This book features the design details of the largest and most innovative examples from such cutting-edge firms as Archi-Tectonics, ARO, Escher GuneWardena, and Office dA, among others. Its pages offer ...
The undulating waves of the porte-cochère are the first hint that this isn’t just one more sand-and-stone desert resort.
By Mary Scoviak
Shrinking budgets have changed hotels’ sense of arrival. Now, the design story starts at the front door. For the 224-room W Scottsdale, architect Hornberger + Worstell (H+W) used the porte-cochère as a dramatic visual introduction to the hotel’s undersea garden theme.
Shimmering blue waves crafted from solid core aluminum ripple down the overhead canopy, dispelling any thoughts about arid deserts. Columns wrapped with a kelp-like pattern frame the entrance. Instead of the harsh sun, daylight filters into the arrival area through circular spy-glass portholes set into the pool deck. At night, color-changing LEDs pour a wash of color into the pool and through the portals.
“The large, below-deck porte-cochère could have been a dark, uninviting cavern. Our goal was to bring filtered natural and LED light into the deep recesses of the porte- cochère, which is located beneath the pool. We set out to transform this into an undersea playground with portholes, water, waves, light and reflections,” says Christian Low, principal in charge, H+W, San Francisco.
To get the effect, H+W turned to the metal fabrication firm Móz Designs, Oakland, Calif., to create overlapping metal panels to simulate wave patterns. There were a range of challenges, especially since the wave panels were fabricated 1,000 miles from the site, says Tripp Sandford, vp, Móz Designs. Not only were there critical intersections in the ceiling between the panels and column supports, but the overhead panels had to connect to the subsequent panels in the series and still be part of a system that would be flexible enough for adjustments on site.
The one-of-a-kind wave ceiling was installed on a prefabricated suspended framework. Móz provided the track system with pre-indexed brackets for the suspension elements so that the panels could be affixed to them, explains Ernie Ngo, project designer at Móz. A series of brackets and cables were attached to the deck to “float” the metal waves.
To keep the hardware from becoming too visible, the team used steel angle hangars set back from the edges to connect the panels to the frame. Each acrylic light portal is clad with the same Champagne-toned iridescent Kelp pattern that gives a sculptural look to the support columns of the porte-cochère and the pool area. Powder-actuated fasteners shot into the concrete anchored the framework to the ceiling/pool deck.
H+W carried the “fanta-sea” theme throughout the hotel. A glass floor area on the second level pool deck looksdown into the Living Room (W-speak for lobby), where daylight illuminates a curving channel glass wall. “Guests looking up through the portals in the porte-cochère or through the Living Room’s glass planks can see the sky, people in the pool and the dramatic angles of the guestroom wings of the buildings above,” says Sam Pedapenki, project technical coordinator for H+W. Adds Low, “What the guest sees as soon as he or she gets out of the car or the taxi has to be inviting, intriguing and connective. It should make him or her look up, look around and see what’s going on.”