R1 R&R Sept '16 52 cc

Article
Thinking outside of the box
The building envelope, whilst being an essential weatherproofing element of any structure, is permanently on display, so
requires as much design consideration as technical specification. We look at three projects which get this just right.
ESRI, Swansea
Leading external envelope contractor
Prater has delivered an exemplary
building envelope for the £30m
refurbishment of Ark Putney Academy, a
secondary school in Putney, West London.
The project overall has resulted in the
creation of a 21st century learning
environment whilst sensitively preserving the
heritage of its existing Grade II listed main
school building..
The ground-breaking London County
Council’s department of architecture, also
responsible for the iconic Royal Festival Hall,
originally designed the school, formerly
known as Elliott School, in the fifties. However,
time had taken its toll and the buildings were
in need of essential repairs and modernisation,
showing signs of substandard classrooms,
dilapidated cladding and year-round problems
with heating, cooling and ventilation.
Internationally-renowned award winning
practice Hawkins\Brown has worked with
Lendlease and the London Borough of
Wandsworth to re-furbish, re-model and reimagine
the school, now known as Ark Putney
Academy. Prater was appointed for its
technical expertise and operational capabilities
to deliver, demonstrating the best solution for
this challenging project.
There were several elements to Prater’s
involvement. Firstly and completely reinventing
the look of the building, Prater
installed a new environmentally responsive
façade comprising 4000m 2 new Schuco
curtain walling to the main five-storey building
with better insulated, modern glazing to
improve year-round temperature and energy
management, also creating lighter, brighter
classrooms. Also 1000m2 SFS, Steni Colour
Rainscreen was installed to the new sports
hall.
One of the key challenges was the delivery of
the replacement glazing to the 'Zig Zag'
staircores to the main building.
“Curtain wall elements were integrated into
the main façade with curtain wall screens
connected back to the Grade II listed floating
staircase landings – it was a real challenge but
looks great,” explained Prater project manager,
Mike O’Boyle.
Prater was also responsible for the roofing
work. Replacing the demolished gym block is
a new, purpose-built four-court community
sports facility, constructed to the latest Sport
England standards. Prater worked alongside
supply chain partner Bemo, to install the
800m2 acoustic (attenuation and absorption)
standing seam roofing system to the new,
barrelled sports hall roof.
Furthermore, 900m 2 Sika Sarnafil single ply
roofing was installed to the DT block, sports
hall link and canopies.
In Swansea, architectural glazing systems from
Kawneer have helped an exemplar building in
sustainable, low-energy design become the
first education building in the UK to achieve
BREEAM Outstanding.
The £12.65m Energy Safety Research Institute
(ESRI) was the final project to be delivered
through the 2009-2014 capital projects
framework at Swansea University and is a
unique centre of research innovation,
facilitating ground-breaking work into the safe
deployment of new renewable energy
solutions.
The Kawneer systems were used throughout
the 4,500m 2 building and comprise AA®541
top-hung casement windows, low/mediumduty
swing doors and AA®100 zone-drained
12 Refurb retrofit
magazine
Sep/Oct 2016 R1