18
Vision Magazine
What about design efficiency?
Planning a comprehensive animal welfare centre is
complex; its functions include administration areas
for both permanent staff and the large body of
volunteer workers, animal day care, shelter, clinics,
training and retail. That meant we had to weigh up
such matters as the degree of privacy required, floor
area, spatial relationship and so on while always
working to a fairly lean budget. In terms of design
efficiency the main street elevation faces south and
this allowed us to be fairly open in our expression to
the street and passing traffic.
Do you have a design highlight?
Part of the brief is to consider the celebratory process
of pet acquisition or happy reunion with a pet in care, but
there’s also the tremendously sad part of loss and death.
Designing for that range of emotions was a challenge
and constraint to deal with the multiple streams of
people and emotions that are so much a part of such
a place. Hopefully we’ve achieved that appropriate
balance that not only functions well, but feels right.
You’re glazing program really seems to reflect that
interplay between celebration and need for privacy.
Yes it does. The glazing at the main entry sweeps
down as a diagonal and meets the floor at the clinic
waiting area and opens up in the more public area.
If there’s a big section of glazing, then that’s where
you want the views and it’s a public area. In other
areas such as the clinic it’s quite constrained.
Were there serendipitous moments during the process
that informed the result, or led to the solution?
With a building of this sort of complexity you don’t
think ‘oh, this should resemble a kidney bean’. We were
very open to opportunities; for example, nowhere
in the brief were we asked to design a cat colony that
faces onto the staircase. Its location results from
the construction staging and functional planning. We
ended up glazing it and this became the adoption space
for the more robust and gregarious cats to be put on
show. As it turns out it has become one of the RSPCA’s
favourite spaces.
What feedback have you received, if not from pets,
then their owners and staff?
Well interestingly we can extrapolate how the
animals feel about the place. The dogs are much
quieter now than in their previous accommodation
and that’s a very good sign. It’s certainly way less
smelly and that makes a difference because dogs,
cats and small animals don’t want the odour of other
stressed animals. The adoption rate has also gone
up significantly because the animals are indoors and
better showcased in that climate-controlled airspace.
What about the upper levels of glazing?
At the higher level of the administration buildings,
EVantageTM SuperBlue glass is used less for
transparency than as branding gesture. It also provides
a degree of privacy. In the dog adoption and dog day
care areas below the administration area EVantage
Grey is used mainly for thermal performance. We could
have used clear glass, but it can be confronting for the
dogs when visitors continually tap on the glass. People
can still see what’s going on, but it’s slightly obscured
for pet welfare. Of an evening, passing traffic get good
views of animal training or exhibitions. In the foyer
area the big geometric window and display cases have
high transparency showcasing retail and campaign
displays, in sensitive areas – the clinic for instance
is potentially sensitive – translucent glazing ensures
natural light and privacy.
Any other assistance from Viridian?
There was quite a bit of research and discussion
about how we could precisely match glass colour.
Getting samples on site for our various colours and
transparencies was invaluable.
What was the most rewarding aspect of using glass
on such a project?
We layered it just like clothing for comfort and specific
needs. There’s no doubt Viridian’s SuperBlueTM is a
key here and being present to watch its installation
was tremendously satisfying. The day it went in we
just knew immediately how perfect it was for this
application. We had confidence that it would work
well and we weren’t disappointed. It really produces a
seamless link for the whole RSPCA brand.