The brief for this project in Milan called for the urban renewal of the area and the renovation and conversion of the building for residential use. Sliding, screen-printed glass panels and black Swisspearl panels on the facades create a dynamic pattern of shifting planes held between the horizontal concrete floor slabs.
This building in Velenje is a spacious bus station at ground level and offices and a parking garage on the upper floors. The superstructure is notable for its extensive white Swisspearl panelling that serves to unify the different sections. The irregular pattern of perforations creates a distinctive day and night contrast.
Comfort and light in daily routines were emphasized in the planning of Sumner House in Christchurch. The house is situated on a flood plain and therefore needed to be raised above the ground. The connection with the street front allows interaction with neighbours and passersby while still maintaining a sense of security. The external materials were chosen for their low-maintenance and durability in the coastal environment, which weathers materials quickly. These materials include prefabricated Swisspearl panels in a silvery grey colour, a thermally modified timber rainscreen, cedar weatherboards, and pre-finished steel roof cladding. Since the Swisspearl panels are prefabricated and the timber floor cassettes and wall and roof panels were built off-site in the builder’s warehouse, the total construction time was minimized to a mere six months.
As its name indicates, Beachside sits on the shore, facing the Long Island Sound that separates Connecticut and New York’s Long Island. The house happens to be just down the road from Red Barn, the small “outbuilding” with art studio and accommodation designed by Ferris and featured in Swisspearl Architecture #27. Ferris says the Swisspearl panels covering the walls and roof of that earlier building enabled him to create an abstraction of “the ultimate red barn.” If the client for Beachside was aware of Red Barn or not is unimportant, since the architect was inclined to take a similar approach to the newer house, aiming for an abstraction of New England vernacular architecture in the gable forms covered in light-coloured fibre cement panels. Instead of a bold architectural statement recalling the state’s agricultural vernacular, Beachside’s relatively subdued imagery and relaxed floor plan harken to the houses in Kelly’s book, or to a farmhouse that would have sat in proximity to a working barn. Beachside consists of four gable volumes with zinc roofs and shorter, flat-roofed glazed corridors linking them. The main approach to the house from the north leads to a two-story glass entry and glimpses of a thick interior wall with punched openings free of glass that correspond to the abstracted traditional windows set into the gable volumes.
Riga’s Rehabilitation Clinic is a unit of the Children’s Clinical University Hospital, which is the largest children’s medical institution in Latvia. The four-story masonry building, built in 1910, has been adapted to new functions and has been extended with a single-story volume, staircase extension, and new elevator shaft. To tie in with the surrounding environment and the existing building, the extension of the clinic is clad in fibre cement panels. Swisspearl was chosen due to its quality, aesthetics, and versatility. The dark grey contrasts with the ochre masonry. The upper section of the cladding is perforated, thus creating a variety of textures and visually separating the roof volume.
Tampografia office building is located in Nogueira da Maia, on the outskirts of Porto, which has been implementing a strategic urban plan aimed at providing optimal conditions for companies and entrepreneurs. The goal was to integrate the building and respect the scale and architecture of its residential surroundings. In order to prevent a massive, heavy construction, it was key to design facades with a sense of dynamic movement, with light and shade and positive and negative forms. These contrasts reduce the scale of the building and disguise its functional character. The linear facades are interrupted by large-format openings, the jambs of which have varying angles so that light is funneled into the interior spaces. Dgrau specified Swisspearl panels for the exterior cladding right at the beginning of the design process. When comparing Swisspearl with similar materials, the architects saw significant advantages in terms of the quality of the product, range of colours, low maintenance, and durability of the material. Using two shades of grey, light on the facade walls and dark grey on the slanted window surrounds, accentuates openings and creates a sense of depth and contrast on the linear facades.
Croixmariebourdon’s six-story residential project is located on a large, elongated site that links two narrow residential streets in the heart of Paris. In order to upgrade the residential building, Croixmariebourdon Architects also added external insulation onto the facades, which are clad in small-format cement fibre Swisspearl panels treated like overlapping shingles. This small format is an unusual and interesting application of Swisspearl cladding. Like a knitted surface, the small-scale Swisspearl tiles in three sizes and shapes create a rhythmic pattern and lively texture on the facades. The external joinery is acrylic resin coated PVC. To integrate splashes of colour into the facade, each window has a colourful high-performance solar protection blind in red, pink, yellow, purple, or turquoise.
The natural colours of the surroundings were the inspiration for the house’s colour palette. Swisspearl fibre cement panels, balcony railings, and visible parts of the load-bearing structure are built in subdued gray-green hues. The timber facade paneling in Accoya wood has a warm, natural tone and the aluminium frames of the doors and windows are powder coated in black. By combining fibre cement panels on the outer skin and timber cladding on the inner facade surfaces a lively effect has been created on the elevations. Swisspearl panels were chosen for their aesthetics and durability in the long, wet winters. The panels have been cut into long, vertical formats that are nailed to a perforated 25 × 120 cm steel profile.
In July 2013, Denver Botanic Gardens, an institution with a long tradition of commissioning cutting-edge architecture, invited selected architectural practices to submit proposals for a “Science Pyramid,”. The new structure was to provide an exhibition space for the institution’s conservation and research efforts, thereby highlighting the Gardens’ broader mission as a scientific research body.
Faced with the task of designing a transparent pyramid, as specified in the competition brief, the architects of the winning competition entry, BURKETTDESIGN, drew their inspiration from the geological processes causing the ragged rock formations of the nearby mountain ridges. The envelope of the structure was likewise informed by a biological metaphor and features almost 500 dark grey, hexagonal Swisspearl panels, arranged in a honeycomb pattern and interspersed with thirty photovoltaic collectors and multiple windows and skylights.
Iowa-based Neumann Monson Architects were commissioned by Iowa University to design a new boathouse to accommodate the women‘s rowing team. Positioned strategically on the curve of the Iowa River, the siting gives the boathouse a vantage point from where boats can be viewed gliding at speed through the water left and right up the sweep of the river.
