The new Perth Library is the first major civic building to be constructed in the Western Australian capital since the city’s Concert Hall was built nearly 45 years ago. Part of the redeveloped Cathedral Square precinct, the library’s cylindrical form is as architecturally stunning as it is functional.
Positioned alongside some of the city’s oldest and most treasured heritage buildings, the new Perth library was designed by local architectural from Kerry Hill Architects. The project forms part of the broader redevelopment of the Cathedral Square precinct.
Bound by St George’s Terrace, Barrack Street, Hay Street and Pier Street, the precinct forms one of Perth’s central CBD blocks. It also includes the historic State Buildings, Perth Town Hall, St George’s Cathedral, The Deanery, the State Administrative Tribunal building, and the David Malcolm Justice Centre.
The redevelopment of Cathedral Square was conducted as a joint venture between the Western Australia state government, the City of Perth, the Public Trustee, FJM Property, Mirvac, and the Perth Anglican Diocese.
After being selected from a highly competitive field in 2011, Kerry Hill Architects’ re-imagining of the heritage-listed site “has returned the soul of the city to its people after decades of disuse”.
The State Buildings – which had remained empty for more than two decades – have been converted into a vibrant hub that includes boutique hotel, hospitality, wellness and retail offerings.
Part of the old Law Chambers building, as well as the Playhouse Theatre, were demolished to open up the eastern side of the cathedral for the first time in decades. In their place, an open, interactive public plaza has been created. The new Perth Library is its centrepiece.
According to Kerry Hill Architects, the Perth Library building is “independent of, but in repose with, the geometry and style” of the new and heritage buildings that surround it at Cathedral Square.
“The City of Perth Library’s cylindrical form allows an architectural reading as a discrete object – a new contribution to the surrounding urban milieu,” says the architect.
The building’s upper profile is defined by a “diagonal truncation” designed to allow the winter sun to enter the newly created Cathedral Square, while giving the building appropriate scale against the neighbouring heritage buildings.
The façade features glass panels and stone fins that allow natural light to penetrate the building. At ground level this façade “peels away to reveal a transparent entry foyer visually connected to the street and Cathedral Square.”
Covering 3,500m² across seven levels, the library features a 90-seat auditorium, bookable rooms, function spaces, a café, outdoor terrace and zones for young adults and families.
An internal public staircase wraps around the building’s perimeter between the façade and the main collection floors.
At the core of the building is the triple-storey reading room on Level One. This screened space receives filtered sunlight across the collection floor galleries.
The children’s collection occupies one of the building’s upper levels, and is arranged around a double-height winter garden. At its centre is a single tree – “The Tree of Knowledge” – which refers to the idealised origins of storytelling.
This level also opens onto a terrace, affording visitors views of Cathedral Square below and beyond.
The library’s interior is finished with warm timbers. The ceiling features a visual, local retelling of Shakespeare’s play The Tempest by renowned Western Australian artist Andrew Nicholls.
The library also overlooks Perth’s largest living green wall installed on the adjacent State Administrative Tribunal building.
Building services are discreetly hidden within the library’s architectural elements. These include a perforated metal pan ceiling, which acts as an invisible HVAC solution through which air diffusion is achieved.
The library’s mechanical services and ESD design was completed by Wood & Grieve Engineers.
According to WGE mechanical project engineer Alex Deluca the project’s bold aim was to deliver an outstanding library building and plaza space that were both functional and successful in their own right. Both space and library had to sit comfortably within the Cathedral Square precinct.
Part of the overall aim was also to showcase best practice in library design and operation. This meant offering high levels of amenity for building users, and incorporating the use of sustainability principles to “maximise efficiency opportunities as well as overall holistic sustainability performance”.
To this end, the innovative high-efficiency façade was designed to maximise thermal comfort, energy efficiency and natural daylight performance.
Furthermore, the use of high-efficiency lighting, control and bespoke air conditioning design led to a 35 per cent reduction in energy consumption when compared to benchmark buildings.
“As part of the design investigation process, WGE reviewed recent library projects in the Perth metropolitan region, along with projects that implemented underfloor air distribution systems,” says Deluca.
“The building’s theoretical energy consumption was then determined via a software package that provided advanced dynamic thermal simulation at sub-hourly time steps for higher accuracy compared with conventional heat-load modelling software. The energy consumption was then compared to conventional ceiling diffuser air distribution.”
The need for a compact floor-to-floor HVAC solution, combined with the project’s sustainability targets, led to WGE implementing an underfloor air distribution (UFAD) system for the Perth Library’s larger collection floor plates on Levels Two and Three.
The UFAD system was selected because of its ability to deliver conditioned air directly to the occupied zone, resulting in greater user comfort.
Deluca says that the UFAD system, coupled with high-induction diffusion, resulted in rapid uniform integration of conditioned air into the space, and improved space conditions.
“The high induction also allows lower supply-air temperatures in cooling mode,” he says, “which in turn allows for lower supply-air flow rates translating into lower supply-air temperatures.”
Relief air and return air from the space is drawn at ceiling level. This further reduces supply-air flow rates by transferring the upper portion of the room load from the supply air to the return air.
