Every budding architect or builder should be familiar with certain key terms, and anybody who wants his or her designs to be amongst the top buildings of today certainly needs to know his brise-soleil from his glass louvres.  One need not be confused by the sophisticatedly confusing sounding French names – these structures are really fairly simple, and as soon as you get your head around them they are likely to be extremely useful.  This article aims to give a succinct explanation of these important architectural terms, so that next time external louvres come up in conversation with a builder or architect, you will know what they mean.

The term ‘brise soleil’ is from the French, meaning ‘sun breaker’.  The term refers to a variety of permanent sun-shading techniques, and the beauty of the technique is the range of architectural strategies that come under this umbrella.  They span from basic patterned walls to the stunning mechanical, pattern-creating devices of the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris.  In its classic form, this sun breaker exists as a horizontal projection extending from the sun-side façade of a building.  Façades with a large amount of glass can be in danger of overheating during the summer, and installing a brise-soleil is a very effective way of stopping this from happening.  The structure can be further adapted by incorporating louvres, which prevent high-angle summer sun falling on the façade, and allow low angle winter sun to provide passive solar heating.

Glass is one of the most useful and multifunctional building products there is.  It can be used fora variety of purposes, from creating striking glass façades to elegant internal screen solutions.  Glass louvres are used to control solar heat gain within buildings, and have traditionally been tinted to create the desired effect.  More elaborate finishes are available, too.  Ceramic frits, for example, involve baking a type of paint onto the glass.  These type of finishes create a more adventurous appearance while reflecting the sun’s heat and helping to maintain a comfortable interior temperature.  Currently, glass louvres are taking on a more active role in buildings than ever before, with light redirection and photovoltaic systems allowing for various different functions.  These louvres can offer building owners and specifiers realistic solutions in terms of creating environmentally friendly buildings by reducing the need for air conditioning while providing renewable energy sources as well as shading.

Basic external louvres, on the other hand, are usually mounted in the vertical, with a row of horizontal blades shaped and positioned to minimise the ingress of water.  With relatively simple functions such as providing shade from the sun, brise-soleil, glass louvres and the like should not provoke confusion.  Once you know what they are and how they work, it should be fairly easy to assess which solution would be right for your project.

Please visit http://www.maplesunscreening.co.uk/ for further information about this topic.

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