Kalwall® By Stoakes Systems – Useable Natural Daylight for Sports Halls

Traditional sports hall design relied totally on artificially lighting to provide a glare and shadow free environment, essential for the playing all ball sports. However, this meant that all the benefits of natural daylight have had to be sacrificed. Now, by using Kalwall, sports hall design can benefit from the cost reducing and psychological benefits of natural daylight - without the sharp contrasts of light and shade associated with glazing.

Kalwall solves the problem of how to transmit useable natural daylight into sports halls. Kalwall is quite different to other light transmitting products because it diffuses evenly distributed daylight deep into the building. The quality of the diffusion of daylight through Kalwall is especially important for fast moving sports and ball games.

Kalwall’s unique composition combines to reduce solar gain while at the same time maximising thermal insulation, and Kalwall diffuses light so efficiently that even direct sunlight is converted into even illumination with reduced glare. Using Kalwall in a sports hall can result in lower energy costs for artificial light, heating and air-conditioning. It reduces or eliminates the need for blinds, curtains or external solar control devices. In addition, although Kalwall transmits light it provides privacy as it cannot be seen through.

Kalwall panels can be flat or curved and by providing a range of insulation densities the thermal resistance and therefore insulation values can be varied. Kalwall is able to transmit large amounts of usable daylight into a sports hall with relatively low levels of light transmission. Panels can be selected to transmit various percentages of light according to individual project requirements, and we can provide a unique daylight modelling service to simulate the effect of Kalwall on specific building and sports requirements.

Since being introduced to the UK by Stoakes Systems in 1997, Kalwall has been successfully specified by architects on a huge variety of projects. Some recent sports hall applications are illustrated here, demonstrating the versatility of application and the unique properties of this widely acclaimed system.

In sports halls, playing, exercising and recreational conditions are dramatically improved with the natural daylight Kalwall provides - no more artificially-lit black boxes!