Products, Systems, and Services
Project Data
Project DescriptionExploratory Hall, completed in 2013, is the home to George Mason University’s College of Sciences on Fairfax Campus. The new science center features 164,050 square feet of new labs, classrooms, and study areas, and the design of the campus reveals an integrated environment that builds a science community for the university.
The custom stainless steel perforated façade is decorated with images of molecules to complement the building’s other nods to scientific references. Perkins + Will contacted us in the design development phase of the project and we met with them in their DC office to help with the detailing up front through a design assist approach. We worked with them on the imagery and perforation pattern, material selection, detailing and engineering, and were later contracted with Glass and Metals Inc. to provide installation assistance.
This project is an example of earlier iterations of our patented ImageWall® technology. Zahner engineers have since developed this system to be able to translate more detailed images, include cross-seam perforation capabilities, and explore more artistic variants of perforated metal designs.
Angel Hair® stainless steel was selected due to its reflectivity being lower than a mirror or 2B finish, but still offers some “life” to the surface. This finish was first developed as a custom product by Zahner as a solution to the reflective nature of standard finishes on stainless steel, and is regarded as the finest, smoothest, and most uniform light-diffusion metal surface available for architectural metal
Zahner also provided a fabricated zinc panel system, using Rheinzink’s preweathered zinc. This scope was added due to our vast experience with working with this material.
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