As one of the largest real estate developers in the Midwest, LandMark Group offers a fully integrated approach to design-build for its clients: commercial/industrial building owners and tenants. For this reason, LandMark turned to NCI Building Systems, Inc. as the single-source building material solution for the company’s latest development in Columbus, IN.
The LandMark facility implements Metallic Building Company’s Long Bay System, a metal building framing specifically engineered to provide wide-open floor bays, ideal for manufacturing and production. In addition to expedited erection time, the system offers reduced interior columns for unobstructed space and superior strength-to-weight ratios.
“All of the building structure is by Metallic except for the concrete cast-in-place walls at the production areas,” said NCI Building Systems’ Josh Bartlett, team leader of envelope solutions and components.
The soon-to-be tenant, a manufacturer of exhaust systems for Cummins diesel and alternative-fuel engines, required a mixed-use facility that combined state-of-the-art production and warehouse spaces with a contemporary, attractive office. The building’s unique amalgam of commercial and industrial functionality was the perfect scenario for an insulated metal panel building envelope. However, strict insurance regulations driven by the tenant’s overseas ownership group restricted the use of standard polyurethane insulation. The answer was a custom ThermalSafe fire-resistant building envelope by Metl-Span.
“The French company that LandMark leases this building to has a unique stipulation that no [polyurethane] foam can be used in the insulated metal panel construction,” Bartlett explained. “We recommended using ThermalSafe.”
Metl-Span ThermalSafe insulated metal panels incorporate non-combustible mineral wool cores. Specified in a 4” thickness, the panels are rated for one-hour fire resistance, while providing some of the same benefits clients have come to expect from Metl-Span insulated metal panels, such as single-step construction, excellent thermal and moisture performance from the elements and even improved sound absorption properties.
The panel’s unique LockGuard® interlocking side joint further enhances the fire-resistant performance of the panel with its tongue and groove engagement of the mineral wool core. The fire-rated panel also offers superior structural characteristics and span capabilities.
While the vertically-installed ThermalSafe panels come standard with Metl-Span’s corrugated Light Mesa exterior profile, the LandMark team and Principal Dan Ericson were seeking a flat building exterior façade with a stucco texture—which would blend seamlessly with the facility’s mixed-medium concrete portions in addition to surrounding structures.
Metl-Span answered the call with more than 12,248 square feet of custom 26-gauge, horizontal 4” ThermalSafe fire-resistant panels with an embossed Santa Fe exterior texture. Painted in gleaming Solar White, the panels are perfectly suited to the facility’s dual-purpose functionality.
“Our tenant was driven by their insurance company to specify a fire-resistant core, but nailing the look of the building, the aesthetic, was a team effort on all parts,” Ericson noted.
This included a custom-tailored installation process to minimize exposed fasteners through the use of trim at the end-splices, according to Bartlett. The flat panel aesthetic with concealed fasteners lends a sleek, modern aesthetic to the industrial/commercial building.
LandMark Group’s Columbus development opened to resounding success in 2017.
“The feedback we have received from LandMark is that both the developer and the tenant are very happy with how the building’s insulated metal panels turned out,” Bartlett said.
In fact, LandMark’s latest development in Blue Springs, MO — another collaboration with the Cummins automotive manufacturer — also specifies a high-performance building envelope featuring Metl-Span ThermalSafe fire-resistant panels.