Facade of the Biocruces Institute
Facade of the Biocruces Institute. The BioCruces Institute received in 2018, within the framework of the presentation of the II Architecture Awards with eÑe, the Veteco-Asefave Award in the Best Façade category. The jury highlighted the coherence of the building's sober image with its research use, while also reflecting the avant-garde nature of the work being carried out there.
The new headquarters of the BioCruces Institute is a large building flexibility to be able to house laboratories and adapt to changes. The plot greatly conditioned the volumetric development of the building, being very limited in its perimeter, which led to focusing the strategies on the formalization of a curtain wall type facade, with an outer skin as a dense and uniform fabric to offer protection against direct sunlight while safeguarding sight lines to nearby buildings.
This sieve is reinforced by the use of silkscreened glass with white dot pattern that provides greater privacy inside without the need to use other additional systems. Only in certain more special areas, such as the access or rest areas, the envelope opens to offer its representative character. The white color of the profiles used forming a grid of vertical and horizontal slats in lacquered aluminium, reinforces the image of the whole contrasting with the environment. Inside, the argument line of the façade extends with white color spaces that provide light in the workplace.
For the facade Biocruces Institute in Bilbao has been used R70ST curtain wall system which allows the fixing of the large slats to the main structure through the open pit between the glasses, intended for shading and solar control of the building.
