Ashton Mitchell state that the challenge for the design team was that the corridor ceiling was 1400mm wide and required free access to plenum services. A standard 1200 x 600mm ceiling module would have required a sub frame support encumbering access and resulting in 100mm side cuts resulting in excessive waste on site.

Following the success of the Symonds Street student accommodation project custom Triton 1400 x 300mm ceiling panels were manufactured by local ceiling company Asona Ltd and mounted on Rondo DX grid that free spanned the corridor with load supported by the perimeter trim.

“We are delighted with the result,” says Neil Ridgway, Managing Director at Asona. “The collaboration and coordination between design team, constructors and manufacturer worked really well to help eliminate waste on site and deliver a good result,” he said.

Asona Ltd is a New Zealand manufacturer of acoustic ceiling and wall panels based in Auckland. It manufactures a wide range of panels from locally sourced materials such as glass fibre board, polyester boards, perforated GIB plasterboard, perforated plywood and MDF panels. Asona also operates several initiatives to reduce carbon costs including local manufacturing, packaging take back and reuse scheme, ceiling panel recycle and renew services, and made to measure product to reduce waste on site.