Efficiency is important in office Design, whether it’s improvements to an existing space or a new building. Swinging doors are typical, however in certain applications, a sliding door is allowable by code and can improve the plan. Should you use a Swinging doors or sliding doors in your design?
Swinging doors take up room to allow for them to open and close. Sliding doors are more compact. A swinging door will open up to a wall. Doors can open 180 degrees against a wall, but in a smaller office, there may not be room for this to occur. Remember to provide the necessary clearances around doors as described in the post “Clearance around a door”. In a space with millwork or cabinets, a swinging door in its open position will affect accessibility to millwork. Below are a few scenarios.
Office Design with 90 degree swinging door
Office design with 180 degree swinging door
ADA compliance affected. Room will require more room to meet door clearances.
Office design with sliding door
Space is more efficient allowing for a more functional space.
The sliding door is much more efficient. If located properly, it allows for additional wall space where the door would swing to place more furniture or more maneuverability within the space
In locations such as a breakroom, millwork or other elements may conflict with swinging doors. In the two examples below, one layout shows where a sliding door will improve the functionality of the space.
Breakroom with swinging vs sliding door
When is a sliding door allowed?
There are a few instances where sliding doors are allowed by code. The following are some examples based upon the 2018 IBC codes. check your local jurisdiction for current code adopted and their interpretation.
Per section 1010.1.2 Door Swing. – Egress doors shall be of the pivoted or side-hinged swinging type. Exceptions where this doesn’t apply:
Private garages, office areas, factory and storage areas with an occupant load of 10 or less.
Group I-3 occupancies used as a place of detention.
Critical or intensive Care patient rooms within suites or health care facilities.
Doors within or serving a single dwelling unit in Groups R-2 and R-3.
In other than Group H occupancies, revolving doors complying with Section 1010.4.1.
In other than group H occupancies, special purpose sliding, accordion or folding door assemblies complying with Section 1010.1.4.3. This pertains to specialty doors which are power operated etc. Example of this is in grocery stores. The doors typical have the ability to hinge during a emergency or when the power disrupts the operation of the door and remains in a closed position.
Power-operating doors in accordance with Section 1010.1.4.2.
Doors serving a bathroom within an individual sleeping unit in Group R-1.
In other Group H occupancies, manually operated horizontal doors are permitted in a means of egress from spaces with an occupant load of 10 or less.
Items in blue, exception 1 and 9 pertain to office spaces.
There are various solutions for sliding doors. Ensure the solution you select meets ADA requirements. Acoustical properties is another factor to consider when picking the type of sliding door. A typical barn door will not have acoustical properties as it doesn’t have a seal at the opening, so if this is a concern, do some research on the type of door system. There are numerous examples of acoustical sliding doors. One example that has acoustical properties is AD Systems.
Summary
When planning your next office, determine if sliding doors would be a solution to make your office design more efficient. Will it save space and make it more functional. Follow the examples above for reference but as always, refer to the local jurisdiction, the current ADA guidelines and a local professional to ensure your projects success.
Should my door have panic hardware? – Building Codes
As an Architect, I interact with clients, engineers and contractors who have acquired bits of information about Building Codes. Sometimes, those bits are misconceptions and regurgitated information. The building codes can be intimidating and have no beginning or end. To learn the code, the best way is jumping in feet first.
Upcoming Blog Posts
In the next series of blog posts, I will explore common Building Codes. Each City has adopted a code but most in Arizona use the IBC (International Building Code).
The item in bold are addressed in this post. As an Arizona Architect, most City’s jurisdictions work with the IBC (International Building Code). This code analysis is based upon the IBC.
Should my door have panic hardware?
Panic hardware – ‘A device designed to provide fast and easy egress in an emergency. Where is it required by code?’
Panic hardware is required by code in a few locations. Use it in buildings for its ease of exit. The following are some basics on where it applies:
Doors serving Occupancy ‘H’ – Hazardous
Occupancy ‘A’ (Assembly) or ‘E’ (Education) where occupant load is > 50.
