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PROJECT REPORT: COMMERCIAL & WORKPLACE ENVIRONMENTS
more for potential startups, including coworking. Its design enables each floorplate to be “broken up potentially into three different spaces.”
Facades © Mike Dinsdale © Mike Dinsdale
The elevation design has been developed as a contemporary interpretation of the classic ‘base, middle and top’ proportions of the mid-rise 19th-century commercial buildings of the adjacent Whitworth Street Conservation Area. Cantilevered frontages “define much of the ground and first floor and create an articulated base,” say the architects, and this produces covered walkways around the perimeter as well as views through to the central green. The windows are framed by projecting horizontal and vertical fins formed as triangular prisms, which add character and provide shading to the interiors. The cladding has been designed to carefully blend with the existing brick vernacular but also to “create a dynamic piece of new architecture,” says Amanda Whittington, with the result being a uniform dark red ceramic exterior throughout, apart from the curtain wall sections, which marks out the scheme from the proliferation of glass facades in similar commercial districts. Whittington sums up the effect: “It creates a dynamic frontage with a bit more depth than just having a glass block, gives it its own character. It says ‘I’m not your average office building,’ and sits within the context it comes from, but also has its own language and personality.” She adds: “Using natural materials, you get colour articulation across the facade that gives it a real USP.”
© Dan Hopkinson
The only use of aluminium in the facades is at the lower levels where there could be damage, with even the window surrounds being in the red glazed tile (from Buchtile in Germany). The ceramic tiles run across the new residential blocks too, but with different colours and profiles chosen to delineate the different uses. Zaman says that they obtained “a lot of samples,” and the project team visited the manufacturer to talk to their colour experts. She believes that a mix of solid and glazed facades is much more practical in energy efficiency terms than an all-glazed alternative, even going as far as to say that all-glass facades may have become obsolete in the context of climate change and net zero. “All glass is just not the way forward, with the thermal values that you want to be meeting, especially with the performance criteria that are coming in.”
WWW.ARCHITECTSDATAFILE.CO.UK
With ceramic facades comes the inevitable question of carbon footprint, and FCBStudios have investigated the carbon implications of a variety of materials with its own ‘FCBS Carbon’ evaluation process. The practice has used similar facades on several recent projects, and while it has carbon impacts like any material, they have established where these can be minimised, such as that its clay is recyclable fully until the point it’s fired. Also with the tiles being clipped to the structure, they can be taken off and reused in future. They worked closely with specialised terracotta facade manufacturer NBK to explore suitable profiles, and worked with the contractor to ensure that loss of tiles during construction was at a minimum to reduce the cladding’s footprint.
The architects did an embodied carbon study across the project, which led to a rationalisation of the buildings’ steel frame so that it changes in thickness throughout the project according to use, which minimised the use of materials. And, as part of applying the NABERS Design for Performance approach to achieving performance efficiency, the architects provided additional M&E and riser space which would allow easy retrofit as M&E and technology changes, for example as more processes become cloud-based, and other aspects of infrastructure grow in size.
A flexible programme
As well as being designed to BREEAM ‘Excellent’ standards, the offices have generous floor to ceiling heights, giving them a “high end” feel, and a decent amount of natural light for occupants. Due to the highly competitive nature of commercial building development, producing a design that would be able to flex to unforeseen client requirements would be crucial for futureproofing, including against the arrival of potential rivals nearby in the coming years. One of the design’s key flexibility components is the grid, which means that if required in future, the building could be turned to residential use.
Zaman explains further: “We allowed the possibility of each floor being let, but also at clients possibly wanting to put two floors together, so they can share, as long as everything is accessible.” She said that ‘flex’ was emerging as a key maxim in such projects, and also that clients are “moving away from BCO standards” when it comes to building dimensions, to achieve a variety of spaces where needed.
ADF MARCH 2022
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