Beautiful living in the hotel
New construction with a difference, handicap accessible and sustainable
Surrounded by seas and the Alps, in a rural setting on the edge of the Alling industrial park and just 22 km from Munich’s city centre, you’ll find the Lichtblick Hotel. Located at Sonnenlicht 3, it takes its name from the rooms suffused with daylight and a completely barrier-free design - from the entrance to the underground car park, lifts, rooms, bathrooms, restaurants, and seminar rooms.
Data
| Building type | Hotel and catering (International) |
|---|---|
| Area | approx. 1,500 m² |
| Country | Germany |
The 22 modern hotel rooms with kitchenettes, approximately 40 m² in size, allow business travellers and vacation-goers to live and work comfortable away from home. When furnishing the interior, the building owners prioritised appealing materials for healthy living, and user friendliness, durability, and sustainability were the focus for the floor.
Hotel management commissioned the master workshop Willi Weigl, from Moorenweis, for the flooring work. The room furnishing company has many years of experience with properties of different kinds and has executed a variety of hotel projects. To implement the criteria desired as best as possible - the floor covering should impart a sense of well-being and be suitable for wheelchair users - the floor experts suggested a Kugelgarn textile floor covering in a bold aubergine colour that would be easy to care for. This contrasts with the light-flooded architecture in the interior, and creates a counterbalance to the light, friendly colours of the furnishings. “This ‘earthing’ is also important for wheelchair users, because a dark floor offers more security,” explains decorator Willi Weigl. No tile was installed in the handicap-accessible bathrooms; instead, resilient floor coverings were chosen for the 500 m² of floor and walls.
The task: sustainable floor installation
The hard-wearing carpeting was meant to be installed on about 1,500 m² of area in such a way that it could stand up to wear in halls, stairs, and the restaurant, and offer the greatest level of security possible. Meeting the “barrier-free” requirement included installation with no thresholds, and perfect execution as well as a healthy living environment, because the building owners are looking out for the good of the guests. Thus the right installation system, which should be low-emission and ecologically harmless, was also of particular importance. The UZIN Terra Line was chosen for this, a new sustainable, super low-emission floor system that contributes significantly to reducing CO2 consumption with a modified raw material selection, increased use of renewable resources, and a new packaging concept. “The value placed on sustainable products has become more significant,” explains Helmut Wolfgruber, UZIN sales agent for installation materials. “Those who operate public buildings, hotels, and restaurants pay extra attention to aspects like indoor air quality, low emissions, and sustainability, and factor opportunities for renaturation, recycling capability, and CO2 output into their plans.”
The challenge: reliable, slip-proof installed floor coverings
The floor covering in hotels must be completely slip-proof and non-skid, especially when suitcases are rolling over it and pieces of luggage or serving trolleys are moved. The floor covering is often exposed to extremely high levels of wear, especially on stairs and in highly frequented areas. “The products have to function perfectly here, and the floor layer must understand their craft and execute it securely,” explains UZIN sales agent Wolfsgruber. “Along with low-odour and low-emission installation materials for primer, levelling compound, and adhesive, we didn’t just need the requested sustainable products, but also completely reliable materials.” Ideal requirements for using the new
sustainable UZIN Terra Line, which securely bonds floor coverings without impacting technical performance and optimally prepares the substrate. In comparison to conventional installation systems, this can save about 250 kg of CO2 on a floor area of about 1,000 m2. This happens through the reduction of synthetic raw materials in primer and levelling compound, and the increased use of renewable raw materials in the adhesive. CO2 can be further reduced with new types of packaging, like the bag-in-box. “Because the system is coordinated, I know that everything works and goes together; furthermore, disposal can be done without a problem and I’m doing something for the environment,” says decorator Willi Weigl.
The solution: coordinated installation products with the sustainability factor
Using the new floor system on the job site worked right off the bat. After sanding and vacuuming, the floor layer applied the ready-made primer UZIN Terraprimo 10. In a sturdy, reusable plastic bag, It reduces the plastics scrap by more than 70% compared to a conventional canister. The advantage for you: it provides a lot of coverage and dries fast. So the floor layer went right to smoothing the floor with the sustainable smoothing and levelling compound UZIN Terraplan 20. It has superior flow characteristics and the Level Plus Effect, which contributes to a very smooth surface and thus also reduces the subsequent application of adhesive. Like other products in the Terra Line, the primer is solvent-free, super low-emission, and designated with the Emicode EC 1 Plus and the Blue Angel in accordance with RAL-UZ 113. It features improved CO2 balance by almost 15% in contrast with comparable UZIN levelling compounds, and is offered in a 20 kg bag made of unbleached paper. “The sustainable dispersion-based adhesive UZIN Terracoll 30 for textile and linoleum floor coverings won me over in particular,” says the floor expert. It’s easy to spread and shows pronounced adhesive stringing after just a short time, as well as high initial and final strength. The increased use of renewable resources
combined with optimised packaging - in the 100% recycled plastic bucket - means that UZIN Terracoll 30 features an improved CO2 balance by about 70% in contrast to comparable UZIN dispersion-based adhesives.
The result: sustainably beautiful
“Using the first installation system in the floor industry that was developed based on sustainable criteria was worth it,” confirms Willi Weigl. “The installation materials coordinated with each other, consisting of the primer UZIN Terraprimo 10, the levelling compound UZIN Terraplan 20, and the adhesive UZIN Terracoll 30 work with absolute dependability, cause little odour, and are convenient to apply. The outcome is an ideally installed floor in the hotel, modern and trend-setting - with a distinctly improved CO2 balance.”