Located in the centre of Tromsø, Kystens Hus – the “Coastal Seafood Center in Northern Norway“ - is a flagship building showcasing the country‘s powerful fishing industry. Envisaged as a hub for information and business related to the fisheries, research and development, and tourism, the facility‘s primary purpose is to showcase the city‘s and the wider coastal region‘s cultural tradition, natural wealth, and economic drive. The permeable, fully glazed ground level is conceived as an extension of the public realm. The centre‘s upper part accommodates office spaces and is clad in a multi-faceted envelope reminiscent of the rock formations lining the northern Norwegian coast.
On a wild coastal stretch of Canada‘s Quadra Island, Patkau Architects have built an extraordinary single-family house that blends into the island‘s natural environment, while at the same time perfectly showcasing its rough beauty. The sea and its tidal impacts served as inspiration for the carefully designed layout and shape of the structure.
Over the past several years, numerous national and international firms have settled in Poznan; therefore, there is great demand for office space and high pressure on developers to make a mark architecturally and thereby distinguish themselves from competitors.
A particularly sensational example of this is the Jet Office building, which the local architectural office Insomia built at the intersection of two main transport axes in the north of the city. The plot’s unique shape demanded a special approach to design in order to optimally utilise floor areas. Normally, office buildings have a central access core and a regular support grid offset from the exterior walls to assure maximum flexibility in the distribution of spaces and facades. However, apart from one single internal row of supports, the reinforced concrete structure of the Jet Office is arranged peripherally.
Architects Superform drew the inspiration for this kindergarten from a nearby learning path running through the Slovenian village of Cerkvenjak. Intended to enrich the children‘s spatial experience, the hallway itself varies in width and each playroom unit boasts a unique, irregular and contorted shape. The design of the Swisspearl envelope supports this idea.
This vast educational complex in the Croatian capital of Zagreb is divided into three functional units arranged along a linear axis. The school at the heart of the facility features three parallel, three-story bars and is complemented by a lower nursery and kindergarten building to the west and a partially subsurface gymnasium to the east.
An integral part of a comprehensive sustainability strategy aimed at LEED Gold certification, the architects devised a rain screen facade clad in Swisspearl panels, which will boost the building’s energy performance and help keep long-term maintenance costs to a minimum.
The scheme involved a careful restoration of the dilapidated historical building, which now accommodates the traditional functions of the parsonage, such as the parson’s quarters, a classroom for religious education, the library, the banquet hall, and a visitor’s apartment. In addition, architects 4 plusz designed a new and decidedly modern structure that connects the two lateral wings of the existing U-shaped building and divides the garden space into two distinct courtyards. Fully glazed to either side, the transparent ground floor of the extension provides space for social events and opens a vista from the reception area to the rear garden.
The building enclosure combines a variety of materials in response to the surrounding campus context. The rear ground-floor spaces are largely concealed behind limestone cladding; to the north, the envelope increases in transparency, culminating in a tapering glass curtain wall that accentuates the building’s main entrance. The architects used a seemingly paper-thin layer of white Swisspearl panels to sheathe the fully glazed upper sections of the east and west facades. The latter extends slightly beyond the pointed corner of the building where the lower part folds slightly away to extend a welcoming gesture to visitors. Inspired by the pattern of a composition booklet, a seemingly random arrangement of circular perforations feeds dappled light into the atrium and allows views from the second-floor walkway.
The envelope is a core element of this sustainability strategy, which covers the building’s entire life cycle—from manufacturing and construction to utilisation and postoccupancy. The façade system features extensive high-performance glazing, veiled by a perforated skin made of sustainably produced and recyclable Swisspearl panels. Dotted by countless circular holes, the cladding helps minimise energy consumption by letting plenty of natural light penetrate the building. At the same time, it screens a number of manually operable windows, which allow the interiors to be naturally ventilated, improving air quality and comfort levels while significantly reducing expenditures for air-conditioning units. Beyond its practical benefits, the perforated cladding serves a major aesthetic purpose. Inconspicuous during the day, the myriad perforations create a striking display when the interior is fully lit, conferring a glowing, almost dematerialising effect to the façades. Moreover, the perforation pattern incorporates the company logo, thus advertising the brand to the nearby A1 highway, which connects Lisbon and Porto, the country’s most populous cities.
107 Forbes is a new, single-tenant office building facing Rowe Boulevard, a prominent location at the gateway to the city’s historic centre and West Annapolis neighbourhood. The new building replaces a group of commercial buildings along Rowe Boulevard. In order to get permission for the building, it had to fit within the existing footprint and maintain a similar volume, height, and floor area. The ground floor façade is constructed from timber cladding and glass, while the upper floor is clad in thin horizontal strips of overlapping grey Swisspearl panels. Large windows bring ample light into the interior. The upper floor cantilevers over the lower level longitudinally, creating the impression of a floating box.
Situated in North Vancouver’s Pemberton Heights, Bridge House pays homage to the tenets of modern architecture while incorporating distinctly regional elements to create a clean, contemporary aesthetic. Bridge House’s name is derived from the dramatic bridge that extends from the backyard to the house. Instead of isolating the upper tier of the garden, the bridge was created in order to gain access from both levels. Charcoal-coloured Swisspearl panels are used both on the interior and exterior as a neutral, dark element juxtaposed with the transparent glazed facades. The dark panels animate the interior spaces and mirror the dramatic dark palette of the exterior facade. The open facades and floating lines with the backdrop of massive old pines create an impression of lightness, almost like a tree-house perched on the site.
Perched on a narrow, sloping site above Lake Wakatipu in Queenstown, New Zealand, Lakes Edge House enjoys superb views of the lake and the surrounding mountainous landscape. With its timber-clad base and dark Swisspearl-clad upper level, the house seems to hover precariously above the site.
