Buro Happold engineers an innovative, energy efficient design
Premier Inn’s newest Belfast hotel at the Four Corners site in Belfast’s Cathedral Quarter, has just officially opened its doors to the public following Minister Margaret Ritchie MLA’s official unveiling of public art on the exterior of the building last week. The project is part of an extensive regeneration programme that greatly enhances the local streetscape, and is a vibrant addition to the city.
The new hotel occupies the historic Four Corners site in Belfast’s Cathedral Quarter, an area that had been derelict for many years. At the junction of Rosemary Street, North Street, Donegall Street and Bridge Street, Four Corners is considered the birthplace of Belfast and appears in the first maps of the city dating from the 1600s; indeed at one time all milestones out of Belfast were measured from here.
Built in 1871 by Thomas Jackson, the facade of the Four Corners building has been maintained as part of the re-development which incorporates a 171-bedroom hotel, a 200 seater bar and restaurant, and a basement car park.
International multi-disciplinary engineering consultancy Buro Happold provided building services engineering, cost consultancy and lighting technology for the project, which involves the revitalisation of this four-storey rendered Victorian building and features original windows with raised surrounds, colonettes with Corinthian capitals, along with raised pilasters, quoins and keystones.
Buro Happold has revived this Victorian landmark with innovative but in-keeping design solutions to ensure optimum energy efficiency. This includes a constant pressure en suite extract system to ensure that extract ventilation only occurs in individual en suites when they are in use and additional features such as an impulse jet fan ventilation solution for the basement car park, and heat recovery hotel ventilation.
Barry Crozier, Buro Happold Associate and project leader, said: “It’s been a real pleasure to work on such an iconic Belfast building and bring it back to the 21st century. The Buro Happold team has delivered an excellent result, where old meets new and works together perfectly – a beautiful building exterior which houses state of the art, energy conscious services internally.”
Ends
Project team:
Client: Whitbread Plc
Architect: Colin Conn Architects
Services provided by Buro Happold: Building services engineering, cost consultancy and lighting technology
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Buro Happold is a multi-disciplinary international practice of consulting engineers established in 1976. We now employ over 1,700 staff in 21 offices worldwide and our aim is to produce high quality engineering design in concept, in detail and in execution, on time, to programme and delivering excellent value for money. Our distinctive culture and ethos is still based on the same principles of care, value and elegance that were established when the practice was founded.
We offer structural, building services, civil, infrastructure and façade engineering, as well as a broad range of specialist consultancy services including sustainability, ground and environmental engineering, fire and security design, health and safety management, inclusive and urban design, project management, and specialist CAD and computer simulation provision.