Our Sustainable Practices

 Case Study Four: The Heritage Discovery  Centre

The Heritage Discovery Centre was created as a tribute to sustainable architecture in Hong Kong. Its establishment not only preserves two historical icons constructed and once owned by Whitfield Barracks in the early colonial days from being wiped out forever in our always evolving society, more importantly, it serves as an education centre for promoting local heritage to the general public and our future generations. The eco-effective elements founded on the basis of sustainable development are adopted in the design of the Centre, which reflect the harmony between the society, the economy and the environment, to convey the following clear messages:

  • Humanity and nature can co-exist in harmony;
  • To eliminate the concept of waste;
  • To utilise the flow of indoor natural energy; to mirror the continuous conservation cycle of production, recovery and reuse; and
  • to seek improvement by sharing knowledge.

Special features include:

 

 

 

 

 
  • A courtyard planted with two old champion trees has been re-opened by removing an erected structure when the buildings were used as a History Museum. Now, these two very old champion trees are thus liberated from the previous ¡§prison-cell¡¨ to echo their seasonal changes with other trees in Kowloon Park beyond the courtyard.
  • The preserved brass gate from the former Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank Building has been now placed at the entrance of the Permanent Exhibition Gallery in the Centre.
  • The original buildings are a masterpiece of integrating natural elements into the design, from site, climate and sun, to the building materials used. The northsouth alignment creates a fundamental natural cooling effect for the building. Other features adopted in the original design, including the semi-basements, pitched Chinese tiled roofs, deep colonnaded verandas on two sides, and high ceiling, allowed maximum solar heat in winters whilst lowering temperatures in summers. These natural passive heating and cooling features left from the original design have been revived.
  • The spacious and bright environment inside the buildings is re-created by demolishing the existing walls beneath the arches surrounding the galleries, and applying glass covered hallways. Such design permits enjoying nature as part of the education experience for the visitors.

  • Shading provided by the two mature trees in the courtyard and the aluminium screens installed at the glazed roofs further reduce solar heat gain, and the indoor thermal comfort is enhanced and fine-tuned by the use of air conditioning system with proper temperature and humidity control.
  • All air conditioning plants use ozone-depleting substance free refrigerant.
  • As for areas required artificial lighting, high efficiency fluorescent lamps and energy saving down-lights operated by occupancy sensors are provided to further optimise the electricity consumed.
  • Batteries used for the emergency lights are made of environmental friendly materials.
  • The existing electrical main panels and emergency power generators that were used by previous Museum are restored and reused.