Windmill Farm receives RIBA Award

The Archive Centre at Windmill Hill Farm in Waddesdon has been recognised for its architectural excellence with an RIBA Award. This project has many outstanding features and one of the most prominent is the zinc rainscreen installed by PJB. The unusual angular shapes cut through the roof on the Office and Reading Room are one of the first details that strike you as you proceed down the driveway to the building. The construction of the roof and rainscreen threw up huge challenges for both PJB and our supplier but ultimately a building of great quality and integrity was delivered, and the architect’s vision was never compromised. The construction of the roof was unusual with a Rigidal standing seam roof installed on a structural plywood substrate, holding a galvanised steel carrier system, which in turn supports the zinc honeycomb rainscreen panels by PSP. Precision was key in achieving the architect’s concept, and due to the design of the layout and constraints in the materials there was no room for tolerance to be taken up on site. Therefore we produced CAD drawings of each individual panel and site operatives had to undertake very careful setting out of the carrier system to ensure the panels fit when they arrived on site. The pictures below show various stages of construction and a full project profile can be viewed in our project archive.