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Der Commerzbank‐Tower in Düsseldorf gilt als eines der bedeutendsten Hochhäuser der frühen deutschen Nachkriegsmoderne im internationalen Stil. Insbesondere die aufgeständerte Rohbaukonstruktion wie auch die damaligen Innovationen in der Fassadentechnik waren gestaltprägend. Das denkmalgeschützte Hochhaus wurde von Gartner zwischen 1959 und 1962 errichtet und schon damals mit einer innovativen Aluminium‐Fassade ausgestattet. Die Fassadenelemente wurden zur Revitalisierung seit 2018 zunächst demontiert und nach Gundelfingen gebracht, auseinandergebaut, gereinigt und wiederhergestellt. Nach der Remontage wurde das Sockelgeschoss mit einer Ganzglasfassade mit geklebten, 6 m langen Glasschwertern ergänzt. Die Konstruktion und Bemessung sowie die Versuche zur Erlangung einer Zustimmung im Einzelfall werden in diesem Beitrag erläutert. Revitalization of the Facade of the Commerzbank Tower in Düsseldorf. The Commerzbank Tower in Düsseldorf is one of the most important high‐rise buildings of the early post‐war modernism in the international style. The design has been particularly influenced by the elevated shell construction and the innovations in facade technology at the time. The listed high‐rise building was built by Gartner between 1959 and 1962 and features an innovative aluminum facade. The facade units were first dismantled in Düsseldorf and carried to Gundelfingen to be disassembled, cleaned and revitalized. After remounting the elements on site, the base floor was completed by a slender all‐glass facade with 6 m long glass fins. The design as well as the testing for an individual approval are explained in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Square One Shopping Centre is owned by Oxford Properties in Toronto, Canada, and was designed by MMC International Architects Ltd. The shopping centre went through a recent expansion and features a large glass and steel rotunda for its feature entrance into the new expansion. The feature glass wall is oval in plan and is 18m tall utilizing a custom splicing detail to minimize the use of steel at the connections. The fin wall was analysed and tested to ensure the connection detail behaved as predicted. This paper will visit the design of the fin wall and review the findings of the physical testing performed on the connection detail.

On the occasion of the 45th anniversary of the foundation of the United Arab Emirates, a unique landmark museum about the nation's history was built. The main feature of the building is its inclined glass fin façade with fins spanning up to 13 m. The whole façade forms a coupled system transferring small portions of the in‐plane loads from one pane to another and finally down into the steel ramps and the last special glass panel. The total work time for design, fabrication and installation was ten months for the whole building. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Kragträger aus Verbundsicherheitsglas, wie sie bei transparenten Fassaden in der Form von hängenden Glasfinnen eingesetzt werden, sind aufgrund ihrer Schlankheit, der produktionsspezifischen Imperfektionen und der auftretenden Belastungen kippgefährdet. Numerische und analytische Modelle, die für das Stabilitätsverhalten von Einfeldträger aus Glas bereits in der Fachliteratur vorhanden sind, werden für Kragträger untersucht und erweitert. Zusätzlich wird, ausgehend von praxisüblichen konstruktiven Ausführungen, der Einfluss der Einspannung unter Berücksichtigung weicher Zwischenschichtmaterialien wie Thermoplasten oder Kunstharzmörtel analysiert. Stability behaviour of cantilevered beams made of laminated safety glass. Cantilevered beams made of laminated safety glass, as they are used for transparent facades in the form of suspended glass fins, are susceptible to lateral torsional buckling due to their slenderness, imperfections caused by production and the occurring loading. Numerical and analytical models, which already exist for the buckling behaviour of single-span beams made of glass, are analysed and extended for cantilevered beams. Additionally, the influence of the clamped support, by considering the softer intermediate materials like thermoplastics or resin-based grouts, is investigated based on connection details from practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The remodelling of the entrance of St. David’s Hall in Cardiff features an array of translucent and partially pigmented structural glass fins with artistic lighting. The fins are composed of 2 x 10 mm toughened glass incorporating a red screen frit and acid etching. The fins are 300 mm deep and up to 5 m long, supported by a stainless steel shoe bracket at the bottom and a fork bracket in the upper zone of the fin. Only by using a stiff Ionoplast interlayer the fins could be designed to suit the load bearing capacity of the existing structure. The robustness and safety of the design was demonstrated by a series of impact tests.