Trinity Business School at Trinity College Dublin is the fastest growing business school in Europe and part of the Ireland’s oldest university. The Business School has not only joined the top 2% of accredited peers in the world but also pledged to double the size of its student body. In these exciting times, the need arose for a brand-new main building on Pearse Street, at the heart of Dublin city . Soprema teamed up with Scott Tallon Walker Architects and building contractor JJ Rhatigan for this project. Soprema provided waterproofing and green roofing solutions for Trinity College Business School NZEB.
New building and conservation work
In 2016, works on the flagship development started on a brown field site, after the existing buildings had been demolished. After two years, the new Trinity Business School building was ready. Spanning 11,400 m2, with six storeys above ground and two below, the building includes a 600 seat auditorium, an innovation and entrepreneurial hub, restaurant spaces that can seat up to 200 people, smart classrooms and a rooftop conference room. The renovation and integration of six protected buildings on Pearse Street was also part of this project. The terraced buildings were repurposed as student accommodation and restaurant space.
Green roofing and high U-values
Soprema used Sopralene Bitumen Felt for podium decks for students and standard roofing. Some 500 m2 of photovoltaic panels were installed on our standard roofing, offsetting 35 tonnes of carbon per year. Soprema contributed to the eco character of the Trinity Business School building in other ways - by taking care of the supporting design for the intensive green roofing created by landscapers and by installing extensive green roofing with a synthetic growth medium, using Sopralene Bitumen Felt combined with SOPRANATURE® GREEN roof. Due to the high U-values we had to achieve and the restricted building heights, our team’s challenge was to keep the insulation layer as thin as possible.
Challenging site, stunning result
The construction work posed other challenges as Trinity Business School is located in Dublin’s city centre, beside the main road artery into the city and elevated railway lines making for a very tight construction site.
The final building didn’t suffer as a result of any of these challenges and features a stunning glass façade and a 70 m2 plant wall, the nearly-zero-energy (NZEB) building has not only enabled Trinity College’s ambitious expansion of curriculum and faculty but has also transformed both Pearse Street and the Trinity campus