Façade & Glazing Solutions UK Ltd has delivered an energy efficient glazed façade for Aperture, a new community hub on the Greenwich Peninsula.

Aperture is an ambitious project covering 150 acres to the east of central London. It’s one of Europe’s largest regeneration projects and will eventually provide 15,720 new homes along 1.6 miles of the Thames waterfront, as well as shops, hotels, schools and public spaces.

Commissioned to manufacture and install the building’s façade, Façade & Glazing Solutions was required to meet a range of tight guidelines for aesthetics and energy efficiency. A notable feature in the design for Aperture was the inclusion of high levels of glazing at ground floor level, with the aim of creating a light, bright interior to emphasise the open and welcoming nature of the community hub. These plans required Façade & Glazing Solutions to design and specify an attractive glazed building envelope with narrow sightlines and a minimum of visible fixtures to let in as much daylight as possible.

Additionally, Aperture’s design aims to achieve a BREEAM rating of Very Good for energy performance and efficiency. This required the glazing specification to account for intelligent ventilation solutions, as well as minimising solar gain to reduce the need for air conditioning.

To meet the requirements laid out in the design brief, Façade & Glazing Solutions manufactured and installed a glazed building envelope comprising of the VS-1 curtain walling system, supplemented with traditional curtain walling for at the ground floor.

The VS-1 installation for Aperture is unique and bespoke, including continuous full high feature fins to minimise the building’s solar gain and enhance thermal and acoustic comfort. The curtain walling system’s highly engineered simplicity allowed the installation to meet the brief, delivering both streamlined aesthetics and efficiency benefits. The system allows the façade to be held away from the mullion without the use of obtrusive bolt fixings or transoms. This means that the glass wall visually ‘floats’, presenting an entirely glazed surface that lets in as much daylight as possible to enhance the building’s visual appeal as well as the comfort of its occupants.

For the areas of the building’s envelope fitted with the VS-1 system, Façade & Glazing Solutions delivered thermal comfort and security with the installation of 10mm SGG Securit heat soak toughened SKN 174 II glass paired with 21.5mm SGG Stadip Securit heat soak toughened inner panes, with a silicon seal creating the units’ 16mm cavity. The system also accommodated bespoke storey-height anodised insulated cladding panels, with perforated sinusoidal rainscreen, to meet the architectural concept.

For Aperture’s ground and lower floors, resilience and toughness were priorities for the glass specification. Glazing for these areas comprised outer panes of 8mm and 10mm COOL-LITE SKN176 II, heat soak toughened for extra strength and reduced breakability. This was paired with inner panes of 10.8mm SGG STADIP PROTECT, separated with a 90% filled argon gas cavity fitted with 16mm black warm edge spacers to reduce heat transfer.