Volume 21, Issue 1 - January 2007

Projects

In an earlier issue, the Architects’ Guide to Glass & Metal asked readers to suggest projects which used glass in innovative ways. While there are many examples in which the material is used in cutting-edge ways, we would like to recognize three outstanding projects which utilized glass in very different ways. They provide an interesting perspective on glass use in design and execution.

Palace of Auburn Hills Expansion, Auburn Hills, Mich.
The Palace of Auburn Hills, home of the three-time world champion Detroit Pistons basketball team, has a new atrium, designed by Rossetti Associates, Southfield, Mich., covered with high-performance coated glass. The expansion sports a diamond-patterned glass exterior to complement the building’s distinctive architectural design.

The entire atrium is designed to be viewed on entrance as a warm, inviting and yet exciting venue. People arriving can see the color and movement of those already enjoying the event in the atrium. The sloped glass wall is intended to reach out to Pistons fans with exciting visual impact.

The entire facade is a glass curtainwall utilizing glass supplied by Guardian Industries. The SN-68 coating was used to maximize transparency while still blocking 63 percent of solar heat. 

The composition of the vision glass is Sun-Guard SN-68 on the #2 surface with a clear inboard lite. Both lites are tempered. Many of the units are large diamonds (7 x 7 feet), actually squares turned to stand on one edge, designed to mimic the diamonds that ring the exterior of the Palace. All the large vision glass is installed with an outward 4 degree slope, top to bottom. Trulite tempered the very large IG units and supplied the glass to meet the tight timeframes for the arena expansion.
Guardian president and CEO William Davidson is also the owner of Palace Sports and Entertainment.

Janelia Farms Research Campus of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), Ashburn, Va.
The striking interior wall partition and all-glass entrances of monolithic ultra-clear, low-iron glass run the entire length of the 300-yard corridor of the new addition to the HHMI Janelia Farms Research Campus, gently winding along the contour of the topography. Designed by Rafael Vinoly Architects (RVA), HHMI is an example of high-performance glass being used in a research laboratory setting to help encourage innovation and collaboration between scientists. 

Aside from aesthetics, the dual interlayer, triple-ply laminated glass lites for the corridor and all-glass entrances were chosen by the architect for their structural integrity. For consistency, the majority of the float glass was manufactured in a single continuous float factory run in Europe to produce a total of 152 laminated lites of glass, more than 65,000 square feet. The glass is composed of three pieces of 3/8-inch Diamant low-iron glass with two .060 clear PVB interlayers for an overall unit thickness of 1 5/16-inch. With laminated panel sizes larger than 120 x 110 inches, all the panels approached a hefty 1,800 pounds each. Many of the laminated panels also have 2 1/2-inch diameter holes near the top, to allow for the installation of a sprinkler system, as well as ground and polished edges. 

J. E. Berkowitz L.P. fabricated 8- and 10-foot laminated glass doors with Blumcraft center lock housings with electric strikes to provide access from the corridor to the labs and offices. The fabricator played an integral role in the engineering, design and final assembly of these all-glass entrances consisting of doors, partitions, fins, and hardware. 

According to Charles Blomberg, the architect involved on the glass elements of the project for RVA, the glass used at Janelia Farms is the largest installation in the world, in terms of volume, of this type of load-bearing structural glass.

Close coordination was involved in acquiring the special size jumbo sheets of 126 x 200 inch Diamant that had to be cut to 120 x 110 inches; and the special ocean and inland freight to accommodate this over-height glass for supply on the project. J. E. Berkowitz had to carefully schedule the run of the glass with Saint-Gobain to ensure that there was enough time to fabricate and transport the product to meet the jobsite delivery requirements. This involved adherence to strict deadlines, coordinating the transportation of the monolithic laminated glass, and storage before delivery. Also, to help achieve USGBC LEED credits, the fabricator ensured that the final fabrication and assembly was performed within a 500-mile radius of the jobsite and that the glass panels were shipped on special Schneider drop-frame trailers in unpackaged stoce form, eliminating the need to use wooden crates.

The Jewish Home for the Aged, East Wing, San Francisco
For this project, in San Francisco, architects Herman & Coliver: Architecture wanted a spacious glazed lobby that made a good fit with its historically significant surroundings, yet was clearly contemporary, signifying a place offering leading edge medical services. Due to the proximity of this addition to the existing building, special fire requirements had to be met. Aside from meeting the property line requirement, the glass also had to meet water penetration, windload and seismic drift, energy and acoustical performance, and the architect’s design criteria and budget.

The design features a fire rated curtainwall that freespans an area almost 30 feet high. The exterior 60-minute fire and hose stream rated window-wall system, curved both in plan and elevation, uses SuperLite II-XL IGU 60-minute, a fire-resistive insulating glass unit with clear low-emissivity tempered glass. The IG unit contributed to the building’s overall energy efficiency and aided in reducing the road noise from the adjacent streets. The glass lites were framed using a custom SAFTIfire Frames FireCW, an equally fire-rated, watertight custom framing system that was designed to meet windload and seismic drift. 

The design achieved the vision and daylighting benefits of using glass and all building code requirements for construction along a property line and unsupported spans were met, with added energy performance and noise abatement from the use of insulating glass. 

Architects' Guide to Glass & Metal
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