News & Updates

The North American Copper Awards has recognized Zahner's copper metal-work for the Waipolu Gallery in Oahu, Hawaii. Waipolu Gallery and Studio in Hawaii

Zahner completed the New Academic Building at Cooper Union in New York City. See the time-lapse construction video at Videos & Downloads.

President and CEO Bill Zahner is featured in the August Issue of Wired Magazine, where he has now been dubbed, the "Alpha Geek" of Metal. Read Article

Alpha Geek Bill Zahner holding Metal Sheets

The NASCAR Hall of Fame project reached 1,000,000 man-hours without a "lost-time" accident milestone recently. In recognition for Zahner's achievement TBEKD presented a plaque to Zahner
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Bill Zahner named an Honorary Member of the American Institute of Architects.

Introducing the Hands of the Artist™ division, where Zahner engineers and craftsmen produce projects for artists.
Visit Zahner's Hands of the Artist website

ZIRA™

Create Wall Panel Designs with our ZIRA™ Visualizer

The ZIRA™ Visualizer enables artists and architects to automatically translate an image to metal, using an image of their choosing onto a metal surface of any size using any combination of selective embossing, cutting, or perforation of the metal. Any image, photograph, drawing, or pattern can be translated to the metal surface using with our ZIRA™ technology.

The resulting mosaic or pixelation pattern is not limited to any one kind of cutting or perforation process. Several projects, such as the Fairmont, below, or the de Young in San Francisco are produced using bumped textures as well as perforated holes cut into the metal.

How we transfer an image to metal wall panels

Our latest completed project using the ZIRA™ Visualization Process is the parking garage produced for the Fairmont Hotel in Vancouver BC. The metal surface of this project was mechanically bumped and perforated throughout via computer-controlled machinery, not unlike the de Young Museum in San Francisco.

The ZIRA™ Machinery is guided by engineered cad files that are generated using the architect's original drawing. James KM Cheng, the architect for the Fairmont, provided a photograph of the dense forest which surrounds Vancouver. Zahner Engineers took this photograph and run it through a series of filters and tests to produce the designs which would one day result in the custom-perforated, custom-bumped, custom-image that surfaces the Fairmont Hotel.

The photograph above was translated onto the surface of the building itself.

How the ZIRA™ Process Works

ZIRA™ stands for Zahner Interpretive Relational Algorithm. This patented process was developed to expedite complex custom perforations and selective embossing on projects of every size and scope.

The process begins when an architect or artist provides an image which is mapped and translated into bumps, dents, holes and shapes. This map is then digitally laid across the building or specific area of the building and imprinted on the panels. Finally the patterning is translated into machine language and produced in our shop. Once installed the patterning matches up perfectly - Patterns and images seamlessly continue from one panel to the next, edge to edge, and around corners and edges. We call this the pattern’s parametric relationship of individual elements to the whole surface.

ZIRA™ steps for a section of the de Young in San Francisco

The end result was that light appears as though filtered between the trees, as seen on the de Young project's page.

Projects using the ZIRA™ Visualizer

Zahner® has completed several projects using the ZIRA™ process, and it several more projects are in the works. This is painting with metal, so the possibilities are endless.

ZIRA™ pattern on Stainless Steel Lumenhaus

ZIRA™ pattern on Stainless Steel Lumenhaus