Arena Space is a commercial office building designed and developed by Architects & Interior Designers, GA Design. The building is designed to be oriented north, overlooking the lake and visible from the JVLR Road, Mumbai. Each floor is a single rectangular office with the services located on the Southern side. The remaining three sides have strategic views and therefore have a complete glass facade that ensures uninterrupted vision.
The design aim was to create a thoughtfully designed building that would balance functionality with aesthetics. The thrust was on ensuring maximum natural light and creating a sense of space while challenging predictability in form & design. The larger objective was to achieve a design that would create an ambience of comfort for the occupants and reflect the dynamism that a business conglomerate would like to be associated with.
The building design is conceived like a ribbon, which originates from the ground and wraps around the building in a dynamic manner. Spiralling up to the terrace level, the ribbon expands and contracts on certain floors, exposing the refuge decks at random intervals. The lower three floors on the West side is an overwhelming triple height lobby. As it reaches the top of the building, the ribbon angles out dangerously to provide a perfect branding location, and extends out beyond the terrace level. A glass lift core on the West side holds the building together, with the ribbon on one side and a glass facade with vertical aluminium fins on the other. The distinctive design is in stark contrast to the surroundings. Standing out as a unique commercial office building, Arena Space attracts the attention of the layman as well as provides a strong workplace identity to its workforce.
The building facade is essentially a combination of several materials like dark granite columns on the lower floors, aluminium cladding, aluminium extruded sections and high performance glass. The West side of the building is completely exposed. Being the side that would let in the maximum sunlight, it was necessary to use a glass which would be high performance in nature and yet complement the ribbon design of the building. The design requirement for the glass was clear from the very beginning. The colour of the glass was to be blue. It was also necessary that the coating would be on clear glass and not on blue glass. SGG Nano Blue Frost KBT 140 is the high performance glass used for this commercial building. The glass has a spectacular blue colour with a fine look and feel. Also, being a high performance glass, it substantially cuts the heat gain to the office areas. As the coating was on a clear glass, rather than a blue glass, the glass façade has a high Light Transmission Index. On the skyline of India's commercial capital Mumbai, Arena Space, with its distinct edifice, makes its presence felt as a unique commercial building clothed in glass.
