The Newtecnic method is described in the following sections:

1. Design Method

2. Pre-tender activities

3. Re-use and recycle

4. The strategies of an evolving design

5. The behaviour of an evolving design

6. The use of grids and forms in an evolving design

7. Sharing expertise as books

1. 25 years’ experience as multidisciplinary engineers and designers

The firm has 25 years’ experience as multidisciplinary engineers and designers on high-profile, large-scale projects around the world, following the founders’ experience of 10 years each in senior roles in world-leading architecture practices in Paris. The firm is ranked in third place in the NCE list of Top 100 companies.

2. Combining architectural arrangement of spaces and engineering of built form

The method used by Newtecnic is the combination of principles of architectural arrangement of spaces and the engineering of their built form, in equal measure. Newtecnic architecture is based on the arrangement of spaces in accordance with the brief and the insertion of forms into a built environment. Newtecnic engineering is based on strategies for structure, environment and facades that use as little energy as possible both during construction and when the building is in use.

3. Real-time solutions via interaction with project stakeholders at design workshops

Newtecnic conduct renowned design workshops, providing solutions in real-time through interaction with project stakeholders. Newtecnic bring in-house expertise to all workshops, combining technical authority, built project experience, and Newtecnic’s own library of typologies, technologies and testing. In 2020, Newtecnic were shortlisted for the NCE Awards’ Leader in Collaboration.

4. Visually striking design language

The visually striking design language is set out in its highly detailed outputs of drawings and specifications, serving as a user manual for project stakeholders.

5. Technical authority

Technical authority comes from the Modern Construction series of textbooks written by Newtecnic and published by leading publisher Birkhauser. The books are used in the architecture and engineering departments of most universities around the world.

6. Commitment to the evolving art of engineered construction

The firm demonstrated commitment to the evolving art of engineered construction through publication of its articles and papers in the technical press, authored by Newtecnic. The social value of the significance of the art of construction is central to the firm’s method of working.

1. At the concept design stage, the material selection is made. We aim to optimise the palette of materials in order to create an elegance of appearance informed by considerations of weathering from the effects of rain and sun. Material selection can help to avoid pattern staining on the facades, allowing them to age gracefully rather than rely on an intense maintenance schedule. The choice of materials is usually reviewed from one of our own reference books used in the industry, the Modern Construction Handbook, which is in its fifth edition and is used in architecture schools and university engineering departments around the world. This reference, along with others in our Modern Construction Series published by Birkhauser, allows us to inform the choice of materials, not just in terms of sizes and thicknesses available, but also how the proposed materials weather together, including bi-metallic action. The material selection informs the facade technology that might be used. For example, metal panels might tend towards a rain-screen technology and may tend towards a prefabricated technology. We take a practical approach that is also best practice.

2. At this stage we review the preliminary budget once again, a task informed by our experience in preparing shop drawings for contractors. We produce reports on benefits that can be brought by minor changes to the build-up of code-compliant facade systems.

3. At the design development stage, the facade cleaning and maintenance systems are developed from proposals already made by Newtecnic at the concept design stage. The task is focussed on how the facades can be cleaned economically, as the system can add significant cost if not addressed at this stage. We develop as economic and as visually minimal an intervention as possible. For example, at roof level, a cradle that that moves around on the track may be selected; alternatively, moveable jibs may be used.

A major factor affecting the facade design of a mixed-use residential re-development scheme of 17 storeys is the need to coordinate closely with the planned interior spaces. The internal spaces often have different requirements from floor to floor, resulting in the facade needing to accommodate different performances through its height. An example is wind pressures in relation to natural ventilation, which vary through the height of a tall building, providing opportunities to optimise framing sizes and glass thicknesses across different facade areas while enabling controlled natural ventilation to internal spaces. Orientations of facade in relation to sun path and acoustic attenuation provide further opportunities for optimisation of effects of light and shadow internally, in addition to providing adequate daylight. Different requirements for sound insulation from floor to floor and associated thermal insulation provides opportunities to optimise performance while avoiding thermal bridging.

In addition to coordination with the spatial arrangement is coordination with the internal circulation. This requires an understanding of what is a ‘fully internal’ space and what is a ‘transition’ space. Staircases and internal ramps are often treated as semi-tempered transition spaces, while fully internal spaces may have lower levels of natural ventilation. The addition of floors to the top of the building may be complemented by creating, for example, double-height spaces at the mid-height of the building or additional space around the podium level. Regarding structural strategy, changes to the structure require close coordination with the potential strengthening of the existing structure while working with its existing structural behaviour. This task is carried out at Newtecnic with finite element analysis in order to establish not just whether the existing structure can accept the additional loads but what effect the new addition of floors will have on the overall stability and movements of the building. Any associated new movements will have an effect on the new facades, which may introduce some movements back into the structure of the building; new balconies are an example. The coordination between the expected behaviour of the structure as a result of the additional loads and the effects on the floors below for recladding will need to be taken into account. Coordination between primary structure and façade assemblies is an essential consideration.

Regarding environmental strategy, the existing building, probably with lower levels of thermal insulation than would be required today, are upgraded to meet contemporary standards, while avoiding interstitial condensation, providing further opportunities for the introduction of controlled natural ventilation.