Herba House has two distinct faces, closed to the street and open to the river. The “house” to the street facing northward is clad in black Swisspearl panels, while the southern part of the house consists of terraces that open out onto the riverside and cascade down the slope.
Torre Estronci 91 is located in an affluent area in Barcelona, l’Hospitalet de LLobregat. The apartments offer the ideal combination of modernity, quality, comfort, and energy efficiency. Aesthetically speaking, the characteristic feature of the block is the ribbons of horizontal Swisspearl panels alternating in white and black that encircle the building, making a strong graphic impression. The black areas incorporate the black-framed fenestration while the white strips clad the projecting balconies. This projecting and recessing of the facades creates a sense of relief on the elevations and prevents the block from being perceived as a monolithic volume.
STW’s design for Peamount Healthcare Facility is the outcome of empathy; seeking to understand the challenges, capabilities, and experiences of the users. STW’s approach relates across all scales, from the building as a whole, down to the finest detail. Each bed has a view of the estate’s parkland surroundings. The central courtyards around which all the accommodations are organized are light filled oases of calm. The play of crisp rendered facades, large, horizontally mounted Swisspearl fibre cement panels and fenestration express the building’s planning grid and at the same time mediate between the need for durable finishes and softer, more tactile ones. In response to the dementia-friendly design brief for the facility, STW utilized a software to determine suitable light reflectance value contrasts between materials and finishes.
Nido Student Accommodation in Curraheen Point is a 145-bedroom student accommodation scheme located within walking distance of University College Cork and Munster Technological University. The apartments are organized around an internal “street” that is landscaped to provide external amenity space, while a large, glazed reception area opening onto both Farranlea Road and the garden contains internal student facilities, such as a lounge, group study room, and laundry. The buildings range in height from two to four floors. A material palette of rich, copper-coloured fibre cement Swisspearl panels in a vertical format, grey metal, render, and stone are combined with the distinctive window design to create a sense of place.
The University of Limerick Climbing Centre is the premier indoor climbing facility in Ireland and caters for Ireland’s fastest growing sport. Through engaging workshops with the clients and end users, Hugh Kelly Architects developed the project brief and concept design, pushing the boundaries of the project.
Located near Riga in Latvia, Ozola and Bula Architects’ new Music and Art School consists of three distinct volumes that step down in response to the slope of the terrain. An outdoor stepped walkway and an indoor corridor link the three colourful volumes to one another.
As a society, we face huge construction challenges: we not only need to build millions of homes, schools, and other buildings, but these buildings need to be low-energy, low-carbon, and built to maximise our wellbeing. Wiki House in Mongolia has been constructed using a digitally manufactured building technology with low carbon emissions, minimising heat loss and waste. It is also energy efficient and was easy to construct.
The Joint Health Sciences Center exemplifies Camden’s resurgence as a hub for medical research and education. The 9,290-square-metre facility has been designed to bring together students from different academic disciplines to share laboratories, equipment, and classrooms, exposing them to a broader educational experience.
This apartment block in Hévíz, Hungary is an excellent example of how Swisspearl panels can be implemented in diverse ways to adorn facades. Custom-made patterns have been cut into the panels to create lively patterns. The curve of the primary body of the apartment building is emphasised by a projecting entry structure that has been clad in such perforated Swisspearl panels. The delicate round perforations in varying sizes form an organic pattern and allow rays of light to shine through the panels. Swisspearl panels have also been employed as vertical sliding shutters on the balconies of the upper floors.
One of the aims for the expansion of this single-family house, which dates back to the 1980s, was to create a harmonious ensemble of old and new while respecting the building‘s natural surroundings. To achieve this, the architect chose a reduced, box-shaped wooden structure clad in large, dark grey Swisspearl panels and floor-to-ceiling glass openings, creating a strong contrast without dominating or competing. While the extension opens up to the existing building and garden in the south, it is closed towards the gravel road in the north. By perforating this closed facade of Swisspearl panels in the form of an abstracted tree branch, the extension is reminiscent of the old orchard.
Montrose Gymnasium is situated in a peripheral suburb of Melbourne and offers a much-loved primary school on the foothills of the Dandenong mountain range and an exceptional new gym for the school and community. With its dynamic forms and colours, the new gym creates a striking new identity for the school.
Located a mere ten minutes from central Gothenburg, alongside a small golf course, Gårda Johan Fastighets AB’s new headquarters in St Jörgen Business Park was inspired by the American model, offering its tenants a wide variety of activities and opportunities for social encounters.
The building consists of two concrete walls supporting a long, diamond-shaped roof. Between the gable walls, glass facades span freely, creating spaces for the restrooms and a waiting room with seating for 24 people. Unlike a traditional pitched roof, here the roof line is mirrored, forming a diamond shape that opens to the sky, while creating a human scale. As the roof is the primary element of the building, the architects needed a cladding material that would function equally well as a roof cladding and as a ceiling. A material was also needed that could be detailed with a high level of precision as the architects wanted the roof to register as a single, monolithic volume. Furthermore, the ceiling of the long waiting room also had to function as an acoustic element and, at the same time, allow for integrated lighting. Swisspearl created both the necessary aesthetic and functional properties. The choice of fibre cement Swisspearl panels made it possible to use perforated panels in the ceiling that function as a light source.
Ostrovní is a modern residential housing project built on a gap site surrounded by historic architecture. It is situated in the heart of Prague, near the National Theatre, just a couple of streets away from Wenceslas Square. The shape of the land plot called for a unique construction solution. While limited space was a concern, the architects managed to fit in 2 apartments with light-flooded rooms onto each floor. The same is true for the main staircase. Two residential units located on each floor are entered from the hallway. The building houses a total of 8 apartments, including a maisonette occupying two top floors.
The Radio and Television Studios of Slovakia (RTVS) are located near the historic centre of Košice. Like many older buildings in the city, the building has recently been renovated. The project’s goal was to renovate the central administration building and improve its energy efficiency and cost-effectiveness. Thus, one of the main aspects was the renovation of the building envelope.
