“Wine rejoices the heart of man and joy is the mother of all virtues.”—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

According to the team over at Hall Winery in St. Helena, Calif., amend that statement to say wine and good views. When constructing its St. Helena Visitor Center, winery president Mike Reynolds says unobstructed views of the scenery surrounding the building were the main focus.

“What we really wanted to do with our location was to showcase the spectacular views in all directions from the winery in all directions and integrate the hospitality experience with the outdoor experience,” says Reynolds.

In addition to the views, Reynolds says the structural glazing used to complete the building is a wow-factor.

“The really interesting thing for me is that it’s a structural glass construction, meaning that the glass is hanging from the roof rather than being supported from below,” he states. “When the building was built, rather than a traditional storefront glass, it’s actually just glass held together by a spider-type connection. If you look at it hanging from above, there are vertical fins. Rather than having the mullions in the windows that interrupt the view, we only have glass throughout.”

“We used all structural glazing for the façade,” says Jarrod Denton, partner at Signum Architecture in St. Helena, Calif. “We wanted really high visible transmittance; this glass is 67 percent … it makes for a seamless indoor-outdoor transition.”

The structure also used radial walls inside to separate the tasting areas.

“The structural glazing—the fins—come in and touch the radial walls … so when you’re standing within any point within the hospitality area you feel as though you’re standing out on a balcony. The glass fins are held 8 feet above your head,” Denton adds.

When selecting the glass for the LEED Gold Certification-pending building, Reynolds says wine temperature was a concern.

“Obviously, there are temperature needs so we had to make sure the provisional space inside would not overheat … All of our wine buildings are built to LEED specifications. This is actually the first [pending] LEED Gold winery in the state of California,” Reynolds adds.

Hall Winery’s glass is structural glazing from Systems West in Guangdong, China. Troy McKinley of Hathaway Dinwiddie in San Francisco served as the project manager/general contractor.