The use of prefabricated facade panels instead of site-assembled facades could reduce the costs of installation while increasing build quality, depending on the numbers of ‘repeated’ panels. Repeated panels do not have to be the same size but they need to be made as a single system with variations in component only; changes of material add more cost than changes in panel size. This approach allows the design team to create facades with the required level of architectural flair which also adds value.

The organisation and detailing between the external envelope and floor plates needs to be closely coordinated in order to avoid the need for adding costs for cantilevered screeds that would fill the gap between the back of the facade and the edge of the floor slab. This close coordination can increase floor area without creating an interdependency between facade and interior finish. Items which might become interdependent, such as electrically opening windows at high level and the electrical supply needed, might be avoided, as requirements for both facade and for the use of internal space, could change in future years.

Other building elements such as the MEP installation are generally kept separate from the facade in order to allow the MEP to be to be upgraded and replaced independently, while still providing sufficient natural ventilation and air movement to avoid condensation within internal spaces. Coordination with MEP at roof level is an essential consideration as this where most of the mechanical and electrical equipment is typically located. The roof is also where sufficient space is needed for access and for equipment used for cleaning and maintenance of the building. Cleaning and maintenance is typically undertaken with jibs that are moved by hand around the edge of the roof, or alternatively with a machine that runs on a dedicated roof-top track. The ability to be able to repair parts of the facade using facade access equipment is increasingly important as this can become an expensive undertaking if the hoist equipment is not is not suited to lifting replacement facade components into place, such as double-glazed units. It can be impractical to move these components within the building itself. Typically, this issue is overcome by having smaller sized units which suits residential space but often does not suit commercial spaces, which might occupy lower floors, where larger glaze units are the norm.

Compliance monitoring during the construction phase is typically undertaken by Newtecnic with site-based testing of areas of facade. For example, tests for compliance with water penetration is often conducted over 10% of the facades. Air infiltration rates can be checked by setting a temporary plywood enclosure around parts of the facade internally, and testing to ensure that the installed facades comply with the performance required in the specification and achieved in the test mock-up. Newtecnic typically has an engineer on site whose role, similar to a clerk of works, is to check that the installation of all components and all related assemblies comply with the approved shop drawings, structural and environmental submittals, samples and mock-ups.

The specific approach to design at Newtecnic is to understand and design all aspects of a building as a single ‘organism’ rather than as separate, loosely connected parts. The design process starts with loose connections, but the design evolves into a single unified ‘organism’, creating a design which is more efficient, cheaper, more useful and better looking than buildings which are designed as a juxtaposition of systems. This aim is achieved by designing each component as internal spaces (from a brief or program); walls, roofs, structure, environmental controls and equipment. When this assembly is loosely fit together, we look for connections between them by looking for efficiencies of combining strategies, functions or assemblies that work well together. The design then starts to evolve of its own accord, avoiding the visual randomness associated with some aspects of contemporary design.

In short, we look at the ‘behaviour’ of the strategies and how their behaviours can work in harmony or with a natural efficiency. An example is where parts fit together almost ‘naturally’ rather than being forced together by the designer’s will rather than coming together by applying the principles of craft: an efficiency resulting in an elegance, an economy and a certain ease of use. These traditional architectural principles of firmness, commodity and delight are based in the craft of building, without the aid of applied decoration. Applied decoration gives a deliberately false impression of a building’s form in relation to its purpose, functions or use. Newtecnic is mindful that buildings are a ‘sketch’ or approximation of some greater intention; their designs should point to what is missing in the design – what would be there if more advanced technologies were available. Newtecnic designs aim to use the minimum amount of material or the minimum number of components in order to achieve their objective of being as useful as possible to the user of the building.

The use of the ‘gesture and the grid’. The grid as a ‘microgrid’ at Newtecnic in order to allow complex issues of facade, structure, environment and spatial organisation to respond to a single grid rather than having a large-scale grid and a set of spaces fitted into them, which might result in an uneasy relationship between structure and grid. The microgrid allows Newtecnic to make the contribution of facade, structure and environmental design without necessarily being able to control all aspects of the building design or the design of the urban quarter in which the building or buildings are set. The microgrid can be wrapped to form facetted or curved elements if remaining locked within the confines of the microgrid.

An alternative approach to the single microgrid is the use of activity space and support space where blocks are set outside open space; the division of building into separate forms, using juxtaposed grids of larger scale.

A third approach is use of non-rectilinear forms within a design, enabling internal circulation routes to allow spaces to be experienced in a non-rectilinear manner. Spaces are experienced as oblique forms or forms that curve to the field of view. Spaces are arranged for the viewer to experience: the building user is the focus of parts of the building, rather than being the passive viewer of a building form that makes no reference to the user. This experience contrasts with walking through, or under, a large static object that is not concerned with how the form or space is perceived.

Newtecnic books MCH and MCE explain how component systems of buildings join together with adjacent assemblies in a generic method of connections. The structural design and environmental design books (MSD, MED) explain how building designs come together as strategies. The Case Studies book sets out examples of design and the supporting engineering analysis that informed these designs.