PLUS LEED-ND brings Rust Belt renewal 33 Who controls the destiny of LEDs? 77 How Manitoba Hydro got it right 130 G r e e n B u i l d i n g & D e s i gN MAR C H + A P RIL 2 0 1 3
THE LIGHTING ISSUE Bringi
Cline Bettridge Bernstein Derek Porter
ar S t r e e tc ng the
Focus Lighting Glenn Heinmiller Le Corbusier Lumen Architecture Marlon Blackwell Skidmore, Owings & Merrill Weiss/Manfredi and more
ka p l a n T h o m p s o n ’s Pa s s i v H a u s - i n s p i r e d b u d g e t b u i l d 150
, Mosq Temples
ues, & M
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: Fi v e rches
contem
p o ra r y
s of house
worsh
ip 58
w n to w n lo s a n g e le s 44 n d o l l a rs ) b a c k t o d o ( a n d a b i l li o
Naomi Miller
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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
In This Issue Lumen Architecture, p.104
the lighting issue
Derek Porter, p.158
photos: mike sinclair; tim hursley; albert verČerka/esto
Weiss/Manfredi, p.116
Marlon Blackwell, p.66
gbdmagazine.com
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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
Table of Contents Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List p11
p27
p43
p57
p79
p87
p115
p149
p155
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gb&d
GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
12 14 19 20 22 24
Editor’s picks Guest Editor Tom Darden Green Scene Lightfair International Notebook Alan Oakes at Ronchamp Defined Design Twin Sails Bridge Defined Design Ryerson Image Centre
150 Budget Build Thompson Residence, Kaplan Thompson Architects 153 Energy Retrofit The Old Church, Imagine Energy
Glowing Greener
156 157 158 160 162
operations
Ford Motor Company The Swig Company New Bedford Housing Authority Greensboro Housing Authority
Design
DEvelopment
Denver Housing Authority Siena College Jordan School District
33 Raimi + Associates 34 WD Schorsch LLC
44 48 51 54
Seidman Cancer Center, Cannon Design Information Technology Facility, University of Iowa
89 Introduction 90 Yotel NYC, Focus Lighting 94 Glenn Heinmiller, Lam Partners 100 BAM Fisher Building, Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design 103 Parans Skylight 104 Claremont University Consortium Administration Building, Lumen Architecture 108 Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center
28 29 31
36 37 39 40
80 85
Los Angeles Streetcar John Kane Mercy Housing Warren Wilson College
Play
116 122 125
Brooklyn Botanic Garden Visitor Center, Weiss/Manfredi Architecture/ Landscape/Urbanism Cornell Plantations Welcome Center Endémico Resguardo Silvestre
TOOLBOX Tomorrow’s Lighting Material World Onyx Solar Designer to Watch Derek Porter Groundwork Green Leaf Inn Show & Tell Jack DeBartolo III
Plus From the Publisher Editor’s note Index People & Companies VERBATIM Stacey McMahan VERBATIM Naomi Miller VERBATIM Steven Bluestone Index Advertisers
7 9 10 25 77 112 161
Learn
places of worship 58 Introduction 60 Prayer Pavilion of Light,
126 Jean Tyson Child Development Study Center 129 White Tank Branch Library work
DeBartolo
Architects 63 Westchester Reform Temple, Rogers Marvel Architects 66 St. Nicholas Eastern Orthodox Church, Marlon Blackwell Architect 70 Green Mosque Proposal, Faith In Place 72 Cathedral of Christ the Light, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
130 134 136 137 138 140
Manitoba Hydro Place Cambridge Discovery Park, The Bulfinch Companies One Oak Park, Means Knaus Partners Archway Studios Stowell & Friedman Offices, Von Weise Associates AIA Colorado Headquarters, 186 Lighting Design Group
live
142 145 146 gbdmagazine.com
Simpatico Prototype, Simpatico Homes Dani Ridge House Third + Bond, The Hudson Companies Incorporated march–april 2013
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CREATE. ENHANCE. SUSTAIN.
Fusing science, engineering, and design solutions, AECOM works to incorporate sustainability in order to shape a better tomorrow. We are responsible for numerous LEED projects, as well as for developing new and innovative sustainable methods.
Manitoba Hydro Place, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada Eduard Hueber/archphoto.com
www.aecom.com
GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
From the Publisher Bright Lights, Big City
photo: samantha simmons
Living on the 36th floor of a River North high-rise in downtown Chicago, I really don’t have much to complain about. Downtown living definitely has its perks—some of the world’s best restaurants are steps from my front door, Michigan Avenue shopping is dangerously close, and while an hour long commute from the suburbs is standard for some, I only walk four blocks to my office every morning. I am spoiled. But on the downside, at night, the neighboring office lights do a better job of lighting my bedroom than my own lighting fixtures. Issues of lighting have become of particular interest to me, especially as we put together the Lighting Issue. So I can’t help but stare out my window and wonder what types of lighting my office neighbors are using. Is it energy efficient? Are they incandescents? Fluorescents? LEDs? A far greater number of questions goes into the design and installation of this lighting, especially in corporate environments. How could it not? We’ve seen the impact lighting has on individuals in the workplace and the difference it can make on one’s mood, comfort level, productivity, and overall happiness. As new lighting technologies continue to surface we must absolutely look at the human health benefits but also further yet, into the overall performance with regard to efficiency, operational life, reduced power consumption, and ROI. In this issue of gb&d, we talk to Naomi Miller about how the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory is collecting hard data on lighting technology and its building applications (p.77). Miller, a senior lighting engineer for the laboratory, discusses breakthroughs in LEDs’ visual effects, how they impact art conservation, and their life-cycle cost implications. With such valuable information out there, it is important to stay connected. This is why we’re bringing the issue to Lightfair International (p.19). We can’t wait to see what networking and edgbdmagazine.com
ucational opportunities the event has to offer, so we didn’t—we interviewed Rochelle Burt, vice president of Lightfair, who told us about new technologies, conference tracks, and the future of the conference. Speaking of tracks, though a very different kind, I’m excited to present the Los Angeles Streetcar project (p.44). Shiraz Tangri gives us an inside look at the impact that a modern streetcar system could have on LA. The city-stimulating development will spur employment and create more livable communities, and it’s estimated that more than $1 billion in development could be catalyzed by the streetcar plan. That’s a lot of dough. Shiraz tells us, “There has been a major residential boom here . . . so there’s greater interest in transit from people like me who are transplants from other cities, looking around and saying, ‘Why is no one walking in Los Angeles?’” Though there is a great deal of interest in a streetcar for downtown LA, funding plays an integral and difficult part of the equation. As Shiraz works to secure a combination of federal and local dollars, we are excited at the possibilities of what LA Streetcar could bring to the city. There are a lot more numbers to crunch and topics to discuss, but I’ll let you dive in to the issue and see for yourself. Go ahead, be enlightened. Best,
Laura Heidenreich Associate Publisher laura@gbdmagazine.com march–april 2013
7
GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
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LeeAnne Hawley, Whitney LaMora Office Manager
Samantha Childs
gb&d
GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
Editor’s Note Lighting Studies
portrait: samantha simmons; cover photo: glenn heinmiller/lam partners
A few months ago I found myself at a Dan Deacon show. The Baltimore-based electronics artist is known for his audience participation, and during one song, he asked everyone with a smart phone to hold it up. With their phones held high, everyone activated the Dan Deacon app. Suddenly every screen turned red, and the venue went dark. As Deacon began to play, the phones changed color in perfect unison. I was amazed; the phones’ mics were picking up the music. Different sound frequencies became blue, orange, green—even activated the LED flash to create mini-strobe lights all around us. It was an amazing use of technology and sound to create an interactive light show, and gazing at the phones-turned-luminaires, I couldn’t help but think about how technology has changed us and our experiences—especially regarding light. Our Lighting Issue therefore is dedicated to ideas as innovative as Deacon’s, and we have plenty to share. Some of those ideas also use consumer technology; in the new AIA Colorado offices, lights are controlled with iPads (p.140). Other ideas are visually bold, such as the way Marlon Blackwell used primary colors to flood a shed-turned-Eastern Orthodox Church, one of five houses of worship we explore in Green Typologies (p.58). Still other ideas are dynamic in a more elegant way, such as Glenn Heinmiller’s design for Kansas City’s Kauffman Center for Performing Arts (p.94), a stairwell from which graces our cover. I’m especially thrilled to present a dialogue on sustainability in lighting design. Six designers share their thoughts on energy, education, and the one innovation they’re waiting on. Heinmiller, who is chair of the IALD’s Energy and Sustainability Committee, is joined by principals from Focus Lighting, Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design, and Lumen Architecture. It begins on p.93. Unsurprisingly, LEDs are still the hottest thing gbdmagazine.com
around—but sometimes they’re too hot, and often they’re hotly debated. The consensus seems to be that LED technology is wonderful but new; there are some bugs to work out. And that’s where Naomi Miller comes in. She left her own lighting design practice for the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, where she’s involved in a government-funded study of LED performance in real-world applications (p.77). On the other side of the field we have our Designer to Watch Derek Porter, who takes an equally educated but even more intellectual approach to the field. Read the interview on p.158. One final highlight is our Guest Editor, Make It Right’s executive director, Tom Darden (p.14). Darden is Brad Pitt’s man on the ground in New Orleans, and he chose for us a few of his favorite things and discussed the foundation’s foray into non-New Orleans development. This Lighting Issue has been one of my favorite issues to make because it feels as if the industry is transforming right before my eyes. Lighting technology improves by the day. And as Heinmiller admits on p.97, although we don’t know what’s next, one thing is for sure: the future is bright. Cheers,
Timothy A. Schuler Managing Editor tim@gbdmagazine.com
ON THE COVER Light is intrinsic to our perception of life and our own humanity. We chose this photo of a stairwell in Kansas City’s Kauffman Center because it seemed to capture that idea. Lam Partners’ lighting design invites reflection— and uses it. The pale washes of color are the carpet, reflected.
