Sunshade
Project name: Wairoa College
Material used: Extreme32
Fabric Supplied By: Rainbow Shade NZ
2022 Awards for Excellence Highly Commended– Shade Sails – Commercial
What did the client request?
Our clients asked us to create a large range of shaded spaces across the school grounds to provide much needed UV protection for college students.
The shades needed to tie in with the existing environment and established trees, be resistant to graffiti, and meet their budget requirements.
They also needed to be strong enough to handle the high wind zone.
What is unique or complex about the project?
Aside from designing the spaces to compliment the school and the built environment, the main complexity of this job was the scale and sheer number of sails and posts involved (10 sails, 29 posts).
Another challenge was the location, being in a small rural town about 120kms from our business. Particularly for getting specialist services to site such as hydro-excavation for efficiently digging that many posts, in a workable time-frame. Despite having access to the plans for the underground services and being given the all clear, we still managed to find a heap of services including stormwater pipes present under the ground! Thanks to having the hydro-excavator on site, adapting was not a major problem – we were able to quickly dig more holes and shift the set of shade sail poles over slightly to accommodate.
What were the results of the project?
The result is a serious set of shade sails and sun protection for the students, and we’re proud to have created a stylish set of architectural sails that invite rangatahi to hang out in a variety of spaces.
The black shade cloth chosen for the college offered a UVR Block of 95.7% and a cooling 95.3% shade, strong protection for the students underneath.
The school are extremely happy with the result and we continue to enjoy a good working relationship with them, having done other tensioned canopy work for them in the past also.
