Three projects. Almost nothing in common.
A vertical school in inner-city Melbourne. A coastal shopping centre food court on the Gold Coast. A multi-residential tower in Sydney’s north-west.
Different building types, different states, different briefs entirely. Each one specified Safetyline Jalousie louvre windows with wide bay configurations that a conventional glass-on-glass system could not have delivered. And in each case, the reason was different.
That pattern is worth examining, because it says something about what wide-bay louvre windows can do that architects and specifiers don’t always anticipate when they first encounter the product.
What follows is an account of each project: the brief, the constraint, and what specifying a louvre system with the flexibility to exceed conventional span limitations made possible. At the end, a common thread that applies to all three.
PROJECT 01 : VENTILATION PERFORMANCE
Wurun Senior Campus, Fitzroy VIC
Architects: GHD Design + Grimshaw │ Builder: BESIX Watpac │ Client: Victorian School Building Authority
The Brief
When GHD Design and Grimshaw were engaged to design a new senior secondary campus on a narrow, constrained inner-city block in Fitzroy, the challenge was immediate: accommodate three full-size multipurpose sports courts on a site that didn’t have the footprint for them at ground level. The solution was to stack them vertically across six storeys, and that decision created a façade challenge that went well beyond standard glazing.
Sports halls generate substantial heat loads from physical activity. Stacked across six storeys on a constrained corner site, the design team needed a façade system that could deliver high free air across a full-height glazed plane, while reading as transparent and open from the street.
What Wide Spans and Full Height Made Possible
Safetyline Jalousie’s SJ Jalousie glass louvre windows were specified across the full height of the sports hall façade. The combination of tall floor-to-ceiling louvre heights and wide bay configurations was central to both the façade’s ventilation performance and its architectural character.
Wide bays mean fewer vertical mullions interrupting the glass plane, and tall louvre heights maximise the operable area per opening. On a façade of this scale, that matters in two ways simultaneously:
- Free air performance improves as both bay width and louvre height increase, because the ratio of operable glass to framing improves with every dimension gained. For a sports hall demanding high natural ventilation rates across a large internal volume, this is a meaningful performance advantage per opening.
- The façade presents as a large, uninterrupted field of glass louvres across the full building height – giving the sports hall an open, lightweight character that reads clearly from the street and contributes to the building’s civic presence on the Fitzroy Gasworks site.
The integrated GHD Design and Grimshaw team modelled the façade extensively to optimise natural ventilation, thermal comfort, shading, and glare control, minimising the building’s reliance on mechanical systems while maintaining comfortable conditions for students and athletes year-round.
Inbuilt security within each louvre bearer allows the windows to remain open for continuous natural ventilation without compromise: a critical consideration for a school environment operating across six storeys.
RESULT Best Secondary School, 2022 Victorian School Design Awards. Shortlisted at the 2023 World Architecture Festival in Singapore : one of 14 school projects from 495 global entries. The building’s passive design approach — minimising mechanical systems through natural ventilation at scale, has positioned it as a reference point for sustainable school design in Australia. |
PROJECT 02 : STRUCTURAL FLEXIBILITY
Westfield Pacific Fair, Broadbeach Waters QLD
Client: Westfield │ Location: Broadbeach Waters, QLD (within 1km of the beach)
The Brief
The louvre specification at Westfield Pacific Fair arrived with three simultaneous constraints that a conventional louvre system could not have resolved together.
The food court ventilation strategy required louvre windows to be fixed open at a specific angle to deliver consistent 30% airflow, and to provide passive ventilation in the event of fire. The louvres also had to fit within the bays created by pre-existing prefabricated structural steel, where post spacings varied and were already fixed. And the coastal location – within one kilometre of the beach, made corrosion resistance non-negotiable.
The second constraint is the one that creates difficulty with conventional glass-on-glass louvre systems. In those systems, the glass blade itself carries the structural load across the span, and glass has inherent flex limitations. As bay widths increase, the unsupported glass span becomes a liability – deflection under wind load, thermal movement, and long-term performance all become harder to manage. In practice, most glass-on-glass systems are constrained to around 1,000–1,200mm. Where existing steel structure sets the bay sizes beyond that range, specifiers are typically left choosing between modifying the structure or accepting visible compromise in the façade.
What the Wide-Span Capability Made Possible
Because the Safetyline Jalousie system uses an aluminium louvre bearer rather than relying on the glass to carry the structural load, bay widths can be customised to suit structural openings without the flex and performance constraints that limit conventional glass-on-glass systems. At Pacific Fair, the louvres were custom-manufactured to fit the exact bay dimensions created by the existing structural steel: with post spacings varying across the facade, and some openings exceeding the 1,200mm that would represent the practical limit for a conventional glass louvre system. Each frame was made to suit the opening it sat within.