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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
Index People & Companies
# A B
186 Lighting Design Group, 140 ADD, Inc., 134 Adobe Creative Suite Subscription Service, 15 Airefco, 154 Akari Light Sculptures, 162 Akerstream, Tom, 130 Ameresco, 40 Anders & Falltrick, 52 Anderson Ashton Design/Build, 160 Architectural Cast Stone, 35 Architectural Lighting Works, 140 Architecture for Humanity, 25 Archway Studios, 137 ATMI Precast, 35 Baird Sampson Neuert, 122 Baldwin, Vernoice, 126 Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center, 108 Barry, Hugh, 85 Bastianini, Francesca, 106 Beauregard, Steve, 39 Beltran, Alvaro, 157 Bettridge, Francesca, 100 Blackwell, Marlon, 66 Bluestone, Steven, 112 Bosch, 151 Boucher, Michael, 62 Boulevard Court, 51 Braungart, Michael, 15 Breuer, Marcel, 64 Brian C. Nevin Welcome Center, 122 Bringing Back Broadway, 45 Brooklyn Academy of Music, 100 Bryant, 154 Build Change, 26 Burnham and Root/D.H. Burnham & Company, 37 Burt, Rochelle, 19 Butterfield, Clare, 70 C Cambridge Discovery Park, 134 Cannon Design, 81 Cardinal Construction, 85 Carver + Schicketanz, 144 Cathedral of Christ the Light, 73 Catholic Diocese of Oakland, 73 CET & Associates, 140 City of Greensboro, 40 City of Los Angeles, 45 Claremont University Consortium, 105 Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design, 100 Cohen, Jonathan, 153 Collins, Peyton, 136 Consullux Lighting Consultants, 24 Cornell Plantations, 122 Cornell University, 122 Cox, James, 40 Cronin, Jim, 134 Cummings, Michael, 90 D D4AR, 13 Dani Ridge House, 144 Darden, Tom, 14 Daues, Stephan, 51 DeBartolo Architects, 60 DeBartolo, Jack III, 60 DeBartolo, Jack Jr., 60 Delta Diversified Enterprises, 110 Denver Housing Authority, 28 Diamond Schmitt Architects, 24 DWL Architects, 129
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E F G H I
Eiss, Steve, 110 EndĂŠmico Resguardo Silvestre, 125 ESC Thul, 140 EYP Mission Critical Facilities, 85 Faith in Place, 70 Farrell, Steve, 54 Fatburger, 53 Finelite, 140 Fisher, Brian, 160 Focus Lighting, 90 Ford Motor Company, 36 Forrester Research, 134 Foscarini Solar Lamp, 156 Frank, Jeff, 103 Frigidaire, 151 Frost, Mark, 29 Gateway, 77 GE LED Accent, 156 GE Lighting, 140 Gensco, 154 Gisolfi, Peter, 64 Goodman, Percival, 64 Gracia Studio, 125 Green Leaf Inn, 160 Green Mosque, 70 Greensboro Housing Authority, 40 Grossman, Larry, 134 Guerrero, Ismael, 28 Hartman, Craig, 73 Haslam, Randy, 31 Heinmiller, Glenn, 95 Hennes, Michael, 102 Herriman Middle School #2, 31 HM White Site Architecture, 117 Holden, Jaffe, 64 Home HeadQuarters, 33 Hudson Companies Incorporated, 146 Hutton Architecture Studio, 140 Hutton, Paul, 140 Imagine Energy, 153 Imren, Ziya, 70 International Association of Lighting Designers, 108 J Jake Dyson Products, 156 Jang, Min, 35 Jean Tyson Child Development Study Center, 126 Jenkins, Nelson, 107 Johnson Ceramics, 151 Jordan School District, 31 K Kane Realty Corporation, 48 Kane, John, 48 Kaplan Thompson Architects, 150 Karlen, Carl, 81 Keane, Marc Peter, 124 Knez Building Systems, 154 Koch Hazard Architects, 25 Koones, Sheri, 12 KPMB Architects, 130 Kreiss, Fritz, 160 Krubiner, Seth, 143 KSK Construction Group, 147 L Lack, Audy, 127 Lackey, Jason, 54 Lam Partners, 95 Le Corbusier, 20 Leading Edge Consulting, 39 LTL Architects, 106 Lightfair International, 19
M N O P R S
Lindenau, Scott, 140 LivingHomes, 17 Los Angeles Streetcar, 45 Louis Poulsen Lighting, 140 Low Income Affordability Network, 40 Low Income Multi-Family (LIMF) Program, 40 Lumen Architecture, 107 Lutron GRAFIK Eye, 140 Mackell, Gregg, 140 Make It Right, 15 Manfredi, Michael, 117 Manitoba Hydro Place, 130 Marasco & Associates, 35 Marlon Blackwell Architects, 66 McCall, Anthony, 102 McDonough, William, 15 McKim, Mead & White Administration Building, 118 McMahan, Stacey, 25 McQueen, Catherine, 160 McShane Construction Company, 35 Means Knaus Partners, 136 Mercy Housing, 51 Milestone Construction Services, 127 Miller Boskus Lack Architects, 127 Miller, Naomi, 77 Mills Building, 37 MLB Construction Services, 31 National Grid, 37 Near West Side Initiative, 33 Nest, 17 New Bedford Housing Authority, 39 New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, 29, 147 Noguchi, Isamu, 162 North Hills Mall, 48 Novak, Alison, 146 Oktem, Onat, 70 Oktema, Zeynep, 70 One Oak Park, 136 Onyx Solar, 157 Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, 77 Parans, 103 Parsons The New School for Design, 158 Pennsylvania Convention Center, 19 Perspective Design, 35 Petruccelli, Armando, 117 Pfizer, 157 Phillips, Ben, 53 Phoenix First Assembly Church, 60 Platek Moon, 156 Porter, Derek, 158 Prayer Pavilion of Light, 60 Prefabulous + Almost Off The Grid, 12 Raimi + Associates, 33 Raimi, Matt, 33 Rakow, Don, 122 Reaveley Engineers & Associates, 31 Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 29 Roger Smith Lighting Design, 62 Rogers Marvel Architects, 63, 147 Rogers, Robert, 64 Ronchamp, 20 Rosetti Hall, 29 Ryan Companies, 85 Ryerson Image Centre, 24 Sacco + McKinney Architects, 31 SALT District, 33 Santa Fe Arts District, 29
Schonour, Sara, 108 Schorsch, William, 34 Sector 9, 17 Seidman Cancer Center, 81 Shoemaker, Anne, 40 Siemens, 13 SimCity, 12 Simpatico Homes, 142 Six Friends East Asian Garden, 124 Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, 73 Softwalks, 13 Speirs + Major, 23 St. Nicholas Eastern Orthodox Church, 66 Stowell & Friedman, 138 Studio B Architects, 140 Studio Como, 140 SVPA Architects, 85 Swatt Miers Architects, 143 Swatt, Robert, 143 Syracuse Center of Excellence, 33 T Tangri, Shiraz, 45 Tapiz at Mariposa, 28 Tech Lighting, 140 The Bluestone Organization, 112 The Bulfinch Companies, 134 The Crystal, 13 The Old Church, 153 The Swig Company, 37 The Upcycle, 15 The Weidt Group, 85 Third + Bond, 146 Thompson, Jesse, 150 Twin Sails Bridge, 22 Tzarnotzky, Uri, 70 U Undercurrent Architects, 137 University Hospitals, 81 University of Arkansas, 126 University of Iowa, 85 Urban Atlantic, 40 Urban Ventures, 29 V Vandenberg, Gary, 35 Vapur Water Bottle, 15 Visual Interest, 140 Von Weise Associates, 138 Von Weise, Chip, 138 W Walsh, Doug, 126 Warren Wilson College, 54 Wasco Products, 103 WD Schorsch LLC, 34 Weiss, Marion, 117 Weiss/Manfredi Architecture/Landscape/ Urbanism, 117 Westchester Reform Temple, 63 White Tank Branch Library, 129 White, Jeff, 36 Wilkinson Eyre Architects, 23 Wong, Chris, 37 Y Yotel NYC, 90
gb&d
GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List 12
Editor’s picks
14
Guest Editor
19
Green Scene
20
Notebook
22
Defined Design
24
Defined Design
New resources for urban design Make It Right’s Tom Darden
Lightfair International 2013
Alan Oakes reaches Ronchamp
Twin Sails Bridge
Ryerson Image Centre
gbdmagazine.com
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UP FRONt
Editor’s Picks
Green building can be fun, just ask anyone who preordered the latest edition of popular computer game SimCity, which weaves questions of energy dependence and pollution into the gameplay. Softwalks also thought about making urban spaces more fun when it invented a simple way to turn sidewalk scaffolding into pocket parks. Ranging from hightech tools (in 4-D, no less) to a book of prefab excellence, our Editor’s Picks are perfect for the jobsite and the coffee table.
