Figure 1 The new Tampa Museum of Art, officially opened in
February 2010, has a thick skin. More than 3,700, 0.125-in.-thick
aluminum panels are arranged in two layers on the building’s
sides. Photo © McNICHOLS Co.
Tampa’s newest
museum proves
perforated metal
can be more than
an accent piece
By Dan Davis, Editor-in-Chief
project to create a building that will showcase
major art collections is no small task for an architect. Coincidentally, it’s no small feat for the
material supplier and the metal fabricator involved in the
project either.
Stanley Saitowitz of Natoma Architects, San Francisco,
found himself in that position as he considered ways to
make the new Tampa Museum of Art in Florida stand out
as a piece of art in its own right, yet at the same time not
have it overshadow the art it would house. He also had to
deal with a need to keep the art above an 18-foot flood
line, because the $32.8 million museum sits on the banks
of the Hillsborough River, and a desire to protect precious
artwork by limiting the amount of daylight entering the
building.
“Part of the goal of a building like this is that it is
memorable,” Saitowitz said. “They are public and belong
to the city.”
Saitowitz found his answer with aluminum panels.
Lots of aluminum panels with lots of holes in them. Ac-
tually two layers of metal panels enveloping 96,000 square
feet of building surface (see Figure 1).
A
The double layer of perforated metal panels would
accomplish numerous objectives. It would reflect the
clouds, daylight, and water during the day and strategically
placed LED lights at night (see Figure 2). The durable
façade would diffuse the daylight, allowing in enough to
illuminate the interior, but keeping out direct light that
could prove to be harmful to the art. Finally, the panels
would make the building unique without upstaging its
collections and visiting exhibitions.
The design was perfect. To pull it off, the design, the
fabrication, and the installation of the panels would have
to be perfect as well.
Picking the Material
Saitowitz is a fan of using metal in his architectural designs. He frequently incorporates aluminum, COR-TEN®
steel, and even titanium into exterior cladding designs.
“All that type of product is pretty much in the vocabulary of our work,” he said.
Saitowitz met Scott McNichols, president of McNICHOLS Co., Tampa, Fla., at a community luncheon in early
2008 where the architect was speaking about his ideas for
the museum. Saitowitz and McNichols established a relationship, and from that point on, the project had a
hometown company involved in the creation of the
metal-skinned museum.
The project came at an opportune moment for McNICHOLS Co., being that the company was committing
to the architectural market in a larger way. It had just put
together a team of in-house architectural design consultants to help spread the word about the company’s
metal products. This project was not only important for
those who lived in the Tampa community, but also for
those looking to establish a reputation in the architectural community.
Initially the Tampa Museum of Art project began with
a look at expanded metal, but the undulating pattern of
the material would have proven too difficult to install in
a precise pattern. Brackets that had to be in specific
places may not have matched up with the open areas and
pitch of the undulating pattern, which would have impeded fastening, adding complexity and expense to the
installation process, according to Dave Brenneman, McNICHOLS’ vice president, sales.
Saitowitz decided that perforated holes in aluminum
could work just as well. A visit to M.G. McGrath in Maplewood, Minn., provided the opportunity to see the panels
in action.
At the fabricator’s facility, the architect and representatives from Tampa witnessed the metal skin on a mock-up wall. The roughly 15- by 15-foot wall can be spun
around and maneuvered to ensure that the metal is seen
at different angles and lighting conditions.
“We can apply just about anything to this mock-up
wall. It’s something that we’ve kind of adopted as part of
our standard practice to give everyone a real feel as to
how it would all come together and how the end result is
going to look, so that there are no surprises,” said metal
fabricator Mike McGrath, whose company also handled
installation for the project.
The visit resulted in a commitment to a natural finish
for the panels and to a layout that called for one layer of
panels to be positioned slightly off-center from the second layer of panels behind it. The clear anodized aluminum panels, 0.125 inch thick, had 3-in.-diameter holes
on 4-in. straight row centers. The plan called for installing
the top layer 5 in. in front of the second layer and offset
by half of a hole pattern, creating a pattern that reflected
light in different ways as a person’s vantage point changed
(see Figure 3).
Figure 2 LED lights embedded within the two layers of perforated panels can be programmed in such a way to create bright
illuminations in the night sky. In fact, digital light artist Leo Vil-lareal recently launched his Sky (Tampa) project, which coordinates a mixture of different colors, flashing and fading, shown
against the building’s southern exterior. Photo ©RWooldridge.
