Voodoo heliostats

Oh, the magic of the big architectural gesture!!! 

By far the most read of my blog posts are those about Nouvel's iconic carbuncle on the face of One Central Park, here in Sydney.  It is clear that there are a lot of people interested in that big and mysterious heliostat.

But what really amuses me is that it seems to have raised expectations more broadly.  Quite clearly, some people think that such technical gymnastics will also solve otherwise impossible architectural or urban design problems elsewhere.

Rational Gerhy, rational critics

The paper bag opens

With much brouhaha, in the presence of the celebrated architect, Sydney's one and only Frank Gehry building was opened  this last week. And the opening was accompanied by the same vehement, self-serving misinformation that has been dished up about it during its construction. It's the building that people love to hate, but they are too lazy to really think about.

Typical was the rant by Elizabeth Farrelly, Sydney's resident public intellectual architecture critic. Before I quote her, let me be quite clear: I am really pleased that Farrelly can survive by her writing, and she has every right to a fairly held opinion. I am even more pleased that Gehry's building prompts Sydney people to be interested in architecture, and to debate it. So what does Farrelly have to say?  First ad hominem, attack the man:

"Frank Gehry is the Kim Kardashian of contemporary architecture: all curves, no content."

Not only a heliostat

It is the piece of bling that keeps on giving. More than likely the heliostat and the very big green facade will continue to dominate the interest of architects in One Central Park, part of the inner Sydney redevelopment starring John Nouvel and Fosters, as well as a minor cast of local architectural firms. But as I was reminded by an article from John de Manincor, the story of how the development came to be what it is, is much more interesting than the technical details of bits of the building. This post is kind of a first-hand review of that article, so you should read it first here at ArchitectureAU.

Almost no description of the first four years of urban design guidelines, design quality competition, design development and community consultation and negotiations with the city authorities can capture the sheer attrition of trying to realise a large brownfields infill development, experienced by the original proponents of the scheme. 

Explaining Sydney's unique apartments

Many parts of the world, and more particularly many cities, can be recognized by their urban forms that are the result of historic periods of dense apartment developments at a grand scale.  Think Paris under the scalpel of Baron Haussman and the likes of the Pereire brothers, bankers and land developers.

Not only did these cities change as 'public living rooms', but the forces of culture and the speculative market also created characteristic apartments.  It isn't hard to describe from memory the 18th century apartments of Budapest, with their four meter ceilings and rambling en-filade rooms, nor to see the pervading influence of their type through the 19th century booms and even in post-WW2 modernist housing in that city.

The influence of ahistoricist  modern architecture, and the social project that so emphatically informed its earliest proponents, broke most of these traditions.  What replaced them is arguably something of an almost homogeneous trend in European apartment design.  That is not to say that modern European apartments are actually all the same, but there is a pervasive and recognizable emphasis on the formal solution of the apartment block, and the generally highly disciplined, spatially efficient, repetitive apartments those blocks embrace in their singular forms.

Sydney, in far-off Australia, stepped out of line with this trend at the beginning of its latest housing construction boom, impelled to produce a special body of apartment buildings under the influence of a unique regulatory instrument.  Of course, it is possible that it only seems like that to those of us parochially on the inside, but in my experience, it is remarked on by many architects who visit Sydney from the outside.  I am forever tempted to attempt an explanatory book, redolent with the sort of sun and surf images that would also make it a coffee table success.  But I rarely get around to more than a pamphlet, concentrating on my own special work as a consultant for solar access and natural ventilation analysis.

So it is doubly welcome to read a local building review, which escapes the usual cliched boundaries into a succinct explanation of the evolution of this local building type.  Doubly welcome, because it addresses itself to the emerging limitations, and subtly hints at an imminent convergence with contemporary European modernist influences.

The article is on ARCHITECTUREAU, which often doesn't tell you up front who is the author. As I was reading, I became progressively more curious just who it might be, and was not surprised that the piece is by my long-time colleague Tone Wheeler.  Tone can explain almost anything architectural by some well turned aphorisms, and almost anything he writes is well worth reading.

To read Tone Wheeler on 17 Gadigal Avenue, click here.

As usual, feedback would be welcome.   

The sky isn't falling, but I'm clueless

Just a quick update: the penthouse apartments in Jean Nouvel's apartment block, known as Central Park 1 in Sydney, have gone on sale this weekend, offered to buyers locally and marketed also in our increasingly affluent and outward looking Asian region.

But I am not a real estate agent, my interest continues to be the question of just what exactly will the much-vaunted heliostat do?  The image above is from the advertisement, and is just a bigger version of the same rendering I used in my previous post about the subject.