Read more a bout Onyx S olar on p.1 57
Walkable Photovoltaic Roofing Don’t walk on just any solar panel; make sure it’s a system from Onyx Solar. The global photovoltaics company is currently developing a solar-generating product that replaces typical roofing material. Composed of elevated ceramic roof tiles laminated with photovoltaic glass, this would give architects a new toolbox for solarenergy solutions without sacrificing walkable surface area.
onyxsolar.com
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the new SimCity The original SimCity debuted in 1989, and aspiring architects and urban planners have long loved designing hypothetical, digital cities. EA Games’ latest version—the first new edition since 2007 and, at the time of press, slated for an early 2013 release—is distinctly of our time and deals with ideas well-known to gb&d readers: the benefits of renewable energy, ways to reduce pollution, and the dangers of depleting our natural resources. Want to share your passion for the environment with your kids? SimCity just made it a little bit easier.
simcity.com
Prefabulous + Almost Off the Grid Sheri Koones hints at something important in the title of her new book: sustainability is not pass or fail. LEED certifies buildings by degrees; mechanical systems are 30 percent or 50 percent more efficient than their predecessors. And a home doesn’t need to be off the grid to be green. In the latest book in her Prefabulous trilogy, Koones profiles 32 American prefab homes, including The GO Home on the cover, built by G•O Logic. And bonus: Robert Redford pens the foreword.
sherikoones.com
gb&d
UP FRONt
Housing the world’s largest exhibition on sustainability, The Crystal opened in 2012 with a light show projected across its façade.
photos: Trent Bell (Prefabulous Cover), Aaron Cansler Photography (Softwalks)
The Crystal When Siemens wanted to fan the flames of the green movement, it went big. The global engineering and building technologies group conceptualized a crystalline structure at London’s Royal Docks that would house the world’s largest exhibition on urban sustainability. It named the building The Crystal and hired Wilkinson Eyre Architects to design it, and although the glassclad building is cool enough, what really got our attention was the opening in 2012, which featured a video mapping that was projected directly onto the multifaceted façade by Innovision.
thecrystal.org
4-Dimensional Augmented Reality
Softwalks
As digital cameras become more and more common on construction sites, Mani GolparvarFard, an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at Virginia Tech, wants to harness them for a new digital tool called the D4AR. Short for 4-Dimensional Augmented Reality, the technology merges in-construction photos with BIM, allowing remote 4-D access, which is 3-D plus time, to a project’s progress. The tool is being beta-tested by Turner Construction on the new World Trade Center building.
Sidewalk sheds are ubiquitous and yet barely noticed. We’ve come to perceive the roofedover pathways beneath construction scaffolding as purely functional, a utilitarian solution that, though dimly lit and ugly, at least lets us get from point A to point B. Softwalks has a better idea. Using a modular kit of planters, seats, counters, and lighting—all of which attach directly to the scaffolding—the company can transform these uninhabitable spaces into pocket parks, an idea so good it was included in Fast Company’s 2012 Innovation by Design Awards.
raamac.cee.vt.edu
citysoftwalks.com
Want more? Download the digital gb&d on your iPad for exclusive photos, video, and more.
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UP FRONt
Guest Editor Tom Darden
UP FRONt
The Make It Right foundation is doing some amazing things in post-Katrina New Orleans. Although Brad Pitt is the celebrity face of the organization, Tom Darden is the man who makes everything happen. As the organization’s executive director, Darden is essentially a nonprofit developer in the Lower Ninth Ward—he’s finding the families, securing the financing, and coordinating the construction for 150 homes. Homes by the likes of Frank Gehry and Thom Mayne. Darden carved time out of his busy schedule to serve as gb&d’s Guest Editor and share with us an innovative prefab, a new book by William McDonough (whom he’s lucky enough to call a family friend), and his effort to build the nation’s largest concentration of LEED Platinum homes. Here are his favorite things, in his words.
Vapur Water Bottle I carry this anti-water bottle with me everywhere. It rolls up and fits in my bag, perfect for travelling and running from meeting to meeting.
vapur.us
gbdmagazine.com
Adobe Creative Suite Subscription Service Adobe now has all its design programs online and available for a small monthly fee. Great to have these powerful design tools available at an affordable price for small businesses or nonprofits.
adobe.com
The Upcycle William McDonough [pictured] and Michael Braungart’s ground-breaking book Cradle-toCradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things was the single biggest influence on how Make It Right builds homes. I’ve got a galley copy of their new book, The Upcycle—everyone interested in green homes and sustainability should read it. mcdonough.com
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UP FRONt
LivingHomes’ LEED Platinum C6 prefab takes its C-shape from Joseph Eichler’s tract homes of the 1960s.
Details
Photos: Izumi Tanaka
Certification LEED Platinum Size 1,232 ft2 Pricing $159,000—$179,000 Program Residence with 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, and courtyard
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gb&d
UP FRONt
“The C6 home is an important step in lowering the cost of sustainable design.” Tom Darden on the LivingHomes C6 Prefab
As executive director of Make It Right, Tom Darden is Brad Pitt’s man on the ground in New Orleans. Below is a portion of an extensive conversation that covers everything from Darden’s accidental ascent to executive director to the daily challenges of acting as a de facto nonprofit developer.
LivingHomes C6 Prefab The biggest challenge we face in green building today is how to make well-designed, healthy homes accessible to everyone. For too long, such houses have been available only to the wealthy, due to higher up-front costs. So how do we bring the price of these homes down? And what developer will step up to the challenge of making sustainable homes widely available? Steve Glenn and the team at LivingHomes collaborated with Make It Right on a solution to this problem. Since 2006, LivingHomes has developed modular LEED Platinum homes designed by top architects like Ray Kappe and Kieran Timberlake. This year, LivingHomes released the C6, their most affordable LEED Platinum home to date at a price range between $159,000 and $179,000. The C6 is a three-bedroom, two-bath, 1,232-square-foot home with nine-foot ceilings. LivingHomes’ staff designed the home and was inspired by California real-estate developer Joseph Eichler, who built thousands of homes from 1950 to 1974. The Eichler tract homes were organized around courtyards that were accessible to several parts of the house. The spine of the C6 house is an open kitchen; a dining and living space, and two perpendicular wings, containing bedrooms and storage space, hug the courtyard. The shape resembles a ‘C’ and brings the indoor and outdoor space together. The exterior of the home is made of cement fiberboard and cedar siding, creating a unique mix of textures. The interior of the home features cork flooring, no-VOC paint, LED light fixtures, and smart controls for heating and cooling energy efficiency. The C6 also includes Cradle to Cradlecertified products like Owens Corning insulation and Mosa bathroom tiles. Ample windows and skylights let lots of sunlight into the home. The C6 home is an important step in lowering the cost of sustainable design; I’m glad to see a company like LivingHomes focusing on making their homes affordable for everyone.
livinghomes.net
gbdmagazine.com
Dialogue Tom Darden
Sector 9 Skateboard Make It Right recently worked with Mountain Dew to build and design the first sustainable skate park in New Orleans. I used to skate as a kid, and I’ve picked it up again, riding this board to work and back home. sector9.com
gb&d Tom, you were the first volunteer for Make It Right, but what made you decide to volunteer for this purpose as opposed to other Hurricane Katrina relief programs? Tom Darden That’s a bit of a long story. I heard about Brad Pitt’s idea for helping rebuild the Lower Ninth Ward sustainably from William McDonough; Bill’s a family friend of ours. He received a call from Brad and the architecture firm GRAFT, and they were brainstorming how they could help. My realestate partner, at the time, and I were looking for a way to do some volunteer work after the storm but weren’t really sure how to get plugged in. So I heard about this concept, and we volunteered to do some research on this idea. Before Make It Right, you’d worked in sustainable development. Was that a factor in becoming its executive director?
Nest Thermostat The Nest thermostat learns your habits and adjusts the temperature automatically to your personal preferences. It’s the best programmable thermostat on the market for saving energy while keeping your home warm or cool. Plus, it just released its second generation. nest.com
When I became executive director, it was more that I was the guy who was standing there. After the volunteer work that I did, we put together a plan for how to go about building these houses. We worked really closely with the community to develop a concept, and then we set up the 501(c)3. Once we rolled out the effort publicly, we had volunteer architects contribute the designs. My role as a volunteer sort of shifted, and I became the first employee, I guess you could say, of this new foundation. You have some of the biggest names in architecture designing for Make It Right. How did you get them on board? Brad had the idea of asking the world’s best architects to help think about this problem: How do you rebuild a community that was completely devastated in a way that’s going to be sustainable for the long-term? The ultimate goal is to design around the needs of these families, and so, who
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UP FRONt
“It wasn’t necessarily our goal to revolutionize architecture across New Orleans or in the Lower Ninth Ward. It was just to build the best houses for these families.” Tom Darden, Executive Director, Make It Right
TABLET & ONLINE EXCLUSIVES! Wondering what kind of boss Brad Pitt is? Read the extended Q&A with Tom Darden online or download the iPad edition.
