Surface Design Awards – Complete

• EXTERIOR SURFACE OF THE YEAR - NEW
  This is a new category that recognises wall and surface design products including decorative, creative and inventive surfaces for the exterior of building including both commercial and residential properties.
• PUBLIC BUILDING - EXTERIOR
  Public Buildings used by the public for any purpose, such as assembly, education, entertainment, government, healthcare, transport or worship. This will also include civic centres, community centres, libraries, visitor centres, culture, health + wellbeing, faith, education, sports venues and stadia, transport, central + local government, entertainment and event venues.

• LANDSCAPE + PUBLIC REALM
  The space around, between and within buildings that is publicly accessible, including streets, squares, parks and open spaces. These areas and settings support or facilitate public life and social interaction.

This project was taken on as a turnkey design, manufacture and installation service. The sub structure for the rails was insulated panels by others. The fixing system used was a proprietary "NES Secret Fix System - PPSF02". There was the concern that the maintenance of the LEDs would be a challenge with such large panels in front of them. To solve this NESA designed bespoke locking brackets that allow the panels to be removed 300mm from the wall while still mechanically fixed to the rails. For maintenance, the louvres may be removed in lengths. These have the LEDs mounted to them, for ease and speed.
The LEDs feature elliptical lenses 5 x 50 degrees. They are mounted in vertical lines with louvres to stop the light bleeding through the holes from blinding people. The light bounces off the supporting panel and then is visible through the holes. The white of the supporting walls helps diffuse the light and provide good reflective qualities.
Lighting the cavity rather than lighting a translucent diffuser such as acrylic or glass makes the system easier to keep clean and more sustainable due to the reduced material usage.
During the day the graphical perforation looks black. During the night it looks bright white. There is a Dali light control system to ensure the LEDs are off in the day, bright as dusk and dim off later into the evening. This is due to the relative brightness in a residential area.
Overall value of the project - £521,000.00
Completion: January 2021.
Scope 550 sq. m of perforated and back lit cladding.

The rain screen cladding was 3mm powder coated aluminium. This has been perforated, folded and polyester powder coated.
The LEDs feature an Osram chip. They are individually potted in an IP65 cast enclosure. This ensures any failure would be limited to one LED, also the lifetime (50,000 hours) is not dependant on secondary water or weather proofing.
The transformers are Meanwell RPS600. The control system is a LTech Dali decoder. The Dali system feeds back to the central building light management system. This is linked into the Lumens sensor input.
This should be considered a Surface Design Award entry due to the interaction of these products as a cohesive system.
This impact of this Section 106 building in the heart of the Southmere residential development is considerable. It is also visible from one of the main arterial roads into South East London. This makes it a land mark development. The way the architects visual intent or graphic has been transposed from lines to dots for the media is important. Also, the mechanics of how the day and night views have been combined to invert the way this art work is seen. - Black on white to white on black.

Aluminium is 100% recyclable. The LED are long life. The control system provides up to 20 year expected lifetime.

Cleaning of the panels without removing the 4+meter tall sheets.
Maintenance of the LEDs without removing the panels. The solution to both of these was the novel bracketry system described above.
There was interference between the PWM resistors in the 12 volts LEDs are the Dali control system. We had to switch out a combined Transformer and controller for the above detailed components.
There are ribs or stiffeners in the backs of the panels. This keeps the perforated cladding flat over 1200 sheet width. These needed to be integrated into the pattern to ensure they did not block or disrupt the pattern.

The entire client team were thrilled:
Peabody Estates
Durkan Ltd
Bisset Adams Architects
The local community are actively using the library and there is considerable positive feedback.