4 ms·

I still think it's a gorgeous building. With more than a half-century's improvement in materials and process, I wonder how if it would turn out differently if s

• willyt 6y ago
  Assuming Canada has similar rules to Europe on energy efficiency now: It would not be such an elegant slender looking structure as there are stricter requirements for insulation which, for a structure like this, would require some major gymnastics to prevent cold-bridging through major structural elements. You would either need to insulate the whole structure making it all look 'fatter' and over engineered or you would need to control interfaces between outside and inside structure carefully to be sure that you are not transferring major moment loads near thermal boundaries so that you don't have huge structural elements crossing thermal boundaries. Where you can't avoid this, a typical strategy is to insulate along a beam or column until the length of steel and or concrete structure has the equivalent U-Value to the surrounding typical construction, whilst taking care to ensure that its all sealed up to prevent vapour migrating through the insulation and condensing on the cold structure thereby creating corrosion problems later.