better to ask for their input than some of the world’s most creative minds in architecture? Originally, we wanted nine firms because we just seemed to keep coming across this idea of nine. We were working in the Lower Ninth Ward, we had nine community partners, so we thought, “Why don’t we ask nine architecture firms?” We asked 13, just because we figured some would be busy, and we asked them to donate their time and told them that we couldn’t pay them. And all 13 of them said yes. I remember having a conversation with Brad where I was saying, “Okay, this is interesting; we have 13 instead of nine. How are we going to figure out who to cut?” And he just said, “Nah, we’re just going to go with 13.” Make It Right is not only the largest cluster of LEED Platinum homes in the country, but also a cluster of high-design homes. How will that impact the community? It wasn’t necessarily our goal to revolutionize architecture across New Orleans or in the Lower Ninth Ward. It was just to build the best houses for these families, and what came out of it was very high design. This neighborhood was historically and culturally significant before Katrina but not architecturally significant. We were replacing slabon grade, post-World War, ranch-style houses with something that was architecturally significant that the community can be proud of. What’s been the most unique challenge? My job is that of a nonprofit developer, so we’re not just a builder, we’re basically organizing the development, everything from assembling the property to working with these families. When I go to work every day, it’s probably significantly different than the day that I’ve had before. And every day something really bad happens, and then something really great happens. It’s a constant updown, up-down; my job is the opposite of boring. Do other developers ask for your help? All the time. Recently, we worked on a project in Newark, New Jersey, where we partnered with a nonprofit builder and developer, and we finished a 56-unit building for disabled veterans. So our role was to take that from being a conventional building to a LEED Platinum building without
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Make It Right houses in New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward
adding any costs, which we did successfully. Now we’re looking at a similar project in Kansas City, Missouri. We wanted to prove that if you’re going to be building any new building or doing a rehab, then you can build to these high standards without adding any costs. If you can prove that, then there’s really no excuse for building any other way. You’ve built or commissioned 87 homes to date, just more than halfway to your goal of 150. What happens after 150? Post-150… an exciting thing to think about. We recently completed a strategic plan to help guide that. We really just want to keep building in New Orleans, but that’s a funding question. What has this project taught you about design? It can have a transformative effect on people’s lives. It really can make an impact on the way people view the world and how they interact with
their family and their home. It is a critical element for any builder to consider. What have you learned about New Orleans? Well, this place is like no other in the world, I will say that. It just exudes culture. I said that my job is never boring; well, this city is never boring. There is always something going on, and the people just love this place like no other residents of any city I have experienced. There is this deep, deep love of everything New Orleans. And it’s the food, it’s the music, it’s the culture, it’s this blend of different ethnicities and races and religions, and you end up getting this pot of gumbo that is unique to New Orleans. After seven years, would you consider yourself a New Orleanian? That’s a bit of a loaded question. Seven years probably isn’t long enough. gb&d
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Green Scene Lightfair International
Lightfair International (LFI) is the world’s largest annual architectural and commercial lighting trade show and conference. In its 24th year, Lightfair expands to become the single largest trade show in its history and has more than 500 exhibitors and more than 23,000 registered attendees. We talked to Rochelle Burt, vice president of Lightfair, about what to expect for LFI 2013.
What is LFI doing to be greener this year? LFI looks for opportunities to improve on its sustainability and green initiatives across all areas of operations. Our signage is printed on recycled material and recycled after the show, our carpet is recycled by being reused or resold, and we have significantly reduced the duplication and mailing of show badges and quantity of on-site printed materials. LFI partners with vendors with similar practices.
EVENT Details
photos: Stephen Hoppe (TLP) (Lenfest Plaza)
What Lightfair International When April 21–25, 2013 Where Pennsylvania Convention Center, Philadelphia Hosts Illuminating Engineering Society, International Association of Lighting Designers, AMC, Inc. lightfair.com
What’s new and noteworthy this year? At LFI 2013, we have expanded the event to include Hall F to accommodate the increased demand for the show and in anticipation of another record-breaking event. We will have the debut of the new exterior and roadway lighting pavilion, introduce solar and software as two new categories, and offer new conference tracks. There will be an expanded networking program including events in the Spotlight Lounge in Hall F. Lightfest will take place on the evening of April 23 at the Pennsylvania Convention Center immediately following the closing of the trade show floor. It will give everyone— attendees, exhibitors, and media—an opportunity to network and enjoy the festivities. How important is this show? The importance of Lightfair International is seen clearly in research. Exhibitor and attendee survey results repeatedly tell us that Lightfair is a show of necessity and the most important show in our business. gb&d —Julie Knudson
Getting Out Philadelphia has a diverse selection of green programs to experience while attending Lightfair. Here’s a roundup of what to see and do.
Reading Terminal Market sells local organic produce and is near the Pennsylvania Convention Center. readingterminalmarket.org The Pennsylvania Horticultural Society offers programs including green roof tours and community gardens and parks. pennsylvaniahorticulturalsociety.org
Lenfest Plaza, which connects the Pennsylvania Convention Center and the museums on the Parkway, is a great opportunity to see a lighting project by The Lighting Practice, a company that focuses on sustainable design. Fork is a contemporary American restaurant a mere 20-minute walk from the convention center. The menu is changed weekly based on what produce is in season. forkrestaurant.com
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Notebook The Sanctity of Light: Alan Oakes at Ronchamp
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“Architecture is the learned game, correct and magnificent, of forms assembled in the light.” Le Corbusier
interior photo: Rory Hyde
All fans of architecture have a list of structures around the world they want to visit some day. Le Corbusier’s chapel at Ronchamp was one of mine. I had studied the great architect’s construction via glossy photos and renderings in books and magazines, but I always promised myself that I would experience Notre Dame du Haut firsthand. On a bright July day in 1998, I had my chance. I arrived in Ronchamp, in the eastern part of France, via train. The sun was setting, and I walked up the hill toward the chapel, following signs that directed me to the gatehouse entrance—only to be turned back by the lone cashier in the small souvenir shop. Ronchamp was closing for the evening. I was out of luck; my encounter with Le Corbusier’s masterpiece would have to wait until the next day. (I should mention that I visited Ronchamp before Renzo Piano’s unfortunate addition was built, but that’s a discussion for another column.) I had arrived in Ronchamp with not much more than a camera, backpack, and change of clothes. I was spending the summer in Southern and Central Europe, touring countless religious structures for my master’s thesis, and if there was anything that unified those structures, it was in their use of the powerful yet illusive symbol of light. A month before Ronchamp, a friend of a friend took me to a tiny Mithraic temple built into a cave in the hills of Tuscany. The two-thousand-year-old temple was windowless, illuminated only by the natural light of the entrance and the butane lighter of my chain-smoking guide. Christians had long ago taken over the space; saintly images were painted onto the cave’s limestone walls. I imagined the early rituals of the worshippers, lit by torches, the mysteries of the rites unfolding in the flickering light of burning flames. My travels took me to Ravenna, where artists used slender slices of alabaster as windows for their basilicas four
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I sat in a pew and took in the space, alone, in silence. It was almost musical, how the light would beam through one tiny window, then be extinguished as another became illuminated.
hundred years after the time of Christ. Light in the worship spaces was even and balanced, casting a warm glow upon the golden mosaics that lined the high walls of the nave and the apse of the sanctuary. Romanesque churches of the Dark Ages were indeed very dark, almost fortress-like spaces with massive stone walls and slits for windows. Today, put a couple of euros in the nearby machine and a blaze of halogen lights illuminates the space with dramatic uplighting as the original architects could never have imagined. I found that it was in France that architects embraced the power of symbolic light most skillfully. French Gothic churches used load-bearing buttresses to free up vast expanses of walls for glassy illuminations. There are moments when sunlight pours into a sanctuary with triumphal might, while at other times the same light gently illuminates the rich colors of stained glass, whose images reveal the story of a persecuted Christ. A week before my journey to Ronchamp, I was in Vence, France, marveling at the light of Henri Matisse’s tiny Dominican gbdmagazine.com
chapel. The white, glazed tiles reflected the artist’s stained-glass Tree of Life, and the light was so bright, the effect so uplifting, it was as if the walls disappeared, and I was floating above the Earth, worshipping in the heavens above. Light is the most volatile, the most powerful of all symbols. We see this today in the green movement, in which we use the light of the sun to power our lives with solar technology; conversely, because of our modern pollution, too much light entering our atmosphere now has the power to destroy us. Perhaps, too, our visceral, almost unconscious connection to light stems from the fact that without it, we would have no life at all. Is it any wonder that no matter the era or religion, light is seen as a divine force of nature? Green buildings demand that designers be students of light. The more they understand and appreciate the nature of the sun’s illumination, the more they can foster life-giving, even transcendent spaces for people to live, work, and worship. That next morning in Ronchamp I walked eagerly up the hill to Notre Dame du Haut. At the clearing in the forest, the chapel revealed itself. It was like an ancient Greek temple crowning the hilltop. Its white textured-concrete walls, freshly painted, reflected the brilliance of the morning sun. Within the outdoor worship space, I walked under the iconic, prow-like rooftop to the concrete altar and looked out onto the dewy, freshly cut lawn, which could hold ten thousand worshippers. Beyond the clearing, rolling hills disappeared into the misty horizon. I was completely alone, and as a Christian, I couldn’t help but imagine I was one of thousands surrounding Jesus as he gave the Sermon on the Mount. I made my way to the other side of the sculptural edifice, through the abstractly painted doors to the interior of the chapel. Inside, it was completely silent, and my eyes struggled to adjust to
the cave-like darkness. A rack of slender devotional candles had been lit by an unseen hand, their soft glow contrasting with the sunlight that streamed through small openings in the outer wall. A crevice of light between the sloped walls and ceiling made it seem as if the ceiling floated effortlessly overhead. Whereas the exterior of Notre Dame du Haut is extroverted and ebullient, its interior is introverted and mysterious. I sat in a pew and took in the space, alone, in silence. I watched the piercing rays of light from the constellation of small openings process across interior surfaces and objects. It was almost musical, how the light would beam through one tiny window, then be extinguished as another became illuminated. Along the rear wall of the church were two smaller alcoves, where light was captured high above in periscopelike features. From openings at the top of the silos, diffused light rained down, casting shadows on the textured walls of each alcove and reflecting on the white linen cloths of the altars. Atop these sat lone candles quietly flickering in the soft white light. I continued to sit in silence for a long time, no longer marveling at the design of the space—instead I became lost within it. Le Corbusier guided me though his design, his mastery of light, to something far deeper. And I realized that more than ever, architects, with an ever-increasing understanding of the power of light, have the potential to do the same, in every building they create. “I wanted to create a place of silence, of prayer, of peace, and inner joy,” Le Corbusier said of Ronchamp. He succeeded. We should aspire to do the same. gb&d Alan Oakes is an architectural historian, writer, documentarian, and regular contributor to gb&d. Drop him a line at alanoakes@gbdmagazine.com.
