ADVANCED FAÇADE SYSTEMS: 300-level
SESSION 2
DATE // START TIME // ROOM NUMBER:
Wednesday, September 29, 2010 – 11:00am – Metro 2A
ABSTRACT:
A panel investigates the design and performance of a 45,000 SF double-glass façade for the new Weill Cornell Medical College Medical Research Building in New York City and the analysis and methodology utilized for the design of this façade.
SPEAKERS:
Hilary Brown, Professor, City College of New York, Bernard & Anne Spitzer School of Architecture, Principal, New Civic Works
Craig McIlhenny, Associate Partner, Ennead Architects (formerly Polshek Partnership)
Wendy Meguro, Atelier Ten
John Pachuta, Partner, Heintges
DESCRIPTION:
The panel will address the design and performance of a 45,000 SF double-glass façade for the new Weill Cornell Medical College Medical Research Building, an 18-story laboratory facility located on East 69th Street in Manhattan. The analysis and methodology utilized for the design of this façade is applicable to any designer committed to reducing solar gain and energy usage while maintaining views and daylight to create a dynamic yet economical façade. The building is pursuing a LEED NC 2.2 Silver or possibly Gold Certification. Design is complete and construction of foundations is currently underway, with a scheduled completion date of April, 2014.
Design:
The building design creates an environment on the College’s urban campus that promotes collaborative research and recognizes the stature of the College’s preeminent researchers. The use of a glass façade establishes an identity for the institution that is accessible, yet representative of its cutting-edge medical research.
Given the site’s east-west orientation, the building uses a double-skin glass façade technology in order to maximize daylight within the building, while minimizing solar heat gain and visual and thermal discomfort within the offices and collaborative workspaces on the prominent, south-facing side of the building.
Design Process & Performance:
To provide a cost-effective and environmentally responsible overall envelope design, a double-skin glass façade is featured on the south face of the building, while the remaining building facades utilize a well insulated, economical masonry cavity wall and a high-performance ribbon window system.
This curtain wall system is comprised of an outer layer of white ceramic fritted glass in an undulating/folded design that shades the interior space, an air cavity of varying depth , and an interior insulated glass façade. Large openings within the outer layer of glass articulate the façade, giving a human scale to the façade design,and promoting natural ventilation within the air cavity, mitigating extreme temperatures on the exterior and significantly reducing temperatures on the interior glass. Computation Fluid Dynamics (CFD) studies suggested this compartmentalization of the cavity and informed the size, location and placement of the ventilation openings.
Indoor Environment and Occupant Comfort:
In accordance with the sustainable goals of the building and to recruit world-class researchers, the Medical Research Building provides its occupants with well-designed and comfortable research spaces with abundant natural daylight and controllable lighting systems.
Interior automatic shades are provided in the offices and meeting spaces behind the double façade. The Building Management System tracks exterior solar condition and raises or lowers the shades as necessary to increase occupant comfort and reduce the use of interior artificial lighting during overcast conditions. The building also utilizes daylight dimming in the offices and meeting spaces along the double façade to reduce energy use.
The exterior glass skin of the double-façade increases visual comfort for building occupants by minimizing glare within the interior. Solar shading and visual comfort are further enhanced by the utilization of “double-pass” glass frit technology, which provides a black inward-facing frit to reduce glare and a white outward-facing frit to increase solar reflectance and to achieve the desired aesthetic.