The curtain wall was upgraded by combining a weatherproofing system and aerated façade system with a cladding of russet-coloured Swisspearl panels assembled vertically. Projecting grey-plastered pilasters at intervals and vertical strips of windows enhance the vertical rhythm. The facades of the broadcasting room, which projects above the surrounding control rooms and office spaces, is clad in Swisspearl panels cut at angles to create a dynamic, unconventional effect.
How a US technical campus is successfully inspiring a future generation, meeting ecological challenges, and supporting equality in the trades through practical planning.
This bar is more than 182 metres long but only about 24 metres wide on the north and south ends. The combination of berms at the lowest level and sizeable top-floor cantilevers sheltering generous terraces on the ends means the academic bar, when seen from the highway or the nearby houses, appears as a one-storey volume clad in Swisspearl panels.
Located at Pike and Pine on Capitol Hill, Chloe on Madison is a vibrant, mixed-use home of 137 units and truly memorable amenity spaces that create and nourish community.Targeting LEED for Homes Gold, the design achieves an innovative balance of creativity and technical solutions.
Situated in an elevated position in the heart of campus, the Bellevue Student Success Center (SSC) is a gateway for visitors coming in through the main campus entrance. The centre’s layout pictures a student’s “ascent” through his academic career. Entry services are located on the first floor, student support services on the second floor, and spaces focused on celebrating the students’ success are located on the top floor.
The exterior reflects the programmatic organisation within the building, with the most active uses visible through a glazed facade. Facades of more inward looking areas have been clad in sand-coloured yellow and beige Swisspearl panels. Through the selection of two similar colour tones from the Swisspearl Largo Carat series, a dynamic effect.
Van Sinderen Plaza runs alongside the elevated tracks of the train from Manhattan. The building has a gradation of bold colors down the full length of the facade to amplify the linear movement of the trains. Both ends start with dark burgundy to echo the residential brick homes in the neighborhood, and gradually transition from dark to light, red to yellow, interrupting the linearity of the building. Above the ground floor, the building volume cantilevers outward to gain a larger building footprint for the apartment levels. Architecturally, this provided the added benefit of reducing the building’s scale. The exterior cladding system is a ventilated rainscreen using Swisspearl fiber cement panels and a Knightwall support system. In order to streamline costs, the panel facade was specifically designed to minimize waste. Amenities in each LEED-certified building include indoor resident recreation rooms, on-site shared laundry rooms, outdoor resident recreation terraces, and bike storage.
Held between two primary vehicular corridors, the Wheaton Office Building eschews conventional downtown office buildings with their glass curtainwalls and precast panels for a dynamic, rainscreen clad building that resonates with Wheaton’s industrial past. The facade is composed of an energy-efficient rainscreen system of Swisspearl panels in warm shades of orange and red and high-performance glazing. The roof is planted, and the site includes bio-retention areas that clean and filter storm water and surface runoff. The project was conceived as a catalyst for urban renewal in Wheaton and a symbol for the future of Montgomery County.
Kean University’s new College of Business and Public Management features large, student-focused communal spaces with dramatic multi-level connections to each floor. The school provides the several thousand students with a variety of spaces to interact, collaborate, study, and relax throughout the day.
Early conceptual visions for the exterior window pattern and corresponding facade design were translated to Swisspearl modular cladding for a clean exterior façade. The dark, slightly recessed facade in the base area lets the bright building volume hover above. Linear grooving reinforces the impression, lending the anthracite-coloured panels a matte restraint.
Located in a remote part of Ontario in Canada, this single-family house is built on a site that gently slopes down toward Haliburton Lake. By designing the house as a long, narrow volume facing south, all the principal spaces enjoy copious amounts of natural light and views through the trees down to the lake.
In contrast to the timber roof structure and the stone-clad walls on the lower level, the exterior upper facades orientated north, east, and west are clad in matte black Swisspearl panels of varying dimensions, some attached horizontally, some attached vertically. The design dissolves the boundaries between interior and exterior by extending the exterior façade materials in the interior. The southern facade facing the lake has been dematerialised with great expanses of glazing to soak in light and views.
Located on a steep site in West Vancouver, Thompson House was designed to capture expansive views of the ocean harbour to the front and mountains to the rear. The dynamic interior spaces are held beneath an extensive roof that wraps around to form the closed side façades and controls sightlines for privacy to and from the neighbours.
The roof structure is inclined with a different slope on each of the four exterior elevations, and consequently, varied ceiling heights on the upper floor interior. The two upper floors appear to hover above the garden pool nestled in a planted rock garden. By cladding the lower level in a light shade of grey Swisspearl panels, the sense of floating above the landscape has been emphasised. Large openings to the views are contrasted with the façades facing the neighbouring properties, which are clad in black Swisspearl panels.
Two creeks flow between mature cedar trees and native plant species, providing habitat for wildlife, such as salmon, otters, eagles, coyotes, herons, and deer, which can all be viewed directly from the house. The existing house was stripped of its layers of past renovation and restored to a modern version of its former self, with the existing timber structure and form remaining largely intact. Design intervention included a reimagining of the original 1950s postand-beam structure, where new design details, construction methods, and materials are expressed and celebrated for their beauty in a raw and honest state. The addition is a simple, modern form that is placed slightly off axis from the original, clearly demarcating the boundary between the two, old and new, to the rear of the house. This division is pronounced on the exterior by the dark fibre cement Swisspearl cladding and on the interior by a subtle change in floor elevation and floor treatment.
The Green Line House in Warmia, designed by Przemek Olczyk from Mobius Architekci Warsaw, won the Grand Prix in the European Property Awards 2019 -2020. We are proud that our Swisspearl roof panels are part of this seminal building. This solitary house remains lonely in a landscape, without adjacent buildings, away from roads. Harsh landscape prompted Przemek Olczyk, an architect and the author of the project, to use transparent and legible tectonics, thus embedding the building in the morphology of the plot.