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bascule (noun) ‘bas-(,)kyül An apparatus or structure in which one end is counterbalanced by the other on the principle of the seesaw or by weights. The Twin Sails Bridge is a double-leaved bascule bridge, and because it is cut on a bias, it gets its name from the intentional sail-like appearance of the 114-foot-tall leaves in their ‘open’ positions, when they are lifted to 88 degrees with hydraulic rams.
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development (noun) di-‘ve-ləp-mənt The act or process of growing or progressing. In addition to lessening the vehicular load on the adjacent Poole Bridge, the newly opened Twin Sails Bridge will help the development of four ‘regeneration’ sites—two in Hamworthy and two in Poole—including a power station site that was decommissioned in 1998.
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Defined Design Twin Sails Bridge
Details Location Poole, UK Size 456 ft long, 35 ft wide Completed 2012 Cost $57.9 million Client Borough of Poole Lighting Design Speirs + Major Architect Wilkinson Eyre Architects Electrical Engineer Ramboll Contractor Hochtief
Speirs + Major’s lighting design for the Twin Sails Bridge earned an AL Light and Architecture Design Award for its clever use of red LED lighting lining the metal-grated pedestrian walkway, which signals it is unsafe to cross, and metal halide sources uplighting the bridge’s underside. The entire design combines unique engineering and nautically responsive lighting features, helping the Twin Sails Bridge deliver on a mandate that the bridge be both functional and iconic for the city of Poole, on the south shores of England in Great Britain, and the greater harbor area. Designed by Wilkinson Eyre Architects, the 456-foot-long drawbridge, cut on a bias, spans an elbow-shaped strait and connects Poole to the town of Hamworthy. gb&d
Photos: Dave Morris, courtesy of Speirs + Major
dynamic (adj) dī-‘na-mik) Marked by usually continuous and productive activity or change. When the bridge goes up, the light design responds in a dynamic way by enacting an undulating sequence transforming the pedestrian walkway from white to red and lighting the masts at the ends of the frosted acrylic-tipped sails with internal white LED lights.
For mo re Twin S ails, downlo ad iPad ap our p via iTunes .
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Defined Design Ryerson Image Centre
polychromatic (adj) ‘pä-lē-krō-‘ma-tik Showing a variety or a change of colors. Programmable LED lighting lines the backing of the exterior frit-glass panels, and at night, the panels are illuminated with a polychromatic display that anyone walking by with a smartphone can interact with.
Details Location Toronto Size 12,500 ft2 (expansion), 35,000 ft2 (renovation) Completed 2012 Cost $30 million Lighting Design Consullux Lighting Consultants Architect Diamond Schmitt Architects Electrical Engineer Crossey Engineers
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Art needs light, and the newly renovated and expanded 47,500-squarefoot Ryerson Image Centre at Ryerson University in Toronto uses architecture to complement that need. Diamond Schmitt Architects removed the formerly opaque brick and reclad the building in white ceramic-fritted glass panels that introduce daylight to the interior. The new panels also function as light boxes for the multicolored LED schema in a lighting design by Consullux Lighting Consultants, which earned the project an AL Light and Architecture Design Award. The LED panels light up the building exterior by night, metaphorically reflecting on the outside what’s happening inside and tangibly reflecting in the pool near the building entrance. gb&d gb&d
Photos: Tom Arban, courtesy of Diamond Schmitt Architects
amend (verb) ə-‘mend To change or modify for the better. Formerly, the Ryerson Image Centre was a 35,000-square-foot brick box—hardly correspondent to its visual arts-oriented program. By adding 12,500 square feet, increasing daylit spaces, and modernizing the exterior, Diamond Schmitt Architects’ design amends the interior academic program.
verbatim
“In Haiti, we had to address factors like cultural dynamics and complex land-tenure situations, gangs, bribes, cholera, hurricanes, rock throwing, and roosters.”
verbatim
Architecture for Humanity’s initial mission was to find five schools to repair or rebuild, then work with the school director and community to design the campus, building, or addition and oversee construction. Two of the original five schools have been completed, and two others are under construction. My philosophy is to design buildings intelligently green, without a lot of bells and whistles, then work in a few innovative strategies here and there. Sustainable strategies for the schools were simple but ‘dark green,’ so to speak. The buildings were simple and utilitarian, but we designed them to let in natural light and be thermally comfortable without HVAC systems or even ceiling fans. We worked hard to incorporate a cultural connection, engaging local artisans to create railings, shutters, and doors using local materials: bamboo, palm leaves, even oil drums. In a disaster context, art seems frivolous when schools are struggling to keep classes going, but the Haitian culture is busting with art. We designed functional art into the schools. We selected local contractors and competitively bid projects in a trial-and-error process. First, we created a sample project and invited contractors to put together a bid showing a detailed breakdown of materials and labor. The prices came in wildly high and low, so we switched to providing the quantity take-offs and let the
S tace y M c M ahan The Architecture for Humanity fellow recounts her experience designing Haitian schools after the earthquake As told to Kelli McElhinny
ABOUT Stacey McMahan, AIA, LEED AP, is a Midwestern native. She graduated from Kansas State University’s architecture program and is now is a principal at Koch Hazard Architects. In 2010, she was chosen by the AIA and the USGBC as Architecture for Humanity’s Sustainable Design Fellow and led design efforts in Haiti after the 7.0 magnitude earthquake of January 12, 2010. She lives in Sioux Falls, SD, with her family.
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verbatim
COMMITMENT TO
SUSTAINABILITY
Lawrence Group is proud to be a corporate member of the U.S. Green Building Council and has over 20 LEED accredited professionals on staff.
Southern Illinois Healthcare Breast Center
314.231.5700
www.thelawrencegroup.com
St. Louis Austin Carolinas New York Philadelphia
Architecture Interior Design Town Planning Landscape Architecture Graphic Design Development Construction
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contractors fill in unit prices for materials and labor. As architects from the United States and other developed nations, we’re used to a process that works. In Haiti, we had to adjust our approach to address factors like cultural dynamics and complex land-tenure situations, gangs, bribes, cholera, hurricanes, rock throwing, and roosters crowing at all hours of the day and night. We also encountered difficulties in finding workers who could read plans and accurately execute work in the field. From the start, we partnered with Build Change to conduct on-site construction training that covered the basics of mixing mortar, building concrete block walls, bending and tying rebar, and pouring concrete. At first we were visiting the construction sites every week or two but found whole foundations and walls and beams had to be torn out and rebuilt to plan, so we hired and trained Haitian staff to be on-site daily helping and directing the workers. The need for repaired and replacement buildings was and still is so great in Haiti. We began branching out into planning new communities, repairing medical clinics, and partnering with other nongovernmental organizations like Habitat for Humanity, Grameen Bank, and JPHRO, the organization with which Sean Penn is affiliated. My main regret is not working faster. In the midst of a daily routine, you tend to
Stacey mcmahan Up Close and Personal What was your first job? I worked in California for two years at a small firm and then stayed home for five years starting a family, so that was really my first job. If you weren’t in your current field, what would you be doing? I might live on a farm and run a farmers market. What inspires you? Organizations like Architecture for Humanity, unpretentious beauty in architecture and artwork, children, and my garden. Describe yourself in three words. Creative, conscientious, curly. What is your hidden talent? I make a mean cupcake.
lose a sense of urgency, and the year I was there flew by. There is so much more to do. Despite all of the challenges, the rewards of this experience were tremendous. I found inspiration in the smiling faces of schoolchildren when they were in their new space or at a building dedication. I also appreciated the opportunity to delve into the Haitian culture. I learned lessons in Haiti that I’ve incorporated into my practice at home, as well. I tend to feel creating a building is a complicated process, but architecture doesn’t have to be complex. It just needs to work well and be beautiful to enhance our lives. gb&d gb&d
GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List 28
Design
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Siena College
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Jordan School District
DEvelopment
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Raimi + Associates
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WD Schorsch LLC
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operations
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The Swig Company
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New Bedford Housing Authority
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Greensboro Housing Authority
Denver Housing Authority
Balancing lifestyles and budgets
LED incentives for greener buildings Building for a booming population
Adapting LEED to the SALT District
Government buildings going green Ford Motor Company
Innovation in the assembly line
Historic San Francisco just got greener
Using sustainability to lower costs
Affordable housing finds new revenue
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Approach Design
Balancing lifestyles and budgets in Denver
Mixed-bags of public and private investment keeps affordable housing healthy while power-purchase agreements make electricity renewable and affordable The Denver Housing Authority (DHA) is pioneering the implementation of several new concepts in affordable housing. Innovations include property financing, energy efficiency and sustainability, and resident quality of life. When the DHA’s Mariposa Community Phase III is completed in 2014, the centrally located stairwell of the four-story structure makes the development a different kind of affordable housing. The stairwell becomes a more active community area through extra-wide stairs and landings, colorful walls and handrails, art, message-board walls, and landing benches. This is just one example of broader principles applied to newer DHA build-
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ings, which include the idea that active living fosters healthier communities. The new Mariposa building is one block from a light-rail station (Denver’s regional transportation network), and it has designated parking for bikes. The DHA incorporated community gardens in the
Mariposa Plaza has a walkable layout, and it incorporates art along West Tenth Avenue, which is similar to what was done in the Santa Fe Arts District, adjacent to the DHA’s development.
