At Bryden Wood, it’s a guiding principle that we never compromise the design to fit the system.

In the case of the prison transformation project we worked on, this meant that there were two key components to the solution: the people that work in the prison and the building that allows them to do what they need to do in order to help prisoners in their rehabilitation journey.In the case of a pharmaceutical plant it is the different value-adding steps of the overall process and the interface with people who operate that process and the utilities required for that process..

The most important thing during these initial workshops is to keep an open mind.Rather than tabling a design solution too early and possibly forcing the conversation to a preconceived solution, we encourage stakeholders to speak freely about what matters to them.Through structured questioning and diagramming on flipcharts and whiteboards (or their digital equivalents), we turn those concerns and desires into clear objectives.

The aim is to ensure that all stakeholders understand each other’s drivers and that we develop an agreed set of objectives that everyone feels is comprehensive and fair.. We turn that knowledge into an initial, digital model.The model captures all the systems and their interfaces, and represents all aspects of the overall solution that affect the objectives of the various stakeholders.

This initial representation allows us to agree what kind of expertise we require to develop a solution.

For a prison design, that might mean that we need to understand how guards and social workers do their jobs.This drives the reduction of the economic and carbon cost of the building and reduce building footprint..

Structural Options –.Various structural options can be considered to minimise material usage and reduce building height, carbon, and cost, whilst not compromising cooling performance.. CFD can provide evidence during the design process to minimise design risk and help optimise data hall designs further.

This allows the design to be improved across all disciplines.Below is an example of a structural study, looking at how structural options affect the air pressures within the data hall.. Pressure Plots from a recent Structural Optimisation CFD Analysis Study.