A newly refurbished office block in London's Old Street, N1 will offer charitable and voluntary organisations the chance to work in controlled comfort following the installation of Mitsubishi Electric's City Multi air conditioning.

The five-floor building in East Road is owned and run by CAN Mezzanine, the award-winning, sustainable social enterprise, which specialises in providing high-quality, affordable serviced office space for third sector charity and voluntary organisations.

CAN Mezzanine has a deliberate policy of finding sites in prime locations, well serviced by local transport and rents space on a per desk basis to allow third sector bodies to work flexibly in professional space in the heart of the business community. The organisation deliberately tries to create a community space of social interest by housing like-minded organisations in the same building.

“All CAN Mezzanine buildings are finished to very high standards to provide exceptional levels of office support and accommodation to the charitable sector,” explained Gary Wells project manager of Wells Senior. “That meant providing a fully controllable air controlling system that will continue to work reliably for them as they fill the building.”

The new offices are due to open at the end of April and will become home to around 80 different organisations, utilising 480 desks throughout the basement, ground and first to third floors. Two full time CAN Mezzanine staff help provide the fully serviced offices.
The building's redevelopment was undertaken by Bradfield Wentworth with John Davies Interiors the main contractor involved in the internal refurbishment. JD Interiors brought in Coolair Equipment as air conditioning and ventilation specialists who were quick to recommend the Mitsubishi Electric City Multi system. This replaced a variety of different split systems installed around the site.

“We installed ten PURY-EP450SHM-A outdoor units to provide full heating and cooling throughout the building,” explained Neil Gibbard of Coolair Equipment (Midlands), who installed the air conditioning system. “These work together to transfer excess heating energy from areas that need cooling, such as data rooms and meeting rooms, to other parts of the building that require heating and this helps minimise the costs of the overall system.

“Using City Multi has allowed us to build flexibility into the scheme and gives CAN Mezzanine the complete control over the use of the air conditioning, the temperatures and operating times it runs.”

The ten outdoor condensers and an external gas fired air handling unit all had to be hoisted to the rooftop, and a dedicated lift was arranged at the weekend, when the area is a little quieter.

“Each floor has an average of fourteen indoor units serving the open plan areas and individual meeting rooms, with the whole system controlled by Mitsubishi Electric's unique G50 controller and TG2000,” added Neil Gibbard. “This gives the company the potential to monitor and control the building over the Internet both now and in the future.”