Kanata, known as 'Silicon Valley North', has an abundance of high-tech firms that make this their home. The area has lacked a five star hotel to service the business trade which frequents the many corporations located there.

The Brookstreet Hotel was conceived as a landmark building to serve traveling executives. The Kanata Research Park already had a number of mid-rise office towers surrounding the hotel site. What was needed was a hotel tower that could be seen from a distance, having a distinctive palate of colors to distinguish it from the surroundings. The material chosen for the exterior cladding was architectural precast concrete.

Form and Function
The 18 storey vertical tower minimized square corners by introducing curved precast and window elements. The penthouse structure features a softly curving roof line, which when viewed from a distance, provides a distinctive corporate image for the building. The building mass was further softened through the use of a large curving podium structure at the base of the tower.

The hotel made use of a balance of three major cladding materials:

· Precast concrete wall panels with an exposed pine-green granite finish
· Polished green granite accent panels and inserts
· Reflective green vision glass windows with complimentary frames.

Architectural Precast Finishes
The exposed pine-green granite precast panels were specially created to achieve two different textures to break up the mass of front elevations. Some areas were left as a green granite exposed aggregate surface. In other areas, the green granite surface was further finished by sandblasting to mute the strong green and provide a lighter, more subtle green hue.

The design architect made use and maximized the inherent features and benefits of precast concrete wall panels. Custom made wood and fibre glass molds imparted the lines, reveals, bluenoses a curves required of the design.

Panel sizes were maximized to:

· Reduce manufacturing costs
· Eliminate the need for additional supplementary support structure
· Minimize the number of construction joints which would need caulking and maintenance in the long term
· Minimize days on site erecting precast panels.

Construction
An additional benefit of precast cladding is the ease of construction. Panel erection can follow closely behind the tower construction. Often, as on this project, the tower crane can also be used to install the precast panels. The windows can then be installed to protect the interior from the weather and allow the finishing trades to work efficiently. Early occupancy saves time and money.

Project Details:
Architectural precast concrete wall panels - 1,100 pieces (8,360 sq m)
Building area - 22,000 sq m
Total construction cost - $50 million

Project Credits:
Owner/Developer: Kanata Research Park Corporation
Contractor: Kanata Research Park Construction
Architect: Crain Architects Inc.
Design Architect: WZMH Architects
Structural Engineer: Adjelian Allen Rubelli Ltd.
Architectural Precast Concrete: RES Precast