Electrical Rooms with equipment rated at 1,200 amperes or more and over 6 ft wide that contains switching devices or control devices.
Exception – Panic hardware not required for the following:
Main Exit in Occupancy A(assembly) where occupant load is less than 300.
In occupancy types B(business), F(factory), M(mercantile) and places of religious worship, the main exterior doors are permitted to be equipped with key-operating locking devices provided: 1. Locking device is readily distinguishable as locked. 2. Sign adjacent to door states “This door to remain unlocked when building is occupied”
Summary
Should my door have panic hardware? Use them in spaces with large amounts of occupants or in rooms with hazardous conditions. The purpose of panic hardware is to ensure safety and security of a building. Panic Hardware isn’t required in all Occupancy types. It does allow occupants an easy means of egress. Always verify with current codes or specialist to ensure that your condition is code compliant.
As an Architect, I interact with clients, engineers and contractors who have acquired bits of information about Building Codes. Sometimes, those bits are misconceptions and regurgitated information. The building codes can be intimidating and have no beginning or end. To learn the code, the best way is jumping in feet first.
Upcoming Blog Posts
In the next series of blog posts, I will explore common simple and more complex Building Codes. Each City has adopted a code but most in Arizona use the IBC (International Building Code).
The issues to be addressed in the following Blog Posts are:
Door swing direction. Which way should the door swing, out of a room or in?
The item in bold to be addressed in this post. As an Arizona Architect, most City’s jurisdictions work with the IBC (International Building Code). The code analysis is based upon the IBC.
Door Swing Direction
A buildings exit pathway typically consists of and exit pathway with hallways containing doors from offices, restrooms, mechanical rooms, leading to the exterior. In certain scenarios, the doors can swing either in or out. In some cases, functionality within the space dictates a swing direction unless code overrides. Below is a graphic showing door swing IN versus OUT.
There are sliding doors, roll up doors, revolving doors, however ‘most’ of those do not meet code requirements. I say ‘most’ because there are some exceptions and some manufacturers who have come up with creative solutions around this issue. Note in the graphic above, the door swinging out or into the hallway would block circulation. There is code requirements for clear hallway width, which will be discussed in upcoming blog posts. In this scenario, swinging into the office was preferable. Each office was small enough to allow doors to swing in.
Hinged (swinging) doors required unless:
Private garages, office areas, factory and storage areas with an occupant load of 10 or less.
Group I-3 Occupancies used as a place of detention
Critical or intensive care patient rooms within suits of health care facilities
Doors serving single dwelling unit (apartments/child care) under specific occupancy count (see code)
Doors serving a bathroom in Occ. R-1 (residential)
etc. The code goes into more details with exceptions
The factors which typically dictate the direction of the door swing are as follows:
Number of occupants.
Type of Occupancy
Hazardous condition of room
Number of occupants is determined by Occupancy type. For instance, the code has a table which calculates the number of occupants per s.f. For example, an office space of 4,000 s.f. would have an occupant load of 4000/100 or 40 occupants. See example below.
When occupant load is 50 or greater, doors shall swing in direction of travel or ‘out’.
Office Scenario
In the example below, each office may have less than 50 occupants. Those individual office doors swing in. The accumulation of all office occupants however exceeds 50 occupants. The door out of the general office area to the main exit corridor (in dark red) would need to swing ‘out’.
Other factors such as hazardous conditions can dictate the swing of a door. For example, within an electrical room, when the overall power exceeds 1200A, doors must swing in direction of travel.
Summary
What is the reasoning for swinging doors in the direction of travel in larger occupant loads or hazardous conditions? Imagine you are at an event with over 50 people and an emergency occurs, such as a fire. If you are the first person to reach the door and all 50 people rush in panic to the exit door at the same time, it would be difficult to swing the door towards yourself. Everyone would be pushing to move forward and out of the space. Therefore, swinging out would be easier to open. The code is created, reviewed and modified from years of learning from past mistakes.