Skilful adaptation of the architecture to the structure of the plot ensures that the scale of the 500 sqm house does not overwhelm it. Due to the strong winds in this part of the Warmian Lake District, the design employs an atrial layout. The screen of glass walls of the building provides a transparent shield while maintaining important viewing axes for the users.
The Inland Northwest Behavioral Health Hospital represents a community investment into the growing need for behavioural health treatment. Through a holistic approach to design, the facility overcomes the stigma of mental health, and provides a safe, reassuring place where people can heal with dignity.
The X-shaped building stands on sloping terrain, which is balanced by a base. The outer shell of the house appears cautiously grey, in complete contrast to the inward-facing facades, which are formulated in striking colour combinations.
Ingleside at King Farm, a Senior Living Retirement Community in Rockville, MD, recently worked with Perkins Eastman to expand their community and reposition their amenity spaces towards a new generation of residents. After embarking on a master planning exercise to create a roadmap for future growth, including a multi-phased expansion of its residences, Ingleside was challenged to seamlessly integrate the new with the old while making sure to not compromise on the services available to their existing residents.
The key goals of the master plan included expanded dining venues, as well as building a new Center for Healthy Living, innovative memory support, and rehabilitation centres catering to the Ingleside residents’ 120 new independent living apartments, and the surrounding community. These phases included approximately 41,800 square metres of renovation and expansion for the campus.
The master plan and new buildings were inspired by the original Ingleside building’s French-mansard roof, which faces the boulevard. The new planning and architecture draws on this aesthetic to reference lively and eclectic Paris side streetscapes for the cross streets with a dynamic collection of modern (as in the new Independent Living spaces) and more intimately-scaled and historic-inspired spaces such as those for memory care and day care.
After a fifteen-year planning period, the inhabitants of Wickham in Western Australia finally got their new community centre. A bent roofscape encompasses the communal spaces. The group of buildings also integrates existing and new sports facilities. Gresley Abas Architects from Perth were responsible for the architectural concept of the new Wickham Community Hub, tailor-made for the needs of the population.
The building’s main effect is created by the facade cladding, which is oriented in part outward, and in part toward the areaways. The cladding is composed of vertical stripes and solid-colour Swisspearl fibre cement panels – 12,000 square metres of Swisspearl Carat in fourteen standard colours and eleven special colours.
Louisiana Children’s Museum presents a transformative model for children’s museums that weaves together indoor and outdoor learning opportunities. Its facade’s colour palette was chosen to provide a subtle reference to traditional limestone façades of public buildings within the park, and to create an optimal backdrop for the rich, changing light over the nearby lagoon. The lightness of the panels provides a projection surface for the ever-changing shadow patterns from the building louvres and water reflections from the lagoon. A combination of smooth panels and panels with a subtle pixelated pattern embossed on the surface creates a playful dance across the long elevations.
The challenge for the architect Andris Vitols was to preserve the old facade of the original building situated one kilometre north of the Daugava River in central Riga. A bold contrast has been created with this sleek modern addition inserted above a traditional timber-clad facade.
Situated on a street with continuous adjoining masonry facades, this office and residential building creates a striking contrast with its pop-up addition clad in white Swisspearl panels. While the lower two levels are constructed in off-shutter concrete clad in timber boards, the upper three levels are constructed in concrete brickwork and clad in white Swisspearl panels assembled vertically and horizontally.
This public preschool in Sweden is an excellent example of the versatility of Swisspearl panels. The elevation of the building facing the public entry is a light, steel framework clad in perforated white Swisspearl panels assembled vertically with generous openings from the upper balconies to overlook the garden playground, while the main body of the building has been clad in distinctive vertical stripes of Swisspearl panels in white, and light and dark grey. Emerald green window frames brighten the colour palette, which is an appropriately lighthearted touch for the preschool.
The National Museum Restoration and Storage Centre, OMRRK, is a new institution that provides an outstanding technological building for the preservation of the collections of the Museum of Ethnography, the Museum of Fine Arts, and the Hungarian National Gallery.
The complex was completed in May 2019 as part of the Liget Budapest Project. Within the framework of the development, unique in Central Europe, world-class art storage warehouses and conservation-restoration workshops will be housed in five adjacent buildings on four underground and three above-ground levels, covering a total area of nearly 37,000 square metres.
Located on the foothills of Vitosha Mountain in Sofia, ACME is a residential complex consisting of three building volumes accommodating eleven apartments. The architectural concept focuses on the design of the roofs, which merge seamlessly with the facades and are treated like a fifth facade.
By continuing the Swisspearl facade cladding as a roof covering, and eschewing an eaves overhang, the archetypal form of « house » has been abstracted and the scale of the house visually reduced. The smooth, dark Swisspearl panels create a strong visual contrast with the russet textured brick facades.
This 1980s office campus needed revitalisation to become a desirable, contemporary working environment. Opting to keep the revision cost effective yet creative, the original form of the building was retained, but refreshed with new materials and colours on the façades. New cladding was constructed with Swisspearl panels cut into complex patterns. Each panel was carefully cut to prevent any waste. The exterior materials were specifically chosen to be long-lasting and efficient during the construction and installation processes, thus reducing waste and labour costs.
The building’s exterior design exuberantly expresses the project’s three uses through its stacking of rectangular masses and changes in material, colours and window patterns. Although the design can appear at first glance to consist of three boxes, a closer look shows that the fire station is a combination of two rectangular masses and that the apartment block sits on a pedestal that separates it from the squash court section, making for a total of five major rectangular forms. The interplay between all these boxes creates a variety of setbacks and projections.
Situated near Tosen Fjord in a remote part of Norway, Storelva hydropower plant was designed by Stein Hamre arkitektkontor, not only as a power plant, but also as a hiking destination and tourist attraction.
