London City Hall Case Study San1ago Torres
Dr Shaun Murray
Structure Of Workbook 0.0 Introduc1on: 01. Air • 02. Light • 03. Ground • 04. Water • 05. Energy • 06. Recycle • 07. Synthesis • 08. Conclusion • 09. Bibliography
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Introduc1on London City Hall is a building in central London, developed by the emblema1c Bri1sh Architectural firm Fosters + Partners. The client of the project was the London Project Development. Ltd and the purpose of the building is to house the chamber of the London assembly and the offices of the mayor staff of the greater London authority (mayor of London). The project is part of the More London development, an ini1a1ve that pretends to give a new face to the area between London Bridge and Tower Bridge
01. Introduc1on • •
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ARCHITECT London City Hall was developed by the London based Architect Norman Foster. Foster was born in Manchester in 1935 and graduated from Manchester University school of architecture in ]1961. Later on he won a scholarship to the University of Yale in which he did a masters in architecture. In 1999 he won the 21st Pritzker award for architectural innova1on and excellence. Fosters+Partners is a firm founded by Norman foster in 1967 and has pioneered projects into being focused on sustainability and modernism through innova1ve ways of making green architecture. The firm works on a wide range of fields like, Urban master plans, airports, public infrastructures, civic and cultural buildings, private and public buildings. The company is based in London, has offices worldwide and has developed projects all around the world. The firm won the compe11on held to determine who would build the London city Hall, sponsored by the Greater London Authority.
01 Introduc1on • Shape: • The Building has the shape of a bulbous distorted sphere and it’s considered a helical walkway, and the purpose of this form is to avoid direct collision of the sun with the facades, so it allows the surface to absorb. Another reason for this shape is to minimize ground area, thus saving energy in resources, energy and space occupa1on.
01.Air
Ven1la1on The condi1oned system of the building is very ecological and differs from the tradi1onal systems. The offices for example are all natural ven1lated through the air filter that exists through the windows. Although the facades are made of glass, the inner wall contains significantly less glazing area, thus making the spaces well naturally ven1lated. The building as such uses natural ven1la1on and a geothermal system rather than air condi1oning to both save energy and make it more comfortable. The building’s cooling system u1lizes ground water pumped up via boreholes. It works through a recycling process that ini1ates by having photovoltaic panels in the ceiling that captures the suns heat, which is redirected to the lower level of the building through the borehole pumps and takes it to the ground water generator, which cools the air and introduces it back to the building
02. Light London city hall as a building gives great amount of importance to the natural lightning. The whole idea of the glassing façade is to develop a system in which the light from the sun can be easily refracted from anywhere in the building. Although ar1ficial light creates a key component to the developing of a self sustainable building.
02. Light • •
Natural Light: The building is slightly 1lted to provide a self shading and receives direct sunlight from the south, while ligle to no direct light from the north. The shape and inclina1on are made specifically to follow the points of highest direct sun to the structure because its meant to receive as much natural lightning as possible, and also recycle the sun energy through sun panels installed in the roof.
02. Light • Ar1ficial Light: Ar1ficial light is used on daylight only in the ground floor and offices near the core, where the natural sunlight is not direct. Because the building is so open and receives a vast amount of sunlight, the ar1ficial light and energy consump1on of the same, is more than halve what would have been expected from a building of this category. The light bulbs are surrounded well around the open and closed spaces, making it well enlightened at night, but in the day they don’t need to be turned on.
02. Light • •
Self shading and shadow: The sloping ‘helmet’ shape of the building, was created by each individual floor on the south side designed to rise over the floors below them crea1ng a natural shading effect and protec1ng the levels from direct solar glade. The facades are made of double and triple glazing.
03. Ground • Materials: The main materials of the London City hall are: reinforced steel (1950 tonnes), structural steel (2100 tonnes) ,concrete (13,100 M3) and glass (3844 unique panels). The core of the building is made of concrete, the structural work is made out of steel and the glazing of the “facades "are made out of glass.
03. Ground City hall focusses its agen1on on recycling and making the building itself as eco friendly as possible, but also the building presents innova1ve proposals in the field of construc1on techniques through the diagrids system, and how these way of construc1on can be made very efficient with the right amount of rather simple construc1on materials.
03. Materials Steel: The whole structural design and system was made out of Structural steel, which was used to support the buildings structure through a special sydtem called/ diagrids, (system that consists of steel weight loading triangles). The reinforced steel is used as bars in the concrete core to make it more resistant and pre tensioned, also it is used on the weight columns on the glazing and first floor.
03. Materials • Concrete The building has a reinforced concrete core, which support the plaque levels and allows the structure to rise. The core has reinforced dips1cks in it to make it more resistant.
