Fläkt Woods smoke shaft system installed in Courthouse Hotel

Project title: Courthouse Hotel

Location: London

Client: Kane Group

Service: Smoke Control

Project Background

The Courthouse Hotel, Shoreditch, is steeped in history and is one of the most beautiful Edwardian civic buildings in London. Situated opposite Shoreditch Town Hall, the building is now an impressive, boutique hotel, but was once Old Street Magistrates Court and Police Station, with the courthouse operating from 1903 until 1996.

The hotel has 128 guest rooms and features a large new-build bedroom block adjacent to the original building with a basement area housing a spa, pool, fitness suite, bowling alley and cinema room as well as function space. It has a ‘historical’ restaurant concept, three bars (including a rooftop bar) and is described as a ‘dynamic social and working hub’.

The £24 million development was carried out by McAleer and Rushe as main contractor which describes the hotel as “styled to fit with the new modern art and media image”.

The Project

The Client

Group SCS was commissioned by Kane Group in August 2013 to work on the hotel due to the savings associated with our use of the innovative e3 Smoke Shaft System from Fläkt Woods, as well as Group SCS’s reputation for project success and a strong previous working relationship between the two businesses.

Our Involvement

Fläkt Woods’ e3 system was selected not only for its simple specification and commissioning, but also due to the cost savings offered by pre-fabrication. The modular e3 Smoke Shaft System is designed as a ‘plug and play’ solution for smoke shaft projects, based around simple selection, simple installation and simple commissioning.

Our Solution

Using a simple 11-question specification tool, the system was priced and the tech sub delivered automatically. From this point, it was just a case of acquiring the relevant products – smoke detectors, zone control panels, HMI input devices etc that are all fully addressable on site following set-up with an ASi controller device.

The system featured actuated door openers to ensure adequate inlet air, e-vent lobby dampers on every floor (rated to FD30s fire door standards) and a rooftop skid featuring the main extract fan, ATS and fan control panel.

As the fan skid unit came ready-wired with fan control panel and ATS attached, wiring time was greatly reduced. In addition, the quick ‘off-the-shelf’ supply of the skid unit and roof vent meant the build could be quickly sealed watertight on the roof, smoothing over the build process considerably. The simplified commissioning meant that all sensors and controllers were set up in one fell swoop, with the system’s software offering a standard cause-and-effect protocol that was ideal for the building.

We finished our work at the site in August 2015 and the hotel opened in Spring 2016.

Chris Connolly, Contracts Manager:

“This project was the first time we used the Fläkt Woods e3 Smoke Shaft System. What it meant was off-site pre-fabrication with it put together in the Fläkt Woods factory. (...) Set-up was so easy – we installed the system components on site, plugged the ASi controller into each to give them an ID, then accessed the HMI touchscreen to find the system already up and running. Easiest commissioning ever. This system meant better time management with fewer people on site.”