“The combination of the above initiatives, combined with the UFAD system, resulted in a significant overall reduction in HVAC power consumption for the areas where UFAD was implemented,” says Deluca.
As well as being energy-efficient, the UFAD system designed for the Perth Library provides for a higher indoor environmental quality (IEQ).
It achieves this by providing “clean” supply air directly to the occupied zone “in lieu of pushing the supply air through the high-level room air”, as is the case with conventional ceiling diffusion.
The Perth Library building is primarily served by a central plant consisting of a 700kWr helical screw air-cooled chiller and gas-fired heating hot water unit located in a central plant room on the building’s top floor.
This mezzanine level also accommodates the main air-handling plant room. This contains a multi-zone variable- air-volume (VAV) air-handling unit that serves the building’s upper three levels. Air distribution for these levels is via the ceiling void, which houses the VAV boxes and diffusion.
Levels Two and Three – featuring the largest floor plates in the library – house the general collection areas. They are served by a UFAD system consisting of three main VAV air-handling units located on Level Three.
The ground floor and Level One are served by a UFAD system consisting of two VAV air-handling units – one per functional space (i.e., entrance foyer and gallery area). The building’s function room on Level One is served by in-ceiling, four-pipe fan-coil units (FCUs).
Deluca says all HVAC systems include full, fresh-air economy modes. Additionally, the indoor courtyard on Level Four contains operable glazing on the façade and roof. This can be opened at the discretion of the users to enable natural ventilation.
The library’s circular architectural form, and resulting curved walls, created spatial challenges for the design of the building’s plant rooms. Detailed consideration of the plant arrangement was required to maximise the available floor area.
This meant accurate and well-prepared construction drawings were invaluable to the project’s mechanical services contractor, Centigrade.
One of the oldest air conditioning companies in Perth, Centigrade worked closely with WGE to convert the design documentation for construction purposes.
Centigrade managing director Chris Smith says there were several key challenges for his firm on the project. These included the building’s circular form, coordination with the raised floor provider to fit duct, and ensuring the builder, Doric, had made all underfloor partitions airtight to allow for zone control.
“Coordinating and fitting the underfloor duct into the complex support structure that held up the raised flooring was the most difficult challenge to overcome,” says Smith.
“Locating and coordinating the floor grilles, some of which were constant-flow and some motorised variable flow, was also challenging.”
The site’s central CBD location also required careful coordination of the delivery and lifting of equipment and duct with all relevant parties. These included Doric, other builders at adjacent sites under construction, and the City of Perth.
“The library project was, at the time of construction, surrounded on all sides by other sites also under construction,” says Smith. “Although there was some cooperation, obviously each party was more concerned with their own project outcome.”
Practical completion of the Perth Library was achieved in December 2015, after which Centigrade carried out preventative maintenance of the building’s HVAC systems for a 12-month period.
After completion of the defects liability period (DLP), Centigrade continued to maintain the building on an ad-hoc basis for a further 18 months at the request of the City of Perth.
Following the relocation of the library’s collection from temporary accommodation, the Perth Library officially opened to the public in March 2016.
Since opening, it has been well received by both the occupants and the public.
The project has also been recognised by winning the prestigious George Temple Poole Award, awarded to the most highly regarded building of the year, at the Australian Institute of Architects 2016 WA Architecture Awards. It also won the Jeffrey Howlett Award for Public Architecture.
At the 2016 Master Builders-Bankwest Excellence in Construction Awards, the library was also recognised as the Best Public Use Building over $10 million and the Best Building Fitout over $10 million.
The personnel:
The equipment:
WGE mechanical project engineer on the Perth Library project Alex Deluca shares some of the lessons learned about underfloor air distribution (UFAD).
Centigrade’s managing director Chris Smith shares some of the key lessons learned from the Perth Library project.
Along with the Perth Library, Cathedral Square is also home to Point Zero – a marker from which all distances to and from Perth is measured worldwide. The marker was first adopted in 1925, with the understated plaque marking the adoption laid in 1975.
Representing the centre point and heart of the city, the marker is located on the south-east corner of the Old Treasury Building at the corner of Cathedral Avenue and St Georges Terrace.
The building served as the original home of Western Australia’s first Post Office until 1923.
Construction of the Perth Library was conducted at the same time as the larger redevelopment of the Cathedral Square precinct.
Stakeholders of three concurrent developments held regular, high-level precinct design meetings to track and resolve design, documentation and construction issues relating to the project interfaces, including that of an existing multi-level basement carpark directly beneath the site of the Perth Library project.
“The new library project was one of three concurrent developments serviced by a common, basement carpark facility,” says Deluca.
“To this end, WGE worked closely with the library project consultant team, the City of Perth and the consultant teams working on the adjacent developments to manage the interface between these projects.”
For example, while the carpark and associated ventilation system were designed and constructed as part of one of the adjacent developments, the carpark’s exhaust discharges via a riser through the Perth Library. Additionally, a portion of the carpark makeup air is provided via the low-level façade of the library building.
The fire mode response for the library building’s HVAC systems is also tied into a precinct-wide, fire-mode response plan.
Article courtesy of the Australian Institute of Refrigeration, Air conditioning and Heating (AIRAH); first published in their newsletter Friday 6 April.
