design awards
Creative Functionality Recycled shipping containers create a unique student center
By Marcy Marro, Managing Editor
The new student center at Monterrey Tech University in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico, is unlike most others at universities across the globe. Designed by architects Rubén Escobar- Urrutia, LEED AP, and Ricardo Pacheco with Ciudad Juárez-based Grupo ARKHOS, the two- level, 7,000-square-foot building is made up of 11 40-foot recycled shipping containers from Iron Square Foot Inc., El Paso, Texas.
Escobar-Urrutia, a Monterrey Tech alumni, says
that Grupo ARKHOS has been working with the uni- versity on all of its projects since 1999, and had even used containers on a previous building for extracur- ricular classes.
DESIGN FACTORS Surrounded by a mature treed garden, the student center is composed of a covered access plaza that integrates itself into the building’s interior by a set of glass and aluminum garage doors from Mason, Ohio-based Clopay Garage Doors, blurring the lines between the interior and exterior. Standard High Cube Intermodal Steel Building Units (ISBU) are stacked one over the other to gen- erate voids and cantilevered areas, creating informal gathering spaces on both levels, and interesting views from one level to the other. The resulting central space works as a double-height patio, sur- rounded by mezzanines and porticos. “The containers’ structural integrity allowed us to place them in a more playful way, not aligning all of the corners of the containers one on top of the other,” explains Escobar-Urrutia. “The several voids we had with this placement of the containers gave us move- ment, variety, interesting geometry, some cantilevered elements, and natural ventilation and illumination on all sides of the building, allowing the garage doors to be open during operating hours and economizing on the use of utilities for most of the year.” To frame the cover of the entry plaza, the archi- tects used 1,100 square feet of 4-mm Reynobond aluminum composite panels in Silver Duraglass 500 from Alcoa Architectural Products. Additionally, Ce- loscreen 200 louvers from Hunter Douglas Contract, Norcross, Ga., shade the entry plaza and some of
32 METAL ARCHITECTURE July 2012
www.metalarchitecture.com
the south and west windows, giving the plaza an enclosed look while still protecting it from the sun. Conceived as a leisure and recreation place for
the student community, the building needed to be fl exible and have a character that appealed to the stu- dents, Escobar explains. The lower level has a central area with seating and space for playing air hockey, ping-pong, board and video games, watching TV, in addition to a small food kiosk, school supply store and restrooms. The second fl oor has a variety of seating options, and a smoothie and soft drinks bar.
SUSTAINABLE ELEMENTS In addition to being a place for students to hang out, the center “also needed to be a sustainable and energy-effi cient building that would show the com- mitment of the institution towards sustainability in a different way, while teaching students that recycling, natural ventilation and sun harvesting is possible on a low-cost project,” explains Escobar-Urrutia. The use of the aluminum and glass garage doors allow natu- ral cross ventilation throughout the year. Because mature trees surround the building, the winds come in at a lower speed and a lower temperature, mean- ing the building can operate with the windows open and HVAC systems shut off for most of the year. The container’s exterior is covered with a mix of
automotive paint and ceramic nanospheres that gen- erate a texture resistant to abrasion. It also repels the sun’s heat, keeping the building cool. Inside the containers, foam insulation from ICYNENE, Missis- sauga, Ontario, Canada, was covered by drywall to give the center the needed insulation. Recycling the containers reduces the CO2
generated by the building construction, while also preventing the unnecessary production of tons of structural steel. Escobar-Urrutia says that 80 percent of the buildings structure was swapped by the containers. Additionally, using the containers as the structure, walls, fl ooring and roofi ng reduces the overall cost of the project by about 20 percent, as well as shortening the construction time by a month and a half, he adds. Using the containers also helped the school meet its budget, while showing that sustainability and recycling could be done without high-tech equip- ment, with a relative low investment and with a very good level of insulation, explains Escobar-Urrutia. Built in only three months, the project was designed to LEED-NC v3 standards. “The high school students love the new build-
ing,” Escobar-Urrutia says. “It has been a very inspiring process and they really feel that it is their own. It is always busy, freeing up other areas of the campus, which we wanted to be free to adapt for college or higher education students. “The campus faculty has also started to use the
building for other activities that were not considered on the initial design goals, like having dinner events with parents or the faculty. Since it is mostly an open area building, it can accommodate other activi- ties with little rearrangement of furniture.”
Student Center, Monterrey Technical University,
COMPLETED: August 2011
TOTAL SQUARE FOOTAGE: 7,000 square feet
ARCHITECT: Grupo ARKHOS, Ciudad Juárez,
www.grupoarkhos.com
METAL WALL PANEL SUPPLIER: Metales Internacionales, Monterrey, Nuevo León, Mexico
METAL WALL PANEL INSTALLER: VV Ingenieria en Cristal S.A. de C.V., Ciudad Juárez
GARAGE DOOR INSTALLER: Sistemas Inteligentes de Acceso, Ciudad Juárez
LOUVER SUPPLIER/INSTALLER: DINTEL Arquitectura y Construccion, Chihuahua, Chihuahua
STRUCTURAL STEEL INSTALLER: Estructuras Dolmen S.A. de C.V., Ciudad Juárez
CONTAINERS: Iron Square Foot Inc., El Paso, Texas,
www.ironft2.com
CURTAINWALL: Aluminio y Tecnologia de Chihuahua, Ciudad Juárez,
www.altech.mx
GARAGE DOORS: Clopay Garage Doors, Mason, Ohio,
www.clopaydoor.com
INSULATION:
ICYNENE, Mississauga, Ontario, Canada,
www.icynene.com
LOUVERS:
Hunter Douglas Contract, Norcross, Ga.,
www.hunterdouglascontract.com
METAL WALL PANELS: Alcoa Architectural Products, Eastman, Ga.,
www.alcoaarchitecturalproducts.com
SUSTAINABLE DESIGN
Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76