Up till very recently, try as I might, I couldn't find a single reference on-line or otherwise accessible to the average punter, that answers my original question: just how does the winter sun in the middle of the day actually get to the bits of the cantilevered frame, which then are supposed to reflect it down the shaded southern facade (remember, this is the southern hemisphere)?

That changed, slightly, when the company contracted to do the feasibility study and construct the heliostat, local firm Kennovations, released a single page promo/case study.  You still have to be a detective to even begin to figure out what is actually proposed.  Let me try to help, while we all wait with bated breath for the chance to see it in action.

Image: Kennovations

The image at the left is clearly from a 3D analysis of ray-traced reflections.  Not labeled for date or time of day, it doesn't by itself demonstrate a lot, except that such modelling has actually been done.  I wouldn't expect otherwise.

It turns out the consultants are Device Logic, who otherwise specialise in design, installation and commissioning of tracking systems for utility scale solar power plants.

Clue 1:  The rays shown, both directly from the sun, and arriving via the cantilevered frame, are directed at the rooftops of the podium, and of the 'West Building', not at the south face of the taller 'East Building'.

Clue 2:  All along, had we read it carefully, the description of project had said:

"The heliostat incorporates an innovative system of fixed and motorized mirrored panels designed to capture sunlight and redirect it into the retail atrium and onto the landscaped terraces."  

Why did we jump to the conclusion that it was supposed to be a Clayton's solar access in winter for the south facing apartments?

Because every other residential building approved in Sydney has to try to arrange such solar access to 70% of all apartments, under the local model code which gives effect to a State Environmental Planning Policy known as SEPP65.  My consultancy practice is almost entirely devoted to helping architects go through the gymnastics of achieving that compliance.

Now that you are in that frame of mind, you probably look at the renderings slightly differently.  I can't help wondering what the occupants of  the apartments on several floors under the cantilever will think of looking into its underside, and losing the light from the sky?  But look more carefully.

Image: Kennovations

Clue 3:  The cantilevered frame shown in the other images is protruding much more from the facade than the one in the top picture.  I wouldn't immediately jump to the conclusion that the 3D renders are cheating.  Mind you, it's either that, or the frame is motorised to protrude further at key times.  If the latter, I definitely wouldn't like to live under it.

Clue 4:  Now look more carefully at the technical description finally available in the Kennovations pamphlet.  It says:

"Kennovations is contracted to Watpac to Design and Construct  the 42 x 6.2sqm Sun Tracking Heliostats (on the rooftop), the 320 x 1.5sqm Reflector Panels (suspended beneath the main cantilever)."

Hold it!  What does that say? 42 big 6.2sqm heliostats on what rooftop?  Is that what those things are on the West Building roof?  If so, what are they lighting?  If not, why has noone mentioned them before?  Unfortunately, I have no clue that helps me out with answering those questions.

Image: Kennovations

So, now that you are thoroughly confused, but like me, keen to keep going with this game of Cluedo, try this one.

Clue 5:  Thenext image also comes from Kennovations.  It looks like a full scale mock-up of the reflectors.  Is it?  If so, where is it?  I'd love to see it.  Because looking at it, I am even more mystified how the heliostat will work.

In desperation, let's try my favourite trick of analysis.  I call it 'semantic opposites'.  In other words, if something just doesn't want to make sense, look at it the other way around.

Clue 6:  What if the things on top of the 'West Building' are reflectors pointing upwards? Watch architect Bertram Beissel wave his hands around about half-way through this video, produced by the Sydney Morning Herald on-line, then finally, you may find on the Kennovations Portfolio Projects page this well hidden linked graphic different from any previously available.

Now I only get anxious about looking down from my apartment onto an array of mirrors reflecting an optical image of the sun upwards.

I think I am getting close to solving the mystery.  But I think it might be best if I have the patience to  answer all those questions by seeing the real thing - relatively soon, if it's true that the new owners of the penthouses are  able to move in come June 2013.  Keep the fingers crossed that it hasn't all been a monumental con-trick.

For the clues, read:
Kennovations One Central Park Heliostats and Reflectors Case Study here.
Gizmag Cantilevered residential heliostat takes shape in Sydney linked here.

For anyone really interested, there are further technical snippets to be found here. The links include a short amateurish video of wind tunnel testing at CPP's huge boundary layer wind tunnel at St. Peters, Sydney.

EDIT:
Jeremiasz Sieczko has posted an excellent reworking of this attempt to unravel the mystery of the heliostat geometry.  It was too long for a comment, so I have posted it as an independent article length post at Clued in on the heliostat.