The power plant is situated beneath a waterfall on open solid bedrock. To echo this, Stein Hamre has conceived the building as a massive rock. In order to emphasise its mass, the building is completely clad in horizontal layers of Swisspearl panels in different shades of dark grey, with thin fissures of horizontal strips of glass dispersed across the facades. The glass in the fissures has a high reflection quotient, thus mirroring the natural surroundings, which change throughout the day depending on the natural light.
This residential building is located in the idyllic town of Briztonas in the southern part of Lithuania. The small village on the right bank of the Memel River is known not only as a resort region, but also for its salty springs and healthy mineral water. Also the construction of the building relies on sustainable mineral raw materials and a natural, but above all, versatile appearance. A large part of the longitudinal facade, which faces the street, is made of the regionally known Lithuanian brick, which gives the building a sandy warm character. The exterior areas on the ground and upper floor are accessible through generous floor-to-ceiling windows and the roofed areas are cladded with warm wood lining. Complementing the brick and as another natural component, a large part of the facade is clad with Swisspearl Largo Reflex panels in a beige tone. The single-family house is a composition of natural materials unified in its shades and playing with different formats.
Villa Void is situated in Saltnes, a village south of Norway’s capital Oslo, on a lush, west-facing site with views towards the outskirts of Oslofjorden. Tall pine trees and a gentle slope towards the northwest characterise the site. From the onset, the architects Resell + Nicca decided that the 29 pine trees would be preserved, that the design of the house would correspond to the various levels on the plot, and the trees would be visible from the key areas within the house.
With its clear lines, Villa Void is inspired by the forms of existing houses in the neighbourhood. The combination of materials—dark-grey Swisspearl panels on the outer skin, and a warm wooden interior, also used on the recessed exterior areas—underline the sculptural character of the house.
The Commons at Stanton Square, so called Martha’s Table, is a 55,000 square foot campus for community programmes that supports the healthy development of children and their families in a welcoming and safe environment. Designed by Washington, DC firm Cox Graae Spack Architects, the Commons was completed in May of 2018 for Martha‘s Table. The building features the use of four colours of Swisspearl fibre cement panels in a vertical orientation.
Completing the “E” is what the team at Perkins Eastman DC calls their addition. In the late 1920s and early 1930s as a nurse’s dormitory, it was planned that the building would have three wings, but it ended up with only two. For this reason the building sat as an “F” rather than an “E”. So completing the “E” doesn’t mean replicating the existing building’s style, footprint, or materials. It means making the old building work in its new life as a school. The addition of the brick facade shows continuation with the old, while the contemporary elevations covered in Swisspearl signal change: of function, of users, and of attitude.
The building of the Moxy Hotel in Chicago meets the ground as a friendly, lively, and at the same time transparent component of its vibrant neighbourhood. An incorporated floor-to-ceiling glass wall in the guestroom corridor frames a dramatic view of the skyline, inviting guests to experience Chicago‘s charm. From the exterior perspective, the dominating glass is perfectly framed by grey Swisspearl fibre cement panels, providing a simple and plain appearance that implies itself into the context of the neighbourhood.
Varina Area Library is envisioned as a place for individual transformation and community advancement, as well as a learning hub. Situated in an agrarian part of Henrico County along the historic State Route 5, the new library connects Virginia’s historic capital in Williamsburg to its current capital in Richmond.
Form and surface meld to express the Red Barn’s inspiration. The simple gable form and the diminutive outbuilding with its vibrant red exterior recall the typology of a traditional barn. Only upon closer inspection do the glazed ends, entry portal, hangar door, and contemporary cladding denote another reality for the building. The Red Barn’s meaning lies somewhere between the past it references and the present it occupies.
Located on a prominent site between Western Road and the River Lee in Cork, DTA Architects’ new student accommodation provides 190 student bedrooms with ensuite bathrooms in 28 cluster apartments, with reception and communal amenity facilities on the ground floor.
Public transit projects are typically led by engineering firms, but DLR Group architects played a key role in the planning of the 2.7-kilometer route. Located on a tight footprint, the station had to provide all the necessary functionality while reflecting the unique culture of San Francisco’s Chinatown, an internationally renowned tourist attraction that is home to 15,000 Chinese Americans.
To celebrate the station’s curved form, DLR Group managed to find alternatives to having a dropped ceiling or columns to contain the necessary ductwork and utilities. The arch that extends across the platforms and subway tracks is clad with white Swisspearl fibre cement panels that conceal utility lines and bring lightness and luminescence to the space. Swisspearl panels were specified due to their good fire protection values, durability, and high-quality surface coating that is relatively insensitive to dirt and pollution.
Designed for a large family of seven, House XL is located on the outskirts of a new residential area in the east of Slovenia. SoNo Architects’ design takes its cue from the typically Slovenian architectural elements and the rolling hills and fields surrounding it.
The house consists of three, double-pitch, gable-roofed volumes: two of which are perpendicular and run parallel to one another, thereby creating a sheltered outdoor living and eating space between them. In essence, SoNo architects’ design is a modern interpretation of a rural barn.
A primary architectural criterion for the San Bartolomeo Church in the northern Italian town of Andrate was to design a building clearly legible as Christian. To this end, a nine-metre-high inclined bell tower was incorporated as an instantly recognisable symbol of the Christian faith, which still plays a central role in Italian society today.
The most effective solution chosen in order to realise the sleek architectural design was a reinforced concrete structure for the church cube and the bell tower. From the outset, the high-performance properties of a ventilated facade made its application obvious, and Swisspearl panels appeared to offer the best product quality. The ventilated facade provides numerous technological advantages: durability, cleanliness, thermal comfort, dry installation of the panels, and waterproofing. The large-format white panels enhance the dynamic, slanted form of the church and contrast strongly with the stained glass rhomboid window openings.