When learning building codes, once you begin digging into the code, it begins to make sense. In regards to door swing, swinging in the direction of travel or outward will work for all conditions in the code. However when it is not required, such as in a small office, storage room or bedroom, functionally it may make sense to swing into the room. Look at how many occupants are within the room and determine if the room is a hazardous condition. When in doubt, rely on an Arizona Architect to explore the code and assist you.
Frequently, Serbin Studio gets pulled away from the design of commercial building to design Public art. Whether designing a building or a sculpture, a similar process is involved. Conceptual design of various renditions are created for the Buckeye Main Street Coalition (entity in charge of creating the art), once a direction is selected, construction documentation is developed. The plans created are submitted to the city for permitting.
The art is a continuation of the sculptures found in Downtown Buckeye previously designed, fabricated and installed near Buckeye City Hall. That originally involved 4 sculptures that included a tractor, a cowboy roper, a cowgirl barrel racer and a cotton boll. www.serbinstudio.com/public-works/
Art Description
This projects consist of sculptures fabricated from sheets of steel. The prior sculptures were slightly larger and required their own footings. This time, our design intent was to design sculptures that would not require the expense of a large concrete footing. Two of the sculptures are 8′ tall so the effect known as Cantilever – “rigid structural element, such as a beam or a plate, anchored at one end” created a requirement for the sculptures to be stiff enough to allow for bending forces created from the occasional monsoon wind gust. This pushed the steel thickness to 3/4″.
A 4′ X 8′ sheet of steel at 3/4″ thick is approx. 1K LBS. This created another fabrication challenge. Fabrication, maneuvering them around the shop and shop fabrication or cutting of the steel. Once the sculptures were cut, powder coating would wrap the steel in the desired color.
The location of the sculptures are at 4th street and Monroe in Downtown Historic Buckeye. If you know the history of Buckeye, this intersection was the main cross streets of a Town that was the thoroughfare from downtown Phoenix to San Diego up to the early 1970’s. Now I-10 bypasses this quite town, but recently, the town is in its early stages of revival.
Downtown Buckeye in the 1930’s. It was a busy time back then.
The sculptures are located at the 4 corners of Monroe and 4th street. They reference the local fauna and flora of Arizona.
The Saguaro and ocotillo are going to be fabricated by the Arizona Corrections. The Barrel and Prickly cactus will be fabricated by the Buckeye High School Metal shop.
Art Presentation Graphics
Saguaro located at Northeast corner of Monroe and 4th Street
ocotillo located at NorthWest corner of Monroe and 4th Street
Prickly Pear located at SouthWest corner of Monroe and 4th Street
Barrel Cactus located at Southeast corner of Monroe and 4th Street
Looking forward to more Public Art in downtown Buckeye.
The Liquor Corral, a business in Historic Downtown Buckeye, is revitalizing the façade to bring new life to a building which contains a thriving business, yet a tired exterior appearance.
The original building is your typical standard metal structure you may see on surrounding properties throughout Buckeye. Years ago, a covered wood porch entryway was built on the front north facade to embellish the standard building.
The new improvements include a new entry doorway and windows without the present security bars to open the building and make it more welcoming/inviting. Sliding barn doors with a cut metal pattern were added for security. It allows it to be very transparent during the day with added security at night when closed.
View of store open View of store closed
New exterior raw steel material was added to the north building facade along Monroe Avenue with a design elegance reflecting the motive of western wear. The pattern of cowboy boot design was used as the inspiration for the fenestration. Custom steel panels were designed and cut using a sophisticated computer aided machine.
project material and inspiration
The panels have a natural rust patina finish. This finish is seen throughout the desert southwest in many forms. Architecturally, it brings a warmth and a level of sophistication to the building.
