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Tuesday, April 3rd, 2012
Original concept for the King Abdullah Financial District Conference Center
We’ve done a lot of unusual projects over the years, but the KAFD Conference Center is probably the most exciting one we’ve come across. Located in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, the structure is covered with over 15,000sf of modular green roof, with nearly 10,000sf of living wall inside.
Tournesol Siteworks was invited to participate on the design team by HM White Site Architects, who are responsible for the breakthrough modular green roof design. The building, designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill in New York City, is the first major element in the new development slated to be the home of new banking and financial infrastructure in Saudi Arabia. The project will utilize a number of remarkable environmental construction technologies to reach an expected LEED Gold status.
KAFD Elevation
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Posted in Company News, Green Building Products, Green Wall, Public Projects | No Responses »
Tags: Custom, design services, Green Roof, International, Living Wall, Saudi Arabia
Monday, March 12th, 2012
Urban lightweight concrete planters at Park Place Retail in Irvine, CA
We recently provided lightweight GFRC concrete containers for Shops at Park Place in Irvine, CA. This retail project is part of the 3 million square foot Park Place mixed-use project, containing class-A office, residential and retail areas. The design, by LPA, Inc. (also of Irvine), was purchased dircectly by the owner (Madison Marquette) and installed by general contractor JM Stitt.
Note the custom tall planters behind the Urban Collection in front
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Posted in Container Irrigation Systems, Pots, Planters & Site Furnishings, Products, Retail | No Responses »
Tags: California, Custom, GFRC, Urban Collection, Wilshire Collection
Thursday, February 9th, 2012
Wilshire Collection planters at the Kravis Center, Claremont-McKenna College
There are more to some jobs than meets the eye. This is one of those.
When Diane Fazio of Land Images in Los Angeles called us about this project, the clock was already ticking. Because of structural problems, a reflecting pool slated to surround this Rafael Viñoly-designed lounge in the center of the new signature entrance to the university couldn’t be installed. Yet the opening of the building was only two weeks away! This building is a big deal, and the reflecting pool was a very obvious component of this building:
Kravis Center consists of the construction of a five-level, 162,000 square-foot academic and administrative facility and will serve as the western gateway to the Claremont McKenna campus. The overall project includes offices, classrooms, seminar rooms, an underground parking structure, and outdoor courtyards. (from the university’s website)
Diane wanted to know if we had enough material on hand to be able to provide them with planters to ring the area originally intended for the pool. That worked out to be nearly 330 linear feet of planters! Not only that, but could we finish it and deliver prior to the dedication in two weeks?
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Posted in Education, Pots, Planters & Site Furnishings, Products | No Responses »
Tags: California, Custom, FRP, Wilshire Collection
Friday, February 3rd, 2012
The Southwest Washington Medical Center Parking Structure, Vancouver, WA
Back in the Fall of 2005, we were just starting to hang planters off the side of buildings. We had recently acquired Flower Framers of Cincinnati, a manufacturer of window boxes and other hanging planters. That led to the insight that we could probably do the same type of product for larger commercial applications. The planters at the Southwest Washington Medical Center, installed in 2005, were one of our first attempts at the design and fabrication of large, custom hanging boxes. The photograph taken above, and most following, were taken by our sales manager John Denman during a visit to Vancouver, WA in December, 6 years after the product was installed.
Custom hanging planters, taken in the Fall of 2011
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Posted in Company News, Hanging Planters, Health Care, Parking Structures, Products | No Responses »
Tags: Custom, Hanging Planters, lessons learned, Revisit, Washington
Wednesday, December 7th, 2011
34th St. Planters, at Penn Station, NYC. Design by Ignacio Ciocchini
After the “Cities Alive” Green Roof and Wall conference in Philadelphia last week, Brian Mitalo and I went to NYC to visit several architects working on projects. At the end of the day, I found myself at Penn Station, waiting for the train out to JFK. It was a perfect chance to revisit product that we delivered nearly 10 years ago, and see how it’s holding up.
