I just stumbled upon the above project. It’s in Portland. It’s called Slate. It’s 147,000 sf. It sits on a 100′ x 200′ site. It was completed last year. And it was developed by Beam Development and Urban Development Partners.

Besides having two very cool facades (the east and west facades are the ones that push and pull), I was surprised to see the building clad in unitized curtain wall (as well as composite metal panel). That kind of glazing comes at a premium and this is not a large building. I’m curious about the numbers.

It’s also a post-tensioned concrete building, which is uncommon in the Toronto market.

Here’s a close-up of the facade:

Also noteworthy is the fact that I’m fairly certain the architects inserted a couple having sex in one of their renderings:

For those of you who did not attend architecture school, there’s a fairly long tradition of hiding “easter eggs” within your renderings. Or at least that was the case when I was in school.

On that note, happy Easter weekend all.

All images via Works Progress Architecture (W.PA). Photography by Joshua Jay Elliott.

New York architecture firm REX is working on a new office building in Washington DC that will incorporate a beautiful fluted glass facade. Here’s a rendering of what it is intended to look like:

Here’s what that looks like in plan (it’s a GIF that should show typical curtain wall vs. proposed fluted glass):

Here’s a photo of the 1:1 mockup:

And here’s a description from the architect:

The façade’s approximately nine hundred identical, insulated-glass panels—3.2 m tall by 1.5 m wide (11’-6” tall by 5’-0” wide)—are subtly curved to a 2.9 m (9’-6”) radius through a heat roller tempering process. The curve yields structural efficiency, which meets wind load requirements and enables a thinner monolithic outer lite than normal, providing greater transparency. 

Because of the curve’s inherent rigidity in compression, only the top and bottom edges of the panels are supported from the floor slabs, while the mullionless vertical edges are flush-glazed for a minimalist aesthetic that improves sight lines, while gaining usable floor area.

They are working in collaboration with Front Inc., which if you haven’t heard of, you should check out. They are a design/engineering consultancy that specializes in facades and building envelopes. They work with many of the big name starchitects. The developer of the project is Tishman Speyer.

It’s worth noting that part of the impetus for the fluted glass facade was to try and innovate within the confines of DC’s draconian zoning – which mandates that no building can be taller than 130 feet. Because of this, developers and architects are usually forced to build out to the allowable area, leaving little room for architectural variation. 

But in this case, the fluted glass removed the need for thick mullions and also allowed them to extend out beyond the lot area by 4 inches every 5 feet (the curves are considered “architectural features”). So this move has created both architectural variation and more rentable area.

It doesn’t appear that the building will have any operable windows, but other than that, I think it promises to be quite beautiful. What do you think?

All images from REX.

I just stumbled upon the above project. It’s in Portland. It’s called Slate. It’s 147,000 sf. It sits on a 100′ x 200′ site. It was completed last year. And it was developed by Beam Development and Urban Development Partners.

Besides having two very cool facades (the east and west facades are the ones that push and pull), I was surprised to see the building clad in unitized curtain wall (as well as composite metal panel). That kind of glazing comes at a premium and this is not a large building. I’m curious about the numbers.

It’s also a post-tensioned concrete building, which is uncommon in the Toronto market.

Here’s a close-up of the facade:

Also noteworthy is the fact that I’m fairly certain the architects inserted a couple having sex in one of their renderings:

For those of you who did not attend architecture school, there’s a fairly long tradition of hiding “easter eggs” within your renderings. Or at least that was the case when I was in school.

On that note, happy Easter weekend all.

All images via Works Progress Architecture (W.PA). Photography by Joshua Jay Elliott.

New York architecture firm REX is working on a new office building in Washington DC that will incorporate a beautiful fluted glass facade. Here’s a rendering of what it is intended to look like:

Here’s what that looks like in plan (it’s a GIF that should show typical curtain wall vs. proposed fluted glass):

Here’s a photo of the 1:1 mockup:

And here’s a description from the architect:

The façade’s approximately nine hundred identical, insulated-glass panels—3.2 m tall by 1.5 m wide (11’-6” tall by 5’-0” wide)—are subtly curved to a 2.9 m (9’-6”) radius through a heat roller tempering process. The curve yields structural efficiency, which meets wind load requirements and enables a thinner monolithic outer lite than normal, providing greater transparency. 

Because of the curve’s inherent rigidity in compression, only the top and bottom edges of the panels are supported from the floor slabs, while the mullionless vertical edges are flush-glazed for a minimalist aesthetic that improves sight lines, while gaining usable floor area.

They are working in collaboration with Front Inc., which if you haven’t heard of, you should check out. They are a design/engineering consultancy that specializes in facades and building envelopes. They work with many of the big name starchitects. The developer of the project is Tishman Speyer.

It’s worth noting that part of the impetus for the fluted glass facade was to try and innovate within the confines of DC’s draconian zoning – which mandates that no building can be taller than 130 feet. Because of this, developers and architects are usually forced to build out to the allowable area, leaving little room for architectural variation. 

But in this case, the fluted glass removed the need for thick mullions and also allowed them to extend out beyond the lot area by 4 inches every 5 feet (the curves are considered “architectural features”). So this move has created both architectural variation and more rentable area.

It doesn’t appear that the building will have any operable windows, but other than that, I think it promises to be quite beautiful. What do you think?

All images from REX.