The sport-didactic complex of the Academy of Economy in Cracow has been passed for exploitation at the beginning of the year 2000. This realisation is an example of the participation of glass in geometrical game of bodies permeation.
According to the design authors, Romuald Loegler and Józef Białasik, main aim was to create an element which would connect various fragments of existing Academy’s buildings. It must be mentioned that the Academy of Economy occupies former buildings of Prince Lubomirski’s Charity Foundation. An axis of the campus lies behind the palace building and by this axis new didactic buildings have been built since then. On the back of the main building, as early as in the beginning of the 90’s a terrain has been appointed for sports objects construction. Because of noted at the time significant increase of interest in economy studies the program of sports pavilions has been completed with didactic part.
Combination of such differing functions in one place convinced architects to express this “collision” with architectural language. As a result, a complex of two buildings “biting each other” with their corners has been created. Several storeys high, fully glazed hall has been developed in the place of the building's connection and from this point permeation of the two bodies may be clearly seen.
The first building includes a sport hall, partly placed underground, that constitutes the largest auditorium of the school that can seat up to two thousand people. Over the hall’s roof a particular, flattened, tin cylinder has been placed. This controversial body contains several auditoriums for sixty people each.
The second pavilion consists of mostly glazed swimming pool, games hall and auditoriums for one hundred and three hundred people. Within this building a special attention is drawn to several steel frames, visible from the outside, supporting eighteen meters wide roof of the pool and arches of oval lectures rooms.
Glazing for both buildings has been made of Pilkington Suncool™ 66/33. It is coated high-performance solar control glass providing an optimal level of light penetration and thermal comfort. Those unique properties are achieved by special coating placed on the glass surface in a so called off-line process that is made off the production line. Pilkington Suncool™ 66/33, although presence of the coating, is a neutral glass and at the first glance is no different from regular float glass. This property in connection with mentioned previously makes the material very popular among architects.