This project elevates its neighbourhood’s existing design paradigm by implanting a modern canon that bridges the residential and commercial scales of the West Annapolis neighbourhood. The structure’s linear planks quite literally reflect the scale of residential siding and – perhaps a bit more abstractly – what one would find on the hull of a ship, tying the neighbourhood to the overall spirit of Annapolis as a maritime city.
Stantec designed this bold auditorium/theatre addition to the existing Round Rock ISD high school to help offset the high frequency use of the district’s performing arts centre. The project has become a prototype for other school auditoria in the district.
Two shades of grey Swisspearl panels provide a high quality, low maintenance choice for the facade cladding, emphasising the stepped heights of the rectilinear volumes and contrasting with the light ochre, rustic stonewall cladding of the lower sections.
Colorado College’s expanded and transformed Tutt Library is America’s largest carbon-neutral academic library. The library has been transformed into a colourful, dynamic facility, accommodating the requirements of a contemporary library and the college’s unique academic programme. Designed during an era when libraries were primarily containers for books, the original building was intentionally introverted. Pfeiffer’s design of the new centre turns this introversion inside-out, to better reflect the changing use of the library and the values of Colorado College.
Black Box II is the latest in a series of micro-additions that significantly impact existing buildings. Conceived as a giant jewellery box, large openings blur the boundary between interior and exterior, revealing its treasure of fine craftsmanship through the playful use of complementary surface materials. The Black Box II addition to the existing masonry house is clad in large-format, black Swisspearl fibre cement panels finely assembled with matching rivets. The balustrade of the loggia is a single, large perforated Swisspearl panel.
With its distinctive red and grey clad high-rise towers, Cepa Housing İncek forms part of the Çayyolu-Alacaatlı residential area within the wider development of western Ankara. This is a high-end district introducing innovative, distinguished and bold projects.
Although the district where Cepa housing is located has high-quality buildings, there are also mediocre, undefined buildings dispersed in the neighbourhood. Architect Ali Osman Öztürk chose Swisspearl panels in strong colour tones to give this housing development its own identity.
Perched in the rugged hills above Pasadena in California, LR2 House enjoys sublime views across the verdant city. Three stacked and rotated volumes clad in black Swisspearl panels cascade down the steeply inclined slope. The relationship between the volumes, the topography, and the treatment of the openings in the dark elongated facades lend LR2 house a sense of drama.
The entry follows the landscape guiding visitors along a walkway that extends under the mass of the building. The stairs create a curved path to a bridged entry portal, from where dramatic views of the house can be enjoyed. As the front door opens, the dark, angular façade clad with Swisspearl panels contrasts with the light-filled interior of soft wood and bright white finishes.
Black Villa is a combination of state-of-the-art technology and simple, clean design that respects the existing conditions of the site and neighbourhood. The single-family house is a great example of how one can use materials and colours in order to tie a building into its natural surroundings.
The facade is clad in fire-resistant Swisspearl fibre cement panels in a dark charcoal hue. All doors and windows have aluminium frames with dual glazing of high R-value to help reduce energy loss. Deep overhangs and screens over the glazing areas help to protect the structure from the severe Californian sun and help to reduce the use of air conditioning.
What at first glance appears to be a single-family villa enclosed by an enormous pitched roof with timber-clad eaves, are actually four separate apartment units. Villa Faun is an apartment complex located in the northwest slope of Oslo with a panoramic view over the city and the Oslo Fjord in the distance. The surrounding neighbourhood is characterised by various types of Norwegian houses built during the last century. The concept of the design team was to bring together a unifying identity to the project, while creating private, individual units.
Uppsala Science Park is ranked as one of the world’s best corporate incubators and is known far beyond the borders of Sweden. Innovative ideas about life science, biotechnology, medicine, and IT are researched and developed here.
With 17,000 square metres distributed across five floors, the rectilinear building expresses its prominent status by its scale, proportioning, and materialisation. A broad façade clad in light grey horizontal and vertical panels is offset by a patchwork collage of diamond-shaped Swisspearl panels in shades of russet reds, oranges, and ochres. The autumnal colour palette and the intense rhythm of window openings is a reference to the adjacent historical buildings.
A slightly shiny surface and its metallic character are the unmistakable trademarks of the Swisspearl Reflex facade panels. The fact that the building envelope nevertheless does not appear overloaded, but scores with a discreet understatement, is demonstrated by the Shiny House, which is located in Zagreb.
The single-family house, which stands on a slight hill, was realised with a white colour and radiates a simple elegance and timeless beauty.
Otago Polytechnic Student Village provides over 200 student rooms and associated common areas and amenities on campus. The quality and character of the village rival the best examples of student accommodation in Australia and New Zealand and significantly enhance the appeal of Otago Polytechnic and Dunedin City as a place of learning.
The elongated building reflects the predominant forms of the multi-storey buildings surrounding the site. Where possible, the plan has been staggered to generate a form that is offset between different accommodation units, in order to reduce the scale and to provide depth. Trees and sports fields screen the building from the public site boundaries.
Because it serves as the main entrance to the entire Hungarian SAP operation, the Lobby was an important part of the concept. The architects –Vikár&Lukács Architects – created a strong statement with the structure of the space. Our aim was to use interior design elements that respect the space, yet gently form it. In accordance with their Brand Guidelines, the background of the SAP logo can only be white. Besides using white colour, we wanted to use some very different, special surface and innovative technology. That is how we came to the choice of using Swisspearl panels. When we created the first renders and elevations, we realised perforation could add more energy to this concept. Our graphic designer worked out several layouts and we feel one of them works with the space and the logo perfectly.
Tartu University Hospital Extension includes three new expandable units for the hospital complex, which was built over a number of decades. Two new units, the children’s hospital and outpatient surgery, are accommodated in the extension of this clinic.
