Pilkington Planar™ Provides Hawk-Eye View

The project included the replacement of the Pavilion Stand, central offices, as well as the conference, banqueting and media facilities.

A highlight of the project is the Pilkington Planar™ encased Media Centre, offering uninterrupted views of the whole stadium, with magnificent panoramic vistas of the Birmingham skyline thanks to a two storey glass fronted construction. The Media Centre was first used in the npower Test Match between England and India in August and received glowing praise from more than 150 journalists from around the world.

The £32 million redevelopment of Edgbaston has increased the capacity at the world-famous stadium to more than 25,000, making it the second biggest cricket venue in the UK. Its new Pavilion Stand has enhanced facilities for players and spectators, with new changing rooms, bars and restaurants and new corporate hospitality and events space, which is one of the best conference and banqueting facilities in the Midlands.

Andrew Stapleton, from installers Apic UK Limited said, “The flush glass surface provided by the structural glazing system of Pilkington Planar™ enabled us to easily install the glass on the main façade of the site where space was particularly tight.” Pilkington Planar™ was the perfect structural solution, allowing for a bold and historically sympathetic design to be applied.

It is qualities such as these which ensure that Pilkington Planar™ remains world market leader in the cutting edge market of bolted glass systems. The Pilkington Planar™ structural glazing system provides a flush glass surface by utilising stainless steel fittings housed in countersunk holes to fix the glass façade back to the structure instead of using the more conventional framed systems. The result is a fully engineered system with the minimum amount of support structure and the maximum possible visual clarity. A silicone seal between adjacent panels provides weatherproofing.

Pilkington Plyglass also supplied the conventional Insulating Glass Units to the curtain walling and windows, also supplied and installed by Apic.

For more information visit www.pilkington.co.uk/planar