In 2002, we rotationally molded custom LLD polyethylene planters for the 34th St. partnership, a business improvement district in midtown Manhattan. We began working with their designer, Ignacio Ciocchini, as he was looking at various materials for the pots. He started the discussion assuming the pots would be made in FRP fiberglass. We convinced him that plastic could be done attractively, and be far more durable than the fiberglass.
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Posted in Pots, Planters & Site Furnishings, Products, Public Projects | No Responses »
Tags: Custom, LLDPE, New York, traffic
Monday, October 3rd, 2011
The Fixtures Living showroom in Costa Mesa, CA
We recently received several installation shots from our friends at Instant Jungle in Santa Ana. They worked with Kevin Evernham at Fitch, a leading retail architect in Scottsdale, AZ and Burke Construction on the showroom for Fixtures Living in Costa Mesa, CA. The people at Fitch describe the showroom best:
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Posted in Green Building Products, Green Wall, Products, Retail | No Responses »
Tags: California, Custom, Instant Jungle, Interior, TerraScreen
Monday, March 7th, 2011
Design for custom irrigation insert for Frontgate
It’s been some time since we’ve had a product other than our Flower Framer windowboxes sold in the retail arena. We were delighted to be approached by Frontgate (a division of Cinmar), who were looking for a container irrigation insert to sell along with an exclusive pot this year. They were able to fit our standard CWC-1300 and CWC-1600 irrigation inserts to several pots that they offer, but had something special in mind for their feature product this Spring. They wanted a custom size for a large, square woven planter.
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Posted in Company News, Container Irrigation Systems, Retail | No Responses »
Tags: catalog, container irrigation, Custom, Frontgate
Monday, May 24th, 2010
When landscape architect Melendrez Assocs. was working on the planters for this student housing project on the Univ. of Southern California campus in Los Angeles, they had originally envisioned 24′ long, galvanized steel troughs. While that may have seemed like an inexpensive solution, the custom fabricating cost, durability, and long-term maintenance made the planters relatively expensive.
Tournesol Siteworks was brought in to look at the job, and was able to provide a lower-cost, more reliable solution by creating custom fiberglass planters with an “unbuffed” aluminum finish. It looks and feels like metal, but doesn’t have the shine of the finished aluminum product. More pictures after the break…
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Posted in Education, Parking Structures, Pots, Planters & Site Furnishings, Public Projects | No Responses »
Tags: California, Custom, VertiGreen, Wilshire
Tuesday, May 18th, 2010
Corner-mounted TerraScreen interior living wall
A small residential installation of a TerraScreen interior living wall illustrates the flexibility of the system into nearly any application. This unit, a TW-7049 panel, was cut in two and wrapped a corner of the dining room of this home. Pictures of how it was done after the break…
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Posted in Green Building Products, Green Wall, High-End Residential | No Responses »
Tags: California, Custom, Living Wall, residential, TerraScreen
Thursday, May 13th, 2010
I wanted to feature this installation because it showcases the durability of the FRP material in demanding circumstances. A few posts ago (Hyatt Regency Gainey Ranch) I repeated something I’d heard from a local contractor in Phoenix (and I paraphrase) – “after one year outside in Phoenix, most fiberglass containers are toast”. These pots were installed in Dec. ’07, and these images were taken in April ’10. The “AAA-five diamond” Fairmont Hotel in Scottsdale, AZ isn’t exactly a low-traffic installation, and the pots are still looking great. It’s a direct result of the way we manufacture our fiberglass. We use 2-3x more fiberglass than most manufacturers and won’t ever “cut” our product with fillers that add to the weight without adding strength. More images after the break…
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Posted in Hospitality, Pots, Planters & Site Furnishings | 1 Response »
Tags: Arizona, Custom, Quality, Trash Can, Wilshire Collection