plans, and a working urban farm is being discussed as well. In the retail space of the recently completed first phase, Tapiz at Mariposa, a café serving healthful foods and a training center, will soon open. These amenities stem from a needs-assessment plan commissioned by the agency to address obesity, inactivity, lower access to health care, crime, lack of mobility, and underemployment in the Denver area. “Our vision and guiding principal was to go beyond LEED, to create a truly sustainable community, not just energyefficient buildings,” says Ismael Guerrero, executive director of the DHA. So although all new construction undertakgb&d
The Denver Housing Authority incorporated design elements that contribute to a pedestrian-friendly urban environment, including stoops, canopies, and sitting areas. The development also meets all health-related Living Building criteria.
en by the agency is targeting LEED Gold or Platinum certifications, in its efforts to create “truly sustainable” communities, the DHA also is identifying other elements of vibrant neighborhoods, including art. Embracing Denver’s Santa Fe Arts District, which is adjacent to the Mariposa development, the housing authority has nonprofit arts organizations occupying ground-level commercial space while an eight-story mural and sculptures have been commissioned to give strong definition to public spaces. The quasi-public nature of the DHA allows for this integration of the commercial and residential uses of its structures within a green context. “DHA is in a unique position,” Guerrero says. “We compete for and secure local, state, and federal capital grants. We also leverage public investment with private debt and equity to structure a mixed-finance deal that provides a public benefit and an economic return to investors. For every dollar of public investment, we leverage four or more dollars of private investment.” Sustainable features are intrinsic to the authority’s economics. DHA is implementing a power-purchase agreement (PPA) program throughout its affordable housing portfolio on 668 existing individual units. At Mariposa, photovoltaic panels will offset 85 percent of electrical-energy demand at the facility. Other money-
saving, environmentally friendly features include geothermal heating and cooling with a 7- to 11-year expected ROI; plantings, pervious pavement, and bioswales to reduce 80 percent of storm-water runoff; greywater recycling and low-flow plumbing fixtures; energy-efficient lighting; and tenant-operable, low-E windows. Plus, the site will have triple the density of what it replaces. Mariposa, all six phases of which should be completed by 2016, also is a mixed-income development. A portion of the units are subsidized while others are provided at near-market-rate rents, roughly $750 for a one-bedroom unit and up to $1,300 for a four-bedroom townhome. “This is more financially viable,” says Guerrero. “It is a better investment of public resources.” Many of the project’s sustainable elements, including its transit-oriented characteristics, emphasis on community engagement, and thoughtful design, came about through the counsel the DHA received from Urban Ventures, who collaborated on the master plan. “We didn’t want a repetitive, sterile- looking development,” Guerrero says, noting that Mariposa is already a model for another project-in-planning nearby. gb&d —Russ Klettke
LED incentive program illuminates savings Siena College’s Rosetti Hall will feature leading-edge lighting, thanks to NYSERDA and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Siena College, a liberal arts school in Loudonville, New York, is constructing its 23,225-square-foot new Rosetti Hall, an academic building of classrooms and offices expected to receive LEED Silver certification. Mark Frost, assistant vice president of facilities management at the college, estimates a 20 to 25 percent energy savings through its many environmental initiatives, including an aggressive lighting strategy that includes all-LED lighting. “Our plan going in was to have high-performance lighting,” Frost says, “[which, at the time, included] mostly fluorescent-type lighting.” Halfway through the design process, the electrical engineer on the project told Frost about an incentive program through the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute that
Rosetti Hall at Siena College
“For every dollar of public investment, we leverage four or more dollars of private investment.” Ismael Guerrero, Denver Housing Authority gbdmagazine.com
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an urban redevelopment company
Urban Ventures, LLC is a fourteen year old real estate development company in Denver which focuses its efforts in urban neighborhoods, close to the core of downtown. Urban Ventures developments have an emphasis on 1600 Wynkoop Suite 200 Denver, Colorado 80202
community building in the context of social, environmental, and economic viability. The Urban Ventures team is led by Susan Powers, the
phone 303-446-0761
former executive director of the Denver Urban Renewal Authority, who
fax 303-623-3251
formed the company with four partners in 1998. In addition to development
contact@urbanventuresllc.com www.urbanventuresllc.com
work, the company is involved with several other real estate consulting projects for private and public clients.
MLB is proud to be a part of the Richard and Joan Rosetti Hall project and to continue our long standing relationship with Siena College.
The first thing we build is Trust! Construction Manager General Contractor Construction Services Design Build Developer
MLB Construction Services, LLC 1930 N. Salem Street Apex, North Carolina 27523 919-387-4647
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One Stone Break Road Malta, New York 12020 518-289-1371 www.mlbconstructionservices.com
2842 Broadway Center Boulevard Brandon, Florida 33510 813-645-6391
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DESIGN APPROACH
By using all LED lighting, Siena College will minimize fluorescent re-lampings, saving 1,140 T8 lamps and 240 18-watt compact fluorescent lamps.
“In addition to energy savings, there will be savings for lamp replacements and less cost for disposal of mercury contained in fluorescent lamps.”
Photo: Paul Richer (jordan school district)
Mark Frost, Siena College
would allow them to get all LED lighting. “We were selected as one of two projects in the state for this program and shifted gears from the high-performance fluorescent fixtures to LED,” he says. “Every single fixture will be LED.” The watts per square foot for LED lighting will be approximately 15 percent less than T8 fluorescent lighting. The college estimates that this will provide a savings of 42,000 kilowatt-hours per year, which will amount to $4,500 in savings on electricity costs per year. Additionally, lighting controls will bring big savings because every room will have dimming controls. “We believe that many offices and classrooms will utilize dimming to a greater extent than they would traditionally use inboard/ outboard lighting, which will add to the cost savings realized from a traditional solution,” Frost says. Other savings will come from windows in large common spaces, classrooms, offices, and vestibules that will let in light during the day, reducing the need for artificial lighting. The stair towers will have fixtures with occupancy sensors that will set the light to 10 percent when not occupied. All offices and classrooms will also have occupancy sensors that will turn the lighting fixtures off if the room is unoccupied for a certain period of time. “In addition to energy savings, there will be savings for lamp replacements and less cost for disposal of mercury contained in fluorescent lamps,” Frost says. He adds that traditional T8 lamps have an average life of 20,000 hours; the LED lights have a minimum of 50,000-hour life expectancy, but many manufacturers believe that they will actually last up to 70,000 hours. Siena College expects to save a minimum of two fluorescent lighting gbdmagazine.com
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change-outs over the life of the LED light sources, which will save 1,140 T8 lamps, 240 18-watt compact fluorescent lamps, and 120 hours of labor totaling an approximate wage savings of $9,500. Given these estimates, the college expects to save at least $77,000 over the life of the LED light sources. Rosetti Hall, designed by Sacco + McKinney Architects and built by MLB Construction Services, is currently under construction and will also incorporate geothermal heating and cooling and photovoltaic solar panels. Siena College expects the building to be open in August 2013, just in time for the fall semester. gb&d —Jennifer Nunez
Education and energy converge in Utah An expanding, migrating Salt Lake City population collides with a new statewide energy code in Herriman Middle School #2
district, which revisited plans from a prior school in the district and enlisted the structural engineering expertise of Reaveley Engineers & Associates to help bring HMS #2 up to 2009 Utah building standards, including requirements set forth in a new statewide energy code. “All these code changes forced us to make some major structural and design changes on the old school plans,” he says. “But the biggest change that came into play was the energy code, which called for much more efficiency.”