This meant:
- No modification to the existing steel structure was required. The louvres were brought to site to fit the frame, not the other way around.
- The façade achieved a cohesive, consistent appearance across all bays despite the varying structural dimensions behind it. A glass-on-glass system constrained by flex limitations at wider spans would have required structural modification or filler panels to resolve the variable post spacings.
- Tamper-proof fixed-open lever mechanisms held the louvres at the required angle, delivering the specified 30% airflow consistently across all bays.
- Aluminium, Zamac, and stainless steel construction with high-performance coatings eliminated corrosion risk for the coastal environment.
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THE LESSON FOR SPECIFIERS Where existing structure sets the bay dimensions: in a refurbishment, a retrofit, or a project with prefabricated framing, the ability to manufacture louvre frames to specified widths removes the need to choose between structural modification and visual compromise. Where any of those openings exceed the practical span limits of conventional glass-on-glass systems, the aluminium bearer system resolves the constraint cleanly. The louvre adapts to the building, not the other way around. |
PROJECT 03 : FIRE AND SMOKE SAFETY
Banksia Apartments, Norwest Quarter, Sydney NSW
Architect: Bates Smart │ Building Type: Multi-residential │ Location: Norwest, Sydney NSW
The Brief
The louvre specification at Banksia Apartments came in two parts. SJ Jalousie natural ventilation louvre windows had been specified throughout the residential apartments, providing passive ventilation for residents at every level.
The remaining design challenge was the building entry foyer. The fire and smoke strategy required a certified Natural Smoke and Heat Exhaust Ventilation (NSHEV) solution at ground level: louvre windows capable of exhausting heat and smoke in a fire event to keep the foyer clear and support evacuation.
The challenge was one of performance density. The foyer had limited façade area available for NSHEV openings. A conventional narrow-bay louvre or standard smoke vent would have required multiple openings to shift the volume of smoke and heat demanded by the fire engineer’s brief. Each additional opening means more wall penetrations, more structural complexity, and more interruption to the entry façade.
What the 1,400mm Span Made Possible
Two large SJ Proteger louvre bays: each at the maximum 1,400mm span, were specified in the foyer façade. That was enough.
At 1,400mm per bay, SJ Proteger delivers substantially more free air per opening than a conventional smoke vent or narrow-bay louvre of equivalent height. For the fire engineer, the calculation resolved cleanly: two extra-wide bays produced the free air area required to meet the NSHEV performance brief without any additional openings.
The outcome for the building:
- Two louvre bays in the foyer met the full NSHEV requirement : no additional wall penetrations, no structural compromise, no visual clutter at the building entry.
- The SJ Proteger bays integrate with the building’s fire indicator panel (FIP) and building management system (BMS), with 72-hour failsafe battery backup, fault reporting, and fire-rated 24V DC actuators. In a fire event, the louvres open automatically to exhaust heat and smoke from the foyer, keeping the evacuation route clear.
- The foyer specification sits within an already-established Safetyline Jalousie louvre language. The result is a façade and entry that speak the same architectural language — one resolved entirely within the Safetyline Jalousie product family.
WHY THIS MATTERS BEYOND THE FOYER The free air advantage of extra-wide SJ Proteger bays at 1,400mm applies wherever NSHEV is required and façade area is limited : not only building entry foyers, but common corridors and walkways in high-rise residential, shared amenity spaces, commercial lobbies, and mixed-use podiums. In any of these situations, fewer wall penetrations means less structural complexity, less weatherproofing exposure, and a cleaner façade. It is worth raising with your fire engineer early, before penetration locations are locked into the structural frame. |
The Common Thread
Three projects. Three different briefs. Three different building types. But in each case, a louvre system capable of spanning up to 1,400mm per bay resolved a problem that a conventional system could not.
Conventional glass-on-glass louvre systems are constrained by the structural properties of glass itself. As bay widths increase, flex under wind load and thermal movement become limiting factors : which is why most glass-on-glass systems cap out at around 1,000–1,200mm. The aluminium louvre bearer at the heart of the Safetyline Jalousie system transfers that structural load out of the glass and into the frame, which is what makes spans up to 1,400mm achievable. And it is why specifying Safetyline Jalousie means access to a performance envelope that glass-on-glass systems cannot match.
Discuss Your Next Project
Whether your driver is ventilation performance, structural flexibility, fire and smoke safety, or façade aesthetics – our team is available to review your window schedule and model bay configurations at an early design stage.
Have a project you’d like to discuss? Get in touch.
safetylinejalousie.com.au │ 1300 863 350 │ sales@safetylinejalousie.com.au
