Located adjacent to Portomaso Business Tower 1, Malta’s tallest skyscraper, is a new development that was formerly occupied by the Portomaso Café, a single storey steel frame structure. With the appearance of a crystal ship with sails, the building has a non-sway steel frame structure that uses castellated beams to reduce the floor area.
The envelope of the building consists of a double glazed façade that is partially protected by balconies. The building envelope on the north side is completed by a ventilated façade using terracotta brick tiles.
For the glazed façade, the architect chose Guardian SunGuard® SNX 60, a triple silver coated solar control glass that offers even better colour consistency and enhanced internal reflections. The glass has a desirable, consistent, neutral, transparent appearance – regardless of the viewing angle. Internal coloured reflection is optimised, adding a much more neutral tone to the glass when viewed from the inside of the building. The glass lets in 60% of natural daylight combined with just 29% of the solar heat – one of the highest selectivity (ratio of light transmission to solar factor) products on the market.