20,262
New residents who settled in Herriman, UT, between 1999 and 2010, a population increase of almost 1,400%
Using the semi-arid environment of the Salt Lake Valley, HMS #2 incorporates 300 geothermal wells, each of which is 350 feet deep. That depth allows the wells to use ambient temperatures to heat and cool the water, and the closedloop thermal system “allows for an energy reduction of half the cost of a standard water-heating system,” Haslam says. Each classroom pulls on a specific geothermal unit, which allows for more proprietary, energy-efficient control of water usage. With all of the suburban expansion encroaching on Herriman and the southern end of the valley, asphalt is and continues to be the surface of choice for parking lots and road-surfacing needs. Although it is a popular material, asphault is a major heat draw and necessitates frequent servicing. “We used concrete drives and parking areas around the building,” Haslam says. “This allows for a reflective system, rather than creat-
When a town’s population doubles nearly four times in ten years—meaning that today it is roughly 14 times bigger than it was a decade before—upgrades are inevitable. In 1999, the town of Herriman, Utah, 25 miles south of Salt Lake City, was incorporated with a population of 1,523. By the 2010 census, that number had swelled to 21,785. The Jordan School District responded by building the 200,000-square-foot Herriman Middle School #2, which Herriman Middle School #2 will begin the 2013 school year at full occupancy (1,500 students) and with a host of green features. “Because of the population growth in the area, we realized we needed a new school building fast,” says Randy Haslam, director of new construction for the school
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APPROACH DESIGN
The new middle school uses natural lighting in its classrooms during the day and has lighting controls for the areas of the building that don’t reach windows and don’t need to be lit constantly.
ing a heat sink. This also saves on what would be substantial maintenance costs.” The goal for the middle school—and all school district buildings—is longevity. “We were intentional about utilizing durable wall systems that wouldn’t require maintenance in the coming years,” Haslam says. Structural block supports the big-box areas of the building such as the auditorium and gymnasium, and
ceramic tile and wainscoting adorn interior walls to reduce damage from volume and traffic. Large clear windows in all of the classrooms maximize daylight, and electric lighting is moderated by in-room sensory equipment to adjust light levels in response to natural light. Because the school district is working with a public budget, the energy-conscious features of HMS #2 are deter-
mined by LEED and Energy Star target goals, though the ultimate concern is efficiency rather than a label of efficiency. “We understand the principles of energy efficiency, and we always design to these standards,” Haslam says. “We often end up with Energy Star buildings, though it’s the result of our other efforts that make this happen.” Other schools in the Jordan School District have software that is tapped into an energy moderation network, allowing students to track the amount of energy being used and saved by energy-saving systems in the district. “We have wind turbines and rooftop photovoltaic panels tracked by computers in the physics rooms at some of the schools, all of which can be incorporated with student curriculum,” Haslam says. “This is a really great feature, and it’s in process for Herriman and other schools in the district.” gb&d —Benjamin van Loon
“If it can be imagined, we will find a way to design it.” Daybreak Corporate Office Center, South Jordan, UT 1st LEED Platinum Building in the State of Utah
innovation REAVELEY ENGINEERS + ASSOCIATES 675 E. 500 S., Ste. 400, Salt Lake City, UT 84102 P. 801.486.3883 www.reaveley.com
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Approach development
Adapting LEED-ND to Syracuse’s SALT District Raimi + Associates applies existing development standards in a fresh way New master plan adds sidewalk connectivity to a former industrial neighborhood Downtown Syracuse
SALT District Development Site
principal at Raimi + Associates. “We pushed the process forward and deepened the conversation about sustainability. We also had the idea to use the LEEDND criteria as a tool, not to evaluate a specific development project but to craft a long-range plan for a neighborhood to fill in the gaps and make it better.” Raimi + Associates has applied this innovative strategy to other neighborhoods with great success, especially when combined with another idea integral to the firm’s philosophy: urban planning that takes into account socioeconomic realities. The SALT District is a neighborhood in the traditional sense, containing housing and jobs, public amenities such as schools and parks, and walkable streets. Its name is both a nod to the
‘A’ is for Art
The newly named SALT District in Syracuse, New York, is being revitalized by Raimi + Associates, an urban planning firm based in Berkeley, California, an increasingly common story being spun in cities across the United States. Yet the most innovative aspect of the SALT District’s renewal is not the improvements made to the network of sidewalks or the green, single-family homes, but the creative mechanism that Raimi + Associates used to assess the existing neighborhood. By using LEED’s criteria for new neighborhood developments (LEED-ND), the urban planners were able to identify the strengths of the existing community as well as areas in need of improvement. gbdmagazine.com
The A in the new name of Syracuse’s Near West Side stands for ‘art.’ Historically, the SALT District was a creative center, and Syracuse University’s School of Architecture is across the creek, just beyond the neighborhood’s eastern boundary. Part of the redevelopment’s plan includes retaining artistic talent and engagement and attracting more of it. A depressed economy actually helps here with low rents spurring an influx of artists. “Their creative energy has given the whole project some life,” says Matt Raimi, who helped plan the project. “Art was a strength. Some of the artists contributed ideas to the process, and having a focus on art came through in the project.”
This gave the team a clearer idea of what a sustainable community in Syracuse would look like. The result is a revitalized and reimagined neighborhood near downtown Syracuse and a success story for the many organizations involved, including the Near West Side Initiative, Syracuse Center of Excellence, and the nonprofit Home HeadQuarters. The SALT District exemplifies Raimi + Associates’ core tenant of planning and designing through the lens of public health. “There had been a lot of good work done in the neighborhood before we were involved,” says Matt Raimi, a
past—the area was the site of industrial salt-making during the early part of the 19th century—and an acknowledgement of its evolution: SALT is an acronym for Syracuse, Art, Life, Technology. In recent years, the community has been subject to a depressed economic situation and rampant disinvestment; vacant lots and unemployment rates in Syracuse are among the highest in New York. But out of turmoil comes opportunity. The existing neighborhood framework lent itself march–april 2013
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APPROACH DEVELOPMENT
“We had the idea to use the LEED-ND criteria as a tool, not to evaluate a specific development project, but to craft a long-range plan for a neighborhood.” Matt Raimi, Raimi + Associates
Syracuse, NY’s 8,400-resident SALT District makes up 156 acres of the Near West Side. Its revitalization also includes planting native trees, creating a network of paths for bicycles and pedestrians, and building numerous live/work spaces, including the award-winning R-House (left), and the 30,000-square-foot Lincoln Apartments.
to community-building. “We went in and looked at what the neighborhood’s strengths were,” Raimi says. “The original layout was a strength.” Raimi + Associates’ LEED-ND evaluation identified numerous other advantages, but it also identified challenges. For instance, the firm’s plan called for a complete mapping and reworking of the sidewalk system, which is a requirement for LEED-ND certification, communities must have sidewalks on both sides of streets, and sidewalks must form a complete network. The existing system was disjointed because a portion of the area was part of a prior urban renewal initiative in the 1950s in which verticalstyle housing projects were built. These subdivisions, like many similar buildings, became problematic in the way of poverty and crime, and they were cut off from the street network. Raimi + Associates recommended that these subdivisions be redesigned to reestablish connectivity to the street, and a range of different housing types that were more
LEED SCORECARD (Neighborhood development) LEED-ND Gold Smart Location and Linkage 17/30 Neighborhood Pattern & Design 20/39 Green Construction & Technology 20/31 Innovation & Design 5/6 Total 62/106
key green features Site Located on developed land Materials 50% of project construction waste diverted from landfills Water 30% reduction in water use in 90% of Category 1 buildings Energy 20% reduction in nearly all new and remodeled buildings
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in line with the rest of the neighborhood were developed. Some of this housing was conceptualized through a design competition called “From the Ground Up,” organized by the Syracuse Center for Excellence and Home HeadQuarters. Architects were invited to submit green designs for singlefamily homes, and the winners had their designs financed, built, and sold to prospective homeowners in the community. The competition brought innovative and beautiful homes to the neighborhood; it also brought an increase in home ownership rates, something that Home HeadQuarters promotes as a means to neighborhood stability. The SALT District is bordered on the east side by a creek and railroad tracks that separate the neighborhood from the most culturally affluent part of downtown Syracuse, and it’s this area that Raimi + Associates sees as a priority and place of opportunity in the transformation of the community. Enhanced connections to downtown Syracuse are opportunities for remaking the thread between the SALT District and the downtown job and cultural center. It recommended safety improvements to roadways, strategies for transforming the creek into an amenity, and establishing new pedestrian connections. The planners also added new parks and gardens on vacant land. “Preserving nature and incorporating nature into cities is important, but we really focus on creating environments that are good for people and their health,” Raimi says. “That ranges from economic opportunity and education all the way down to sidewalks and access to healthy foods. When we do planning work, we look at that from the beginning.” gb&d —Ashley T. Kjos
Chicago developer brings green to niche market WD Schorsch partners with McShane Construction to add cutting-edge green features to two new LEED projects
Winning turnkey federal government projects comes down to the lease rate, and Chicago developer William Schorsch has extensive experience putting the right project team together in this highly specialized market. Schorsch is the senior principal of WD Schorsch LLC, and his company added two more projects to its list in 2012: a medical office building in Rockford, Illinois, for the Veteran’s Administration and an administration building for the General Services Administration on Ninety-Seventh Street in Chicago. “Both projects were competitively procured in a very lengthy process that starts with a government advertisement,” Schorsch says. “We go for the projects that best fit our capabilities and meet our criteria for size, location, length of lease, agency, and finding the right people to partner with.” In June 2012, the Veteran’s Administration procured the building that would become the medical office. The lease structure was 20 years for the VA building, and the Social Security Administration project completed in late fall 2012 had a 10-year lease with an option for five more. The price for the building is the lease rate for the term, which can’t be modified after being awarded. “Project schedule is key in these deals,” says Schorsch. “It can make or break the project.” It’s a high risk to hold lending rates and cover construction costs in case the schedule gets extended. As the developer, Schorsch is responsible for finding the land, design, construction, financing, operations, and maintegb&d
DEVELOPMENT APPROACH
nance for the term of the lease. Both the Rockford project and the Ninety- Seventh Street project are aimed for LEED Silver certification. For both projects, Schorsch teamed up with Chicago design-build contractor McShane Construction Company who provided the developer with a guaranteed maximum price. The Rockford project, designed by Colorado architecture firm Marasco & Associates, is a 33,000-square-foot, single-story outpatient medical office with 29 exam rooms. “The new building includes 70 percent native plant coverage for landscaping, bicycle racks for alternate commuting, and a geothermal system with 16 wells drilled 580 feet deep,” says McShane project manager Min Jang. “We are 37 percent more efficient than a conventional mechanical system.” The project also features low-VOC paints and sealants, recycled content materials,
The Rockford VA’s geothermal system is 37% more efficient than a conventional mechanical system.
