Kuwait Opera House

The Project

Sheikh Jaber Al-Ahmad Cultural Centre (Kuwait Opera House) is the largest cultural centre and opera house in the Middle East. Completed in 2016, the 214,000 square-metre complex was Inspired by Islamic architectural tradition.

The $775million project won the Cultural & Heritage Project of the Year at the 2018 MEED Projects.


 

The Challenge

The construction of landmark global and regional destinations requires careful management in all matters of health, safety and productivity and the Sheikh Jaber Al-Ahmad Cultural Centre is no different.

Already working within very exact and precise guidelines, the project required access to the façade of the building in order to clad, glaze and carry out associated external works. With an irregular shaped façade and multiple irregular and unique cladding and glazing panels, the project required a solution which would not only allow safe and efficient work at height but could also handle multiple complex installation procedures. The ideal solution would provide all this while being sympathetic to the aesthetic designs of the building and maintain safe and practical access in and around the project site.

The Solution

Rapid Access undertook a detailed and comprehensive project site survey to establish the ideal access solution. The survey considered the entire range of indoor and outdoor manlift solutions, specific scenario-based training, bespoke material handling solutions and ongoing site support.

A full managed service partnership was provided to the site which satisfied the supply and maintenance of the aerial work platforms (AWPs) alongside enhanced safety measures that Rapid Access could supply to both main-contractor and sub-contractors alike.

The Benefits

With early engagement from Rapid Access, the customer was offered a comprehensive ‘one-stop’ solution for all manlift requirements. This included specific training tailored to the equipment and the working envelopes experienced on site. Rapid Access were able to provide products designed specifically to achieve timely and safe completion of the work, including SkyRak® and SkyRak+® material handling attachments.

Manlifts supplied by Rapid Access provided the Sheikh Jaber Al-Ahmad Cultural Centre project site with the ideal safe and mobile solution. Powered access offers significant benefits over scaffolding solutions by providing easy to manoeuvre solutions which are quicker to put into place, versatile in terms of people and tools, and can effectively work alongside other powered equipment such as telehandlers and cranes.

As the region’s largest rental specialist, Rapid Access also provided its market-leading AWP solution which included dedicated project management team and dedicated on-site AWP engineering support. Rapid Access on-site partnership provided immediate advice, support and guidance to maximise machine uptime whilst delivering substantial savings over alternative products and providers.