The Shingle Façade system developed by Daniel Marshall, Founder of Re-Assembly Ltd, takes mismeasured and irregular scrap glass units, re-organizing them through computational matching algorithms into new high performing façade assemblies. The project was initiated within the MIT Department of Architecture, as a thesis by Daniel Marshall in 2019. The Unmaking Architecture proposal for a demolition and re-use materials management tool received a Holcim Awards Next Generation prize in 2020 and has spun out into one-to-one prototyping through support from the Holcim Foundation Research in Practice Grant for 2021-23.

A common misconception is that glass from buildings is easy to recycle. Due to concerns with impurities causing breakage, architectural float glass is seldom recycled, and nearly all glass used in construction is made from melting virgin sand rather than tapping into abundant recycling waste streams. As architects try to reduce carbon emissions during construction, they need to give more attention to recycling glass, so argue Daniel Marshall and Sheila Kennedy in their recently published paper – A Shingled Glass Envelope System Constructed from Reclaimed Insulated Glass – in the Journal of Physics: Conference Series.

The contemporary glass façade industry predominantly relies on manufacturing insulated glazing units (IGUs) by melting virgin silica with sodium carbonate, contributing to environmental degradation through carbon emissions and riverbed mining. Due to technical challenges like nickel sulfide inclusions, purity concerns, and warranty risks, float glass manufacturers do not permit scrap glass from urban recycling into their float lines. Architectural glass contributes as much as 0.5% of global carbon emissions [1].

The overlapping Shingle Façade allows units of irregular sizes to be slotted together. By re-using irregular sized glass from the waste stream, the Shingle Façade offers architects an option to specify a glazed curtainwall with around 75% less embodied carbon compared to an industry-standard curtainwall system while offering better or equal performance, and unique aesthetic qualities. The Shingle Façade system has been developed with a full suite of computational processes, shop drawings, thermal and structural engineering, air and water tightness tests, embodied carbon comparisons, artistic renderings, and visual mock-ups: everything needed to persuade architects to specify recycled glass over new glass. The system has been designed to perform better or equal to contemporary curtainwalls regarding air infiltration, thermal conductivity, and cost.

Glass for the prototype was collected for free from glazing shops in Lewes, East Sussex, United Kingdom. The glass facade industry produces “mismeasure” units from orders gone wrong. These units are expensive to dispose of, yet effectively new, with a valid warranty and sealant/argon gas intact, providing clients peace of mind. The performance mock-ups have been carefully tested and developed at a 1:1 scale as a proof of concept using these irregular-sized units.

This Shingle Façade proof of concept inspires architects to explore alternative methods of reclaiming glass and represents one of the first recycled/reclaimed assemblies targeted at replacing glazed curtainwalls. 

References

Arup Group Limited (2022) “Carbon footprint of façades: significance of glass”

Further information

Daniel Marshall, Director, Re-Assembly Ltd

daniel@re-assembly.com

https://re-assembly.com/