This architectural award-winning, 45,600 m2 facility is designed for a life-span of approximately 500 years. This is not a simple storage facility; it is a highly-technical structure containing controlled static environments in the form of preservation, communication, video, film, processing, EDP, optronic and audio laboratories. These research and testing facilities are housed within a fourth floor “village” of 24 separate buildings overlying a three-level cast-in-place concrete structure of 48 climatic-controlled vaults. The concept is a building within a building to provide protection from outside contaminants. All building materials used within the archives have zero VOCs (vapours of contamination).
The outer building consists of composite roof and wall systems including a 70'-high structural glazed aluminum curtainwall supported by clear-coated structural steel bow trusses and an entire stainless steel superstructure enveloping the inner concrete archival vaults. The inner concrete vaults contain state-of-the art mobile shelving and security systems. The main mechanical and electrical systems are in a separate building outside the archive's thermally-neutral environment, allowing for maintenance and renovations to systems without contamination of the laboratories or vaults.
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