4 ms·

This is an interview with the architect: https://youtube.com/watch?v=VIKYjriWgiY https://youtube.com/watch?v=VIKYjriWgiY What comes across is that the client

This is an interview with the architect: https://youtube.com/watch?v=VIKYjriWgiY https://youtube.com/watch?v=VIKYjriWgiY What comes across is that the client was very keen to do this, is there any reason why there aren’t many other buildings like this? Mention is made of Portcullis House, office by the Houses of Parliament. Are they expensive to design? Just unusual for architects to design? Shouldn’t this be standard where possible?

rocqua 7y ago
Glass towers are, if not beautiful, a status symbol. Especially because brick looks stuffy and traditional whilst concrete invokes 80s brutalism. If you want a modern looking facade, glass is an easy choice. Moreover, if temperature is properly controlled, a working or living environment with a lot of sunlight is actually very pleasant. Most people prefer sunlight over artificial light. I guess this combines to suppress demand for the style shown here. I recall seeing similar attempts to make skyscrapers more passively cooled. They seem popular, but are quite expensive.
- jacobush 7y ago
  Glass is to me very 80s...
  - rocqua 7y ago
    What does a modern building look like for you?
    - toast0 7y ago
      Modern large office buildings these days are mostly glass exterior, but with other prominently visible materials (metal, concrete, maybe wood) as accents. Usually some big diagnol lines or at least visible sections. Older all glass offices present as a single plane of glass, sometimes with light/dark striping. Modern shopping centers, or residential have different looks, of course; although high density high rise residential gets fairly close to high density high rise office.
jsty 7y ago
There's quite a trend for new 'Corporate HQ' buildings to incorporate this kind of stuff to burnish their environmental credentials - e.g. Bloomberg's new London HQ [0]. If you're just a development company building offices to rent, you'll include anything your prospective tenants are willing to pay for! A lot of those will simply want climate control to be as cheap as possible, so it'd boil down to whether the aircon / energy savings outweighed the extra capital costs incorporated in the rent. [0] https://www.bloomberg.com/company/announcements/bloomberg-most-sustainable-office-building/ https://www.bloomberg.com/company/announcements/bloomberg-mo...
zeristor 7y ago
There’s a website called Carbon Culture which shows the energy use of a building, and they have a page for Portcullis House which uses the same chimney method. Although I doubt cooling in London is as much of an issue as Harare. https://platform.carbonculture.net/places/portcullis-house/51/ https://platform.carbonculture.net/places/portcullis-house/5... Portcullis House Wikipedia entry, though doesn’t seem interested in its energy use: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portcullis_House https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portcullis_House
- Symbiote 7y ago
  > Although I doubt cooling in London is as much of an issue as Harare. The climate is similar in both cities. Harare's average January (summer) daily mean is 21°C, London's (July) is 19°C. The average highs are 26°C and 24°C. The high-low range, which looks to be important so the building can cool at night, is 10°C in both.
  - lozenge 7y ago
    Harare is 15 degrees south and London is 50 degrees north of the equator. The sun is much more intense in Harare and occupies less of the day, allowing more time for the vents to cool the building. That said, this principle can be applied in London as well.
    - zeristor 7y ago
      Also London’s day lengths vary far more between summer and winter.
    - finolex1 7y ago
      Does London even need cooling on 99% of days? 25 degrees is the temperatures air-conditioners are often set to in the tropical country I live in.
      - rocqua 7y ago
        In america the standard airco setting is 18c to accommodate people in business suits. Given that London has a pretty big financial sector (with a lot of suits) they might have something similar. The same could hold for parliament.
tgsovlerkhgsel 7y ago
- Small windows with limited view. Less of a problem for a shopping mall since most stores I know don't seem to have windows at all, but I'd expect it to be perceived as unpleasant by western standards. - If it's an unusual design, using it means you're taking a big risk. If it works you save money, if it doesn't you have an uninhabitable building that may be hard or impossible to retrofit to a "normal" system. http://www.mickpearce.com/Eastgate.html http://www.mickpearce.com/Eastgate.html has some data, which looks remarkably good.

rocqua 7y ago

Glass towers are, if not beautiful, a status symbol. Especially because brick looks stuffy and traditional whilst concrete invokes 80s brutalism. If you want a modern looking facade, glass is an easy choice. Moreover, if temperature is properly controlled, a working or living environment with a lot of sunlight is actually very pleasant. Most people prefer sunlight over artificial light. I guess this combines to suppress demand for the style shown here. I recall seeing similar attempts to make skyscrapers more passively cooled. They seem popular, but are quite expensive.

jacobush 7y ago
Glass is to me very 80s...
- rocqua 7y ago
  What does a modern building look like for you?
  - toast0 7y ago
    Modern large office buildings these days are mostly glass exterior, but with other prominently visible materials (metal, concrete, maybe wood) as accents. Usually some big diagnol lines or at least visible sections. Older all glass offices present as a single plane of glass, sometimes with light/dark striping. Modern shopping centers, or residential have different looks, of course; although high density high rise residential gets fairly close to high density high rise office.

jsty 7y ago

There's quite a trend for new 'Corporate HQ' buildings to incorporate this kind of stuff to burnish their environmental credentials - e.g. Bloomberg's new London HQ [0]. If you're just a development company building offices to rent, you'll include anything your prospective tenants are willing to pay for! A lot of those will simply want climate control to be as cheap as possible, so it'd boil down to whether the aircon / energy savings outweighed the extra capital costs incorporated in the rent. [0] https://www.bloomberg.com/company/announcements/bloomberg-most-sustainable-office-building/ https://www.bloomberg.com/company/announcements/bloomberg-mo...

zeristor 7y ago

There’s a website called Carbon Culture which shows the energy use of a building, and they have a page for Portcullis House which uses the same chimney method. Although I doubt cooling in London is as much of an issue as Harare. https://platform.carbonculture.net/places/portcullis-house/51/ https://platform.carbonculture.net/places/portcullis-house/5... Portcullis House Wikipedia entry, though doesn’t seem interested in its energy use: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portcullis_House https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portcullis_House

Symbiote 7y ago
> Although I doubt cooling in London is as much of an issue as Harare. The climate is similar in both cities. Harare's average January (summer) daily mean is 21°C, London's (July) is 19°C. The average highs are 26°C and 24°C. The high-low range, which looks to be important so the building can cool at night, is 10°C in both.
- lozenge 7y ago
  Harare is 15 degrees south and London is 50 degrees north of the equator. The sun is much more intense in Harare and occupies less of the day, allowing more time for the vents to cool the building. That said, this principle can be applied in London as well.
  - zeristor 7y ago
    Also London’s day lengths vary far more between summer and winter.
  - finolex1 7y ago
    Does London even need cooling on 99% of days? 25 degrees is the temperatures air-conditioners are often set to in the tropical country I live in.
    - rocqua 7y ago
      In america the standard airco setting is 18c to accommodate people in business suits. Given that London has a pretty big financial sector (with a lot of suits) they might have something similar. The same could hold for parliament.

tgsovlerkhgsel 7y ago

- Small windows with limited view. Less of a problem for a shopping mall since most stores I know don't seem to have windows at all, but I'd expect it to be perceived as unpleasant by western standards. - If it's an unusual design, using it means you're taking a big risk. If it works you save money, if it doesn't you have an uninhabitable building that may be hard or impossible to retrofit to a "normal" system. http://www.mickpearce.com/Eastgate.html http://www.mickpearce.com/Eastgate.html has some data, which looks remarkably good.