We’ve been talking about our new pre-engineered architectural systems for several weeks now, and to be expected with anything that’s a game changer, I still get a lot of “say again … what’s THAT?”
They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so I snapped a few when traveling this week to downtown Chicago to visit the site of the installation of one these new systems – an engineered glass vestibule – at 800 West Fulton, a new office development in Chicago’s revived Fulton Market District.
Glass+Metal Craft designed and delivered the vestibule based on one of our pre-engineered OSTIUM™ designs. Our OSTIUM family has three “tiers” of designs: ranging from a simple, beautiful glass box with minimal hardware; to a vestibule featuring supporting glass fins and stainless hardware; to a system featuring a stainless steel cage, cladding, and a myriad of other hardware. Each is a modular, scalable design that can be installed “as is” or customized to fully meet the architect’s intent.
The advantage to the architect is that spec’ing one our OSTIUM designs saves time and cost that can be allocated elsewhere in the project – and still deliver a stunning result. The advantage to the glazier is that OSTIUM designs are proven, kitted for flow, and thus faster installs, checking a major box.
The 800 West Fulton vestibule is a great example of customizing a base design. We took our Tier Three OSTIUM product and adapted it to install halfway into the building, as the architect desired, rather than all inside or all outside of the façade.
Our Fulcrum Architectural Design Assist Division made all required engineering changes and delivered the vestibule with stamped drawings. Our Project Management Team guided the project through fabrication and was on call for on-demand support.
Further, through our strategic partnership with Guardian Glass, we were able to quickly and reliably source the low-iron laminated glass featured in the design – in this case, their excellent UltraClear® product. We believe having a strong working relationship with a local major glass producer is critical. If someone drops a load of glass (and we all know that can and has happened), there’s no waiting on a ship from China to replace it.
OSTIUM is just one of a family of pre-engineered architectural systems envisioned at G+MC, ranging from a family of canopies and structural walls, to guardrails and windscreens, and more.
We look forward to updating you, here, on all of them!
