End of the Service Life of Ceramic Cladding: Lessons from the Girasol Building in Madrid

Abstract

In the summer of 2015, the existing ceramic cladding of the Girasol Building in Madrid went through an inspection campaign that left all underlying occurrences of detachment exposed. The community of neighbors then decided to renew the façade, therefore marking the end of the service life (SL) of the cladding. A visual assessment of the façade was thus made in order to quantify its overall condition after 49 years of SL. These data are used to provide real life feedback and discuss existing methods of SL estimation. The information gathered confirms that 50 years (or 100 aging cycles) are accurate estimations for the SL of ceramic claddings for a 20% level of degradation. Conclusions are also reached regarding the relationship between SL, threshold limits, and their dependency on human decision making processes.