Walkie Talkie, 20 Fenchurch Street

An ambitious new-build skyscraper in the heart of London’s financial district, the Walkie-Talkie is nicknamed for its top-heavy shape with its 34th floor offering 60% more floor space than its ground level.

As if that weren’t notable enough, it also boasts a BREEAM 2011 rating of Excellent and it was one of the earliest projects to truly push the boundaries of BIM capability.

Project background

20 Fenchurch Street was previously the home of another distinctive sky-scraper, one of the first tall buildings in the City of London at 25 storeys. After its demolition, a new project was conceived.

The result is a 38 storey building reaching 160 metres above ground level, with 32 levels of Grade A office space, a double height ground floor lobby and a public Sky Garden with restaurants and spectacular views. Its shape is innovative, using complex curved designs to create more floor space at the top of the building and increasing the commercial opportunity.

The inclusion of landscaped gardens on the 35th, 36th and 37th floors give 360-degree views of London and the River Thames. The Sky Garden is open to the public, and was part of the projects plans to meet urban planning requirements for a structure located on the edge of a conservation area. The structure also includes London’s largest green wall, an area of 712 square metres housing plants, insects and birds.

Deliverables required

MultiCAD’s expert team provided

• MEP Coordination

MEP designs were required for 39,000 square metres of office accommodation including ventilation, fan coil air conditioning, suitable ventilation for fresh air, bespoke lighting, audio-visual equipment, water services and drainage.

Main challenges

A combination of concave and convex elements in the building’s façade means that each floor plate in the building has a unique shape. This created challenges not only for the construction of the steel frame, but also for the provision of MEP services.

Managing a project with this level of complexity and ambitious sustainability targets presented a huge challenge. Co-ordinating all sub-contractors, avoiding wastage and accurately forecasting project schedules was no small task and design work had started in 2010, before BIM was widely used. The project team made a bold decision to use BIM and to extend into a 4D BIM model, including the BIM dimension of time, so the construction sequence could be forecast even at the earliest stages of design.

Solutions provided

Having adopted BIM early, the MultiCAD team were well versed in the latest software and technology. Our technicians were able to work flexibly with the data inputs and digital requirements.

Owing to the buildings shape, each steel floor plate had to be designed and made separately and this demanded a high level of co-ordination for MEP elements like the under-floor power services.  A high-quality bespoke architectural lighting scheme and a state of the art tele-presence suite with design for acoustics, lighting and air conditioning were also incorporated.

High-quality clash detection was provided, our technicians working flexibly with the latest inputs, to ensure a minimum of wastage and delays on site, another key factor in the building’s sustainability credentials.

The MEP services include a fuel cell tri-generation system, generating 300KW of low carbon, low emissions power from the building. This is integrated with a combined cooling heat and power system, reducing CO2 emissions by 270 tonnes per annum. The services also needed to provide hydration and climate control for the lush planting of the Sky Garden.

The Walkie-Talkie achieved a BREEAM 2011 rating of Excellent and a post-construction score of 80.2%, making it one of the most sustainable buildings in the City of London.

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