The search for almost completely continuous glazing across the façade has led to a potential fire hazard through the possible spread of fire between floors. In this case, this problem is solved by offsetting the glass panel by several centimetres.
Metal profiles assembly
Load bearing facades are nowadays a common solution due to the permeability they permit in the inner space. Some of those structures are let to be seen from the outside, some of them are not.
There is little to say here, it is just a masterpiece!
Jean Prouvé was probably the first architect working as a façade specialist.
He was probably the first to opt firmly for façade prefabrication.
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This façade is not watertight and it is not airtight. Depending on the density and size of the stones, it protects against direct sun radiation but without managing the visual relationship with the outside. It considerably blocks the entry of light, gives privacy and protects from intrusion. If it is true that, together with a drained cavity, it would constitute a watertight envelope, but it seems that this is not the case here.
Energy-efficient architecture does not have to have a certain image. This is clear in the work of Sauerbruch & Hutton, which has a sober but colourful image.
This is an interesting resource to hide the blind area associated with the edge of the slab, the facilities’ cavity and the elevated floor without having to delimit this area with two transoms visible in the elevation. The only apparent cutting is that of the unitized panel, with greater or lesser density in the pattern of the serigraphy that opalizes or simply veils the transparency of the glass.
This use of the double skin facade where the outer glass is patterned with a white serigraphy that gradually dilutes as one gets closer to the areas of vision may disappear as rapidly as it has spread. It is an easy way to blur the openings limits. In the case of this hotel in London, the opening is perfectly well defined on the wall in the interior skin. This technique harks back to the effect of traditional interior thin white curtains, except for the important difference that the curtain can be used to cover the openings with a very efficient light diffuser.
This emblematic building in the London financial district maintains its formal unity beyond the differences in the design of the façades depending on their orientation. The case "Devoid of the human scale (034)" describes the southwest façade of the same building. The southeast and northwest façades attract our attention due to the sobriety conferred by the enormous glazed surface, which is only interrupted every three floors by horizontal bands of stainless steel.