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RiverSouth at 401 South 1st Street in Austin is a new Class A office building just south of the city’s downtown district. It is being billed as the “smartest and safest” building in Austin (if not all of Texas), and since its construction, has achieved LEED Gold certification.
For the project team, there was only one door type fitting for such a structure, and it was custom balanced doors by Ellison Bronze.
The New York–based manufacturer provided satin stainless steel balanced doors in a narrow stile with tempered glass to match the building’s glass curtainwall entrance space. The doors effectively allow natural light into the lobby and give RiverSouth’s main entrance a cohesive look and feel with the rest of the structure.
An Intentional Selection
The RiverSouth architects originally specified a competitor balanced door system for the project, but project managers at Harmon had experienced challenges with that particular manufacturer’s product in the recent past. Ongoing maintenance was an issue with those doors. In short, Harmon pushed for an alternative solution, one that would surely stand the test of time, so they advocated for the installation of Ellison custom balanced doors.
“We know that Ellison makes reliable doors that rarely need service, so we won’t get callbacks” said Pete Pankey, senior project manager at Harmon. “As we anticipated, we had no issues with the doors and the customer is very pleased with our selection.”
Going with Glass
Another key reason for selecting Ellison balanced doors was for the ability to achieve narrow sightlines. RiverSouth features floor-to-ceiling vision glass throughout the curtainwall, allowing for plenty of natural daylight to enter work and recreation spaces throughout the building. This was a deliberate choice consistent with the project’s LEED Gold target, aimed at significantly reducing reliance on artificial lighting systems and harnessing as much natural Texas sunlight as possible.
Read the full story and discover how Ellison Bronze played a key role in bringing RiverSouth to life.
