ANIBAL BUILDING, RIO DE JANEIRO
going to occupy part of the building them- selves, clearly wanted an attractive, outstanding office building that is simulta- neously fairly private and discrete.” To meet these seemingly conflicting expectations and counter the visual impact of the higher surrounding buildings, the architects envisioned a structure with differ- ing aesthetics to its neighbours. “We sought to transmit a sense of quality and originality combined with an element of discretion,” he says. “However, the first practical issue we had to resolve was getting enough daylight in because even a fully glazed front facade would not let in enough light.” The solution was the Anibal ‘library’, an eye-catching interior feature running verti- cally down the interior of the rear wall of building, lit directly from above via 10 m2 of coated, solar-controlling skylights on the roof.
Light cascades vertically down from the skylights through a series of 40mm-thick toughened glass ‘walkways’ and glass panels below, located at each level of the library, and illuminates the interior spaces. The open office areas and meeting rooms on each floor are divided by glass parti- tions, enabling good interior daylight penetration.
“The library forms what we call a ‘light
prism’, distributing daylight while filtering out unwanted solar radiation,” explains Abreu. “The floor glazing is supported on a grid of metal beams firmly anchored into the columns in the wall structures and also columns supporting the slab floors.” Additionally, the library transforms a potentially bland, functional supporting rear-wall into an attractive inward-facing facade comprising shelving and display systems containing books, magazines and other visible materials, while dark-grey aluminium sheet clads the spaces between. The outside of the wall is simply rendered and painted.
Defining feature
The major light source and the defining design feature of the building envelope is undoubtedly the front facade – in particular the trio of visually different layers fronting the three office floors. Specifically, sound- proof aluminium-framed glazing, fronted by a distinctive white metal, diamond-lattice brise soleil with live plants forming a soft, calming green layer in the space in between. Anibal’s side walls project 40 cm beyond the front glazing plane, forming a
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