03 Materials • Glass: the building uses four different types of glass. On the first floor, triple glazed ven1la1ng panel glasses, with a cladding and ven1lated system with solar blades. From fl 1-‐7, minimal framing and insula1ng panels are used to create maximum transparency. The rest of the building consists of laminated glass and solar panels.
03 Construc1on system •
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The building uses a diagrid systems to support the loads. A diagrid system consist of ver1cal can1lever beams which are subdivided longitudinally into modules according to the repe11ve diagram pagern. The modules are triangular and are tessella1ons subdivided into the space of the building. This system allows the loads to be transported uniformly to the ground. This diagrids are made of reinforced steel, a material rigid enough to widthstand the amount of weight of the structure and not bend, compress, flex or other.
04 Water •
The ven1la1on of city hall is used through the use of water collected from the river Thames through boreholes, which are buried 130 m into the ground un1l it reaches the water from the Thames, which then pumps it into the building. Aoer the water is used for ven1la1on, it comes to the bathrooms to be used for the toilets and as irriga1on savings(watering the plants and trees) on mains water. Meaning that about 85% of the water is reused and recycled within the building.
04 Water • Grey water The water from the rain is collected at the top of the building through plumbing pipes, hidden in the structure, and are then taken to the toilets and other non potable water sources, which are later redirected to the sep1c tank, that leads the water to the sewerages.
05 Energy •
The building is very energy efficient as the water and ven1la1on are cons1tuted out of recycle processes. Natural light is abundant, it has a self shading system thus reducing the electric consump1on during the day and the carbon emission foot print. Also light sensors have been put in all the floors, to reduce the amount of electricity used and the heat waves produced from the computer is energy recycled by reapplying at the heat ven1la1on system of the building. This structure not only saves energy in the ven1la1on system through the natural water collec1on through the boreholes and electricity through the solar panels on the roof but also saves energy by receiving more direct light and reducing area space.
05 Energy • On the roof and par1al sides of the GLA there are solar panels, which provide around 70 kilo wags of renewal energy and 3 million kilo wags in the life1me of the building. Voltage op1misa1on technology is installed, and boiler plant lagging is being used to help minimise heat loss.
06. Recycle •
GLA hired i-‐clean, a company that specializes on consul1ng buildings and create new forms in which can make the building greener through recycling methods. Through studies of the city hall, it was decided that the disposals rubbish in the buildings should be divided into 3 categories: Non recyclable rubbish, other recycling and glass recycling. The three bin bags are placed around the building, thus making it efficient in recycling magers. The bags are then collected in the three different categories and be respec1vely distributed. As for the recycling of materials in construc1on, the floor 1les in the inside are made out of recycled granite and leoover granite was used to put into the aggregate.
07. Synthesis •
As a synthesis, the London city hall is a structure developed as a part of a bigger project, whose main purpose is to make of the Bri1sh capitals buildings more modern, innova1ve, ecological, green and recycling ins1tu1ons. Including the fact and responsibility that the City hall is a building to be admired for its improvement in the development of sustainability and energy saving. The main idea behind these intrepid building is to show that the future developments like these are capable to embrace the environment and develop mechanisms in which natural resources are not being savagely consumed but safely re used and conserved. Thus giving a very clear example of a very promising future in the architecture evolu1on.
08. Conclusion In conclusion, crea1ng and developing systems that help the environment by saving energy and natural resources, is one of the key ideas that sir Norman Foster wanted to explain while construc1ng the city hall. Helps also as a reflec1on, showing that this kind of projects are possible and are a clear obligatory transi1on of how sustainable buildings should be in the future. Personally I am impressed in the complexity of the systems that where developed for this and how well where they covered in the structure. Every object in the construc1on is there for a specific reason and some1mes has mul1ple uses, making of it a remarkable result given of all the complicated systems that where developed inside this self developing landmark. Even though I am not a big fan of the volumetric shape, everything else is admirable to me, because its innova1on and progress, specially in the sustainable part, gives us a perfect example that beger buildings can be developed for the preserve of our natural resources and our future. If I could change something, it would probably be the shape. Even though is built with specific parameters I s1ll believe it is a very rigid volume and has no real elements coming in and out, making it very flat and doll on the surface. If the elements would go back and forth and could be allowed to be played more in the facades, it could help improve in the self shading, natural ven1la1on and the dynamism of the structure.
09. Bibliography • Web • hgp://www.fosterandpartners.com/projects/city-‐hall/ • hgps://www.london.gov.uk/city-‐hall/the-‐building/key-‐facts-‐about-‐ city-‐hall • hgp://www.greatbuildings.com/buildings/London_City_Hall.html • hgps://fosterandpartners1.app.box.com/shared/ frxoldddcx6g52ce9svl • Books • Norman Foster, A global Architecture (Mar1n Pawley, 1999) • Self Sustainability in construc1on, II Edi1on, Mar1n Doys, 2003