Spaceport America

New Mexico Spaceport Authority Building

Located in Truth or Consequences, New Mexico and designed by Foster + Parners and the URS team, Spaceport America is the first private spaceport in the world. The building will house both the visitors and space tourists, as well as the spaceships themselves. The interiors for the project seek to capture the mystery and drama of outer space exploration, articulating the thrill of space for the first tourist into the outer atmosphere and space itself.

Zahner has been selected as the producer and installer of the outer Solanum™ Steel panels which will guide visitors into the building. The material is suited both in color and in performance for the New Mexico landscape surrounding the structure. The organic shape of the building rises out of the golden desert as a functional spaceport for the center of international space tourism.

Zahner was introduced to the team early on as a consulting partner to explore different artistic possibilities for both the interior and exterior. Several rooms have been designated for sterility, as clean rooms for the decompression of space tourists and astronauts. The spaces have been analyzed by Zahner for the installation of easily cleanable materials developed by Zahner.

The project is commissioned by the New Mexico Spaceport Authority (NMSA) and Virgin Galactic, the company forging the future of space travel for individual citizens. Designed to have minimal carbon impact and meeting many energy requirements, the project is designed to achieve the prestigious LEED Platinum accreditation.

The low-lying shape of the spaceport will exploit the thermal mass, buffering the building from extreme heat and colds common in the New Mexico landscape, as well as catching the westerly winds for ventilation. Natural light enters via skylights, and the glazed east wall provides a platform for viewing the runway.

The renderings above and the construction photos below give a glimpse into the future of this stunning project. The metal surface of the vertical planes will be clad and constructed using Solanum™ Pre-weathered steel, pictured below during fabrication.

The pre-weathering process for this material is a seven step proprietary process developed to reduce and prevent the steel material from rusting onto adjacent surfaces.

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