’ALUPROF GIVES LIGHT
TO HAYWARD GALLERY’
Since opening in Summer 1968, the Hayward Gallery has earned its
title as one of the worlds leading contemporary art galleries. Closed
in September 2015 and open again in January 2018, the Gallery
underwent an extensive two year refurbishment programme. In
May 2019 the refurbishment won the prestigious RIBA London
Award Awards and RIBA the National Award 2019.
The main focus of the refurbishment was the replacement of
sixty-six glass pyramid rooflights which were re-engineered to
let controlled natural lighting into the upper galleries for the first
time. The refurbishment was made possible by a grant from Arts
Council England, the Heritage Lottery Fund, trusts and foundations,
and Southbank Centre friends supporting the ‘Let The Light In
fundraising campaign.’
For the new pyramid construction the architects chose to use
aluminium profiles from Aluprof’s MB-SR50 Curtain Wall system.
The four sided pyramids are glazed on two sides with laminated
low-iron glass and to maintain weathering the square base of
the pyramid rooflight, utilised an additional 5° slopped, low-iron,
double glazed unit. The two glazed sides of the pyramid offer sun
shading to the lower, 5° sloped glazing whilst still allowing a view
of the sky from below through the two open sides of the pyramid.
The sixty-six new pyramid rooflights replace the original,
problematic, heavily leaded, single glazed Georgian glass units.
Early in the buildings life these dysfunctional original units had
been blocked out, now, with the support of Aluprof, the building
retains not only its original design intent but offers high levels of
thermal efficiency thanks to the introduction of double glazing and
high performance thermal breaks in the frames design.