Mercure Son Tra Resort project of Saigon General Service Corporation (Savico) has recently broken ground in Da Nang. This construction  is designed based on the concept of environmental friendly architecture (green architecture) with the sense of saving energy and water, and using sustainable materials (the production of these materials does not affect the environment).

Explaining about the concept of green architecture which is applied in this construction, architect Duong Hong Hien said that the direction of the house must be determined first. The project consists of two parts: the 120 room hotel and 22 villas. Direction of the hotel is East - West is but of the villa is North - South.

East-West direction is selected for the hotel since the West is covered by mountains and the East has the sunlight to help limit the use of artificial light, meanwhile, visitors do not regularly stay in the room so the blazing sunlight does not affect their activities and energy for lighting and air conditioning can be saved.

For the villa, most of the shorter sides with few windows are put toward sunny directions to reduce the energy consumption in air conditioning.

Next, the distribution of light is related to the use of the work: for example, lobby areas will have minimal light but the center will have a lot more. Toilets of hotel rooms and the villas have transparent glasses to  utilize light from the bedrooms, reducing the use lamps.

Simultaneously, all the doors use anti mosquito nets to let the air come in to help limit the use of air conditioners most of the time; rain water or wastewater is put into the wastewater treatment plant to be reused, after processing, they will be returned to the lake and allocated to irrigation. Drinking water (tap water) is separated from irrigating water.

Architect Hien said that he had also planned to install solar lights for walkways of the area, they would absorb light in daytime and emit light at night. The lights would be energy saving bulbs or long life and energy saving LEDs (the investments depend on locations). Solar water heating system is the priority measure for the hotel.

The interior of Mercure Son Tra Resort will focus on using natural categories including natural tiles, sand paintings on the walls, natural woods for decoration and hand-made ceramics. Cloths will be silk, jute and cotton.

On the other hand, the roof of the hotel can be seen from the mountain or the main entrance, so planting grass on rooftops is researched as a solution for the landscape and can help reduce the reluctant participation of concrete in the nature of the coast.

Planting trees in proper places to shade bedrooms and living rooms of the villa area is also a special concern in landscape design to save energy used for air conditioning.

By Minh Duc