Completion of innovative roof and facade contract for the Dolce Vita Tejo shopping mall in Lisbon, Portugal.
Tuesday, 12 May 2009 12:16
Hightex is pleased to announce that, together with its consortium partner Martifer Group (the Portuguese steel construction company), their work to provide the entire steel structure, ETFE cushion roof and facade for the Dolce Vita Tejo shopping mall situated in Lisbon, Portugal for Chamartín Imobiliária in partnership with ING Real Estate, has been successfully completed.
The Dolce Vita Tejo shopping mall in Lisbon, Portugal, one of the largest shopping malls in Europe, opened its doors to the public on 7 May 2009. Totaling 122,000 square metres of gross rentable area, this is the largest shopping mall in Portugal and one of the largest in Europe. Hightex designed, fabricated and installed 346 cushion elements with an average size of 10 x 10 metres. There are several cushion types with multiple layers and various combinations of transparent and opaque foil. In addition, 108 facade cushions were installed. In total more than 200,000 square metres of different ETFE membranes were produced in order to execute this outstanding project.
The total contract value was approximately EUR 9.5 million, an increase of approximately EUR 1.0 million above the original contract value (announced in May 2008). Approximately EUR 2.7 million arose in 2009, with the balance in 2008.
The Dolce Vita Tejo shopping mall is the first in the world to use a new and innovative ETFE roof design. The benefits of ETFE cushions are finding an increasing range of applications in modern building design. The design used for Dolce Vita allows ETFE to compete with glass in thermal performance, through the use of high performance Selective Filters and Low-Emissivity ("Low-E") coatings applied to the cushion system. Emissivity is a measure of how much a glass or other surfaces transfers radiant heat.
The Selective Filter is a coating which represents a pioneering use of the ETFE membrane: it allows light but restricts the amount of heat entering a building. The second feature, a Low-E coating, serves to prevent the roof, when it gets hot, radiating heat into the building. The benefits of both coatings reduce significantly the energy costs of cooling the structure.
Using the cushion roof forming "windows" within their three dimensional form, whilst at the same time rejecting or filtering light and energy using selective filters and Low-E coatings, the design is a 21st century innovative illustration of the "northern light" principle, allowing light mainly to enter the building from the north thus eliminating unwanted direct heat build-up and glare.In this way the design achieves a feeling within the building of being outside, but at much more comfortable temperatures.