Unitized ceramic facade, by Renzo Piano in London (011)

St Giles is one of the latest projects by Renzo Piano’s studio that has a dry fixed ceramic façade. In this case, the architects resorted to unitized panels for its construction.

Despite using the latest façade technologies, St Giles does not show the wit present in IRCAM or in the Rue Meaux dwellings complex. Perhaps in St Giles Piano achieved what he aspired to create in the initial projects: closing the building with prefabricated dry fixed ceramic panels. However, with this advance, wit seems to have been replaced by technology and its associated cost. The Botin Foundation in Santander leads us to the same conclusion.