The various buildings designed and built in their time, showcase a variety of architectural styles and materials. This project is a continuation of the previous attempt to combine existing architectural elements and create a harmonious whole. The extension is designed with a lofty, triple-volume atrium between the two so-called “towers”. One of the main concepts was to create a long gallery to the rear of the building to ease the logistics of the entire hospital complex. The linear accelerators for the radiotherapy department are situated beneath the atrium on the basement floor. All personnel circulation, as well as material flow for the hospital has been placed in a new “internal street” between two, eight-storey wings.
The total area of the three- to four-story business centre in Kaunas, Lithuania, is approximately 5,300 square metres, the bulk of which is available for rental. Modern heating, cooling, and ventilation systems installed in the business centre ensure a high level of comfort for employees and visitors of the centre, which accommodates 400 workstations. Furthermore, a relaxation zone with benches and green spaces is provided in the inner courtyard.
This stylish, single-family house in Herzliya, north of Tel Aviv on the Mediterranean coast, has been designed as a succession of interconnected thresholds that proceed through the building. Aluminium latticework screens have been used as a device to create subtle intermediary spaces.
Neptune Office Building is articulated in long, extended parallel lines of layered materials: stone, glazing, Swisspearl panels, and steel flashing in tightly packed, overlapping panels. Interlocking forms protrude from the facade envelope covered by the timber-clad eaves overhang that protects the upper floor outdoor balcony.
Founded in 1994, the International School of Tianjin is a standard kindergarten to twelfth grade international school. The school offers an exceptional education for the expanding, culturally diverse international community in Tianjin. In 2018, the entire school building was given a new facade.
From the onset of the design, it was decided the bright red and yellow colours of the school emblem, a dragon and ball, should be incorporated into the facade. The new design continues the original exterior colour palette, but rather than plaster and paint, high-quality Swisspearl fibre-cement panels were utilised in eleven colour tones.
The Aurora precinct in Canberra is a sustainable, mixed-use scheme consisting of high-quality apartments, restaurants, and office spaces within the Kingston Foreshore precinct on Lake Burley Griffin. Quality urban architecture and sustainability were primary aims for both the client and the architect.
The Heaney Centre is a new community arts centre in Bellaghy, County Derry. This small village is best known as the birthplace and childhood home of Irish poet and Nobel laureate Seamus Heaney, to whom the new building is dedicated.
IaN+ has clearly demarcated the new reception area with their unusual, curved design and woven exterior surfaces clad with coloured panels of Swisspearl fibre-reinforced concrete and glass. The entire three-story volume is bathed in light that filters through the curtain of glass imbued with blue and green tones, echoing the ocean, which the building is situated alongside of. When the sunshine reflects off the cladding, the faceted facade shimmers like the scales of a fish and when the building lights up at night, it resembles the watery colours of an aquarium.
A seven-story, U-shaped apartment block elevated on concrete pilotis accommodates 112, two-to-five-room apartments and encloses an inner courtyard with sports and recreation facilities including a large swimming pool and tennis court.
The modular facade is articulated at each level with subtle offsets that create a curved geometry, a set of concave and convex movements that follow the streets bordering the site. Swisspearl fibre cement panels are key to expressing this volumetric strategy. A lightweight material that allows for large-scale panels has proven to be the ideal material to articulate the facade shapes. A dark shade was chosen for the ground floor and penthouses, contrasting with the main body of the building, for which white was chosen.
The Mall of America in Minneapolis opened its doors to the public in 1992 and is now the most frequented building in the United States with over 42 million visitors per year. In an effort to preserve this notable status, Triple Five Group decided to reinvigorate the existing mall through an expansion, which would reinforce the centre’s strong brand and status as a tourist destination.
The exterior of the retail podium consists of a Swisspearl rainscreen and continuous glazing, which provide a backdrop to a dramatic installation at the entry.
The new building for the College of Health and Human Studies at Missouri State University impresses through its sculptural formation. That can be said not only of the volume, but also the spatial organisation, which includes a communication zone connecting all floors.
Although the inner organisation is orthogonal, thereby transferring the logic of the street grid onto the building, one of the architect’s goals for their new university building was to break open the rigid geometry. This is evident not only in the slants and upturns of the entry front, but also in the nooks in the southwest, which mediate to the neighbouring residential development; the slightly buckled east facade towards South Holland Avenue; and finally, the folds of the roof. What thus arises is a sculpturally-formed volume whose physicality is emphasised by the all-over cladding with Swisspearl panels in the Carat model, based on the Sigma 8 fixation system. In interplay with the slightly recessed glazing, the horizontally offset panels underscore the building’s compactness, but as a recognisably thin façade skin, likewise emphasise its lightness. In this way, the new building creates a counterpoint to the rather heavy seeming limestone structures from the post-World War II decades. However, with the Onyx 7090 colour option, it purposely integrates into the existing spectrum of colours.
The architect was hoping to design a very simple building, with very basic colours but which would not to be quiet and boring. The main goal is the motion captured in the “flying windows”, which are seen from both inside and out. If you view the building from the exterior, you can see that the faces appear to move slightly. When viewed from the inside through the destroyed window shape, the world seems to be moving. The building was constructed with a concrete skeleton; the facades were built using a concrete base with thermal insulation in an affixed ventilated facade system. All of the windows have electric blinds to allow incoming sun to be regulated during hot summer days. Solar panels are used for heating water.
École Enfants du Monde (International School) in Montréal was initially designed in 1961. Clad in Swisspearl panels, the new façades of the two-storey, rectilinear school are mainly white, but are also peppered with black and red to give the school a sense of fun. The local borough experienced an annual increase in the number of primary school pupils, which prompted the School Board to expand several of its schools, most notably the Enfants du Monde school. Due to the design versatility of Swisspearl panels, Birtz Bastien Beaudoin Laforest Architectes decided to clad the École Enfants du Monde with the fibre cement material to add some colour and a light-hearted atmosphere to the newly renovated building.
This villa is a good example of a successful combination of Swisspearl panels with stone. A dialogue occurs here between the two interlocking materials, contrasting textures, and corresponding colour tones.
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