Renovation, restoration, and functional and systems upgrades

Client Name: A nationally recognized consortium in the Global Services sector

Project Name: Bid for the awarding of contracts for the renovation, restoration, and functional and systems upgrades of the Casa d’Italia in Zurich

Project Period: April – June 2023

Total cost of the project: 16 ,855,474 CHF

Buildings involved: Historic building located in Zurich

The work involved identifying improvements to the final design—which had already been prepared by a third party and attached to the bid documents—and preparing the technical proposal to describe the qualitative and methodological characteristics of the bid and demonstrate the bidder’s experience in similar projects.
The project called for renovation and conservation-oriented restoration of the building, the reconfiguration of interior spaces, a complete upgrade of the building systems, and the construction of a new outdoor guardhouse. Bidders were required to describe the solutions adopted for the construction site setup, the methods for organizing and managing the work, the planned environmental protection measures, and any improvements to the building systems to be incorporated into the final design. Following a careful analysis of this documentation, a thorough on-site inspection was conducted.
Having established a complete picture of the current state of the building, the first proposal was to streamline and simplify the heating system. All heating circuits were converted to low-temperature operation, thereby enabling the design of a hybrid system—comprising modular boilers and a multi-purpose heat pump—to serve them. The heat pump produces either hot or chilled water—depending on the season—for the various circuits and, thanks to the condensation heat recovery system during summer operation, supplies the reheating coils of the air handling units year-round. In addition, a proposal was made to separate domestic hot water production by introducing a standalone boiler, and the ventilation system was reorganized to allow for functional separation between the two distinct areas of the building with different uses. The proposed innovations will increase the reliability of the new system by fully leveraging the unique characteristics of each generator and will significantly reduce both energy consumption and CO2 emissions compared to the initial project version.
In drafting the technical proposal, great attention was paid to safety, taking into account both Italian and Swiss regulations, and proposing a dynamic site organization capable of responding to the varying needs of the different work phases. Finally, given the presence on-site of three protected chestnut trees, several protective measures were identified, such as mapping the root systems, replacing the soil with beneficial fungi and bacteria, and periodically monitoring the trees’ health.