In conceiving a design for the Corporate Park Building in Sao Paulo, Brazil, the architects at Collaço & Collaço Arquitetura sought to use premium building materials to convey a feeling of permanence and to achieve a high-quality aesthetic. The end result was a project that used natural stone from various points in Europe, which was imported into Brazil for fabrication and installation.

The task of coordinating the stonework for the project was handled by the LuxStone Group, which controlled and supervised the job. To meet the design goals of Collaço & Collaço Arquitetura, natural stone was shipped in from Italy, Greece and Spain. A total of 130,000 square feet of flamed Gegrege granite was specified as exterior cladding. On the building itself, the granite was specified as geometric panels with simple modern detailing. This was complemented by modern glasswork. The granite was also used for “showcase” exterior elements such as a large fountain.

Inside the building, the stone usage shifts to marble, with polished beige, tan and red varieties used for the floors, walls and columns. Virtually all of the flooring inside the facility - from the main lobbies to the entrances and elevator lobbies - was custom cut for the project, and it features a circular pattern. The stone for this design, which was conceived by Collaço & Collaço Arquitetura, was cut with computer numerically controlled (CNC) technology. To program the CNC machinery prior to fabrication, LuxStone's engineers had to adapt the architects' drawings into the proper language for programming the processing unit.

In addition to the flooring, the stone used at the reception desks also has a radius pattern, and each of the pieces used for the countertops and facing had to be cut with a high degree of precision. In all, over 45,000 feet of stone was specified for the interior of the project.

All of the stonework was processed by two factories - Antares and Itaarte - which are part of the LuxStone Group. The total project took 19 months, including the import of marble slabs from Italy, Greece and Spain, the stone processing and the installation.

“In a very tough market, Sao Paulo, Brazil, LuxStone Group had to be very competitive to develop this huge job,” according to LuxStone. “The whole process was carefully controlled by the factories' production managers, who take care of each little detail, especially when dealing with the lobby drawings. All the cut pieces for the lobby floor and tops were properly kept at the job site to avoid damage.”

With the completion of the Corporate Park Building, LuxStone Group has also worked on large-scale architectural projects outside of Brazil, including two major hotel projects in the U.S. It has also begun marketing in Europe.