Oval at the Baseler Platz

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Distinctive Shape – Lightweight Solution

Oval am Baseler Platz in Frankfurt on the Main, Germany, is directly located at the southern entrance to Frankfurt City. Located near to the main railway station in downtown Frankfurt, Basler Platz is one of the latest city commercial and residential developments for this historic city. The Oval is a 10 floor multi-usage building with a distinctive shape designed by AS&P (Albert Speer and Partner Architects), Frankfurt. We could not miss the opportunity to install a 700 m² Texlon^® ETFE roof at the seventh floor covering the atrium. It creates an incredible outdoor feeling to the indoor area below.

Glass is too Heavy – Our Lightweight Architectural ETFE Solution Wins

A glass roof underlies the advantages of our Texlon^® ETFE system for this project. The dead load of glass was too high and would have been very complex and expansive for the Oval. The roof over the atrium spans up to 25 m and incorporates 12 Texlon^® ETFE cushions.

The ultra lightweight nature of the Texlon^® ETFE system also enabled the use of a sophisticated pretensioned cable and strut system – a fraction of the weight of conventional atrium roof support structure. Our Texlon^® ETFE system creates lightweight protection against the weather.

Transparency for the Atrium

Transparency and openness for the atrium are maximized with our Texlon^® ETFE cushion system. The architects choice of a special ‘chaos point’ print pattern on the middle and upper ETFE foil layers is enough to reduce the glare from the surrounding glass facade. This helped manage glare without losing too much of the overall transparency of the roof system. The print pattern on the ETFE foil layers provides a variable solar shading.