in the concrete wall panels. Each fin was then craned into place and hooked to the wall using a combination of lifting eyes and suction cups to keep the fin hanging vertical. Finally the fins were bolted to the hook rails to prevent any movement.
RESULT
We developed a cost-effective bespoke solution that delivered the functions and architectural intent, all within the constraints of the design-build model and existing budget.
The result is a visually striking architecture that helps shape the journey down to South Auckland.