and regional materials, such as a precast building envelope by ATMI Precast of Aurora, Illinois. The 18,000-square-foot Social Security project was completed in fall 2012; it is a single-story, commercial building designed by Milwaukee architecture firm Perspective Design. The project features a local cast-stone on the wainscot of the building by local manufacturer Architectural Cast Stone. Schorsch took advantage of metered faucets and used the values to moni-
SCHORSCH LLC WD
tor water consumption of low-volume fixtures, and energy-efficient water heaters were also used. The site had native plantings and drip irrigation and was built on an existing brownfield industrial property. “Contaminants were hauled off and properly disposed of,” says McShane project manager Gary Vandenberg. “The building slab and asphalt surfaces acted as physical containment barriers. But in the green areas, we provided a fabric material plus 12 inches of clean topsoil.” gb&d —Scott Heskes
COOLING HEATING CONTROLS
GOVERNMENT REAL ESTATE SPECIALIST
PHOTO: TYLER KASCHKE
• Management Services • Consulting Services • Brokerage Services • Development Services W D Schorsch LLC is a Chicago – based commercial real estate firm founded in 1983 that specializes in United States Federal Government real estate. We can provide expertise and experience in the Development, Management, Consulting and Brokerage of Federal Government real estate. Through exclusive daily focus on the Federal Government niche we can provide insight and advice not available through many sources. We have developed numerous GSA projects including: Social Security Administration, DHS and ODAR. We have also developed VA Outpatient Clinics. Our ongoing operations and management of our portfolio of Federal Government projects provides historical data we can use and provide a basis for comparison.
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Atomatic would like to congratulate McShane Construction on jobs well done. We look forward to many more years of our valued partnership. For over 65 years, Atomatic Mechanical Services has been dedicated to quality design, installation and service of HVAC systems for the commercial,institutional, industrial and residential building markets throughout the metropolitan Chicago.
William Schorsch | Josh Hausman W D SCHORSCH LLC • 694 Grandview Lane • Lake Forest, IL 60045 p 847 482 0178 • f 847 770 4449 • www.wdschorsch.com
gbdmagazine.com
847/818-4300 Fax 847/818-4302 3733 N. Ventura Drive Arlington Heights, IL 60004-7952 www.atomatic.com
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Ford makes a case for sustainable manufacturing The Michigan car-maker cuts steam from plants to save heating costs while its new painting process conserves oven energy At a time when any discussion about a greener automotive industry tends to focus on electric or solar-powered cars, one car company is also focusing on greening both its products and itself. The Michigan-based Ford Motor Company is quickly becoming one of America’s leading companies when it comes to creating efficient, sustainable facilities for its operations. Recently, Ford adjusted assembly processes to be as efficient as possible and upgraded facilities to feature advanced green technologies. By doing so, it has cut its energy use by 22 percent since 2006, and the company is setting its sights higher to cut an additional 25 percent through energy efficiency by 2016. From slowly eliminating its use of steam heating, restructuring its painting and equipment-cooling processes, and taking advantage of opportunities to use LED technology in its facilities, Ford is committed to maintaining the highest standards of green operations. “Our focus on sustainability goes back quite a few years,” says Jeff White, Ford’s energyefficiency manager, who has helmed the automaker’s facility-greening efforts for nearly 15 years. “Our energy-efficiency group has been in existence as a formal activity for driving energy reduction since as far back as the 1980s.” On the facilities side, White credits the company’s conversion of steam heating systems to direct-fire gas for helping to reduce energy usage for heating. Directfire gas heating, he says, ignites gas so it heats the building air instead of producing steam that travels through pipes, loses heat, and eventually needs to be pumped into a boiler. Steam-heating systems, he
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The Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne, MI, which once built large SUVs for Ford and Lincoln, was recently refurbished to support production of both the new gas and fully electric, zero-emission models of the compact Focus sedan and hatchback.
says, are only about 50 percent efficient, and in 1998, Ford shut down steamheating at eight of its facilities in North America. “That was right before energy prices started going through the roof in 2005,” White says. “It turned out to be a huge physical edge. The business case for making these systems more efficient is really there.”
Another key to reducing energy usage was revamping its painting process. The paint shop accounts for 65 percent of the energy use at Ford’s assembly plant, so the company was anxious to find ways to make the process more efficient. Previously, Ford had put its cars through separate spray booths and ovens for the primer, base coat, and clear coat layers. gb&d
SOLAR PROMISE On the roof of Ford’s Michigan assembly plant, DTE Energy’s 500-kW solar system uses a battery-storage grid to store 2,000 kW of energy. It’s a new system of renewable-energy and smart-grid technology that Ford hopes will teach its employees about managing the integration of solar energy and battery energy, both of which are key for balancing high-demand charging requirements.
“Long ago, Bill Ford said that there has to be a business case for environmentalism. We’ve found that there are very good business cases.” Jeff White, Ford Motor Company gbdmagazine.com
With its new “three-wet” painting process, the company eliminates two ovens, allowing the primer coat to be followed directly by the base color paint, and then by the clear coat, drying it in an oven only at the very end. At several plants, including its engine plant in Lima, Ohio, a new process was adapted for cooling the equipment that cuts and grinds materials during the machining process. At the old engine plant, oil was sprayed onto the tools to cool them off. Today, oil is applied only to the tip of the tool. “That greatly reduces the amount of oil that gets sprayed into the atmosphere,” White explains. “We’re also putting exhaust hoods close to the point of use where oil is being sprayed. . . so it’s a combination of reducing the amount of oil mist and capturing the oil mist significantly closer to the point of use. This has an impact on energy, working conditions, and the quality of the product.” In Buffalo, New York, Ford worked with National Grid, a local utility company, to revamp its stamping facility with LED lighting; this project has reduced energy usage of a single lighting fixture from about 1,000 kilowatts to a little more than 200 kilowatts per hour. More than 1,700 fixtures were retrofitted with this project to achieve a 10 percent reduction in electric use. LED technology, assembly processes, and hearing systems are all areas Ford will focus on as it continues its sustainability efforts. As the company continues to evaluate projects for the future, it will stay abreast of the wind, solar, and other green technologies that will be crucial to its success. For Ford, he says, the decision is simply logical. “Long ago, Bill Ford said that there has to be a business case for environmentalism. You can’t just do it to do it. We’ve found that there are very good business cases for sustainability and environmental activities that go beyond what’s expected.” gb&d —Annie Monjar
San Francisco's historic Mills Building receives LEED overhaul Owners since 1954, The Swig Company honors the building’s 120-year anniversary with a modern update, yet the greening process is ongoing In August 2012, the historic Mills Building at 220 Montgomery Street in downtown San Francisco received a LEED Gold certification, making it the city’s oldest official LEED-certified structure. Originally designed and built in 1892 by Chicago architects Burnham and Root/ D.H. Burnham & Company, the 10-story, 450,000-square-foot building, notable for its subtle Romanesque detailing, is owned by The Swig Company, which is headquartered in the building and manages more than nine million square feet of office space across the country. Regarding the decision to undergo a LEED overhaul, Chris Wong, property manager for the building, says, “The Swig Company purchased the building in 1954, so the Mills Building has a lot of history for the family. We’ve always recognized the importance of keeping the building up to date with various sustainability initiatives.” In 1974, the Mills Building was added to the National Register of Historic
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Chris R. Stroupe, PE, LEED AP President 811 West 5th Street, Suite 101 Winston Salem, NC 27101 p (336) 724-0139 • f (336) 724-1812
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OPERATIONS APPROACH
“The overhaul has given us a great way to bring the old architecture into the new world.” Chris Wong, The Swig Company
Building upgrades equal energy savings in New Bedford The Massachusetts housing authority saves $620,000 by using energy saving measures
Places, so it is not only a high-profile building in the Bay Area architectural landscape but also the oldest in Swig’s portfolio. An in-depth energy consultation performed by Leading Edge Consulting helped inform the overhaul, which led to a building-wide adaptation of an energy-management system, allowing for the building managers to better moderate usage and expenditure. “This system, which has especially altered the lighting in the building, is really helpful because it began to give us a way of quantifying our savings,” Wong says. Aided by the energy-management system, which is used partly to respond to strict demand-response requests, lighting in the corridors and public areas is managed by the system, and high-intensity lighting is being replaced with lowenergy LED options. The LEED overhaul also created daylight-harvesting opportunities in the elevator lobbies. Lighting automation features are included in the building’s 220 tenant spaces, which range from 200 to 42,000 square feet. “We’ve seen a significant drop in our electric costs with the changes in these lighting systems,” Wong says. “We’ve also slowed down the speed of our elevator cabs. We have 12 passenger cabs, and we’ve seen a lot of energy savings here with no decrease in tenant satisfaction for elevator speed.” The building also includes temperature moderators for its steam fittings, gbdmagazine.com
The Burnham & Root-designed Mills Building is the oldest building in San Francisco to be LEED Gold-certified. Much of the overhaul centered on lighting and elevator upgrades.
where it gathers its heat and then reduces stress on the boilers by allowing for better temperature moderation. With a designation of LEED Gold, the Mills Building is the third LEED-certified building in Swig’s portfolio. The Kaiser Center Building, in Oakland, California, and the 180 Montgomery Building, across the street from the Mills Building, also have LEED Gold certifications, but the Mills Building is the company’s only historical building to have it. As Wong says, “The overhaul has given us a great way to bring the old architecture into the new world.” gb&d —Benjamin van Loon
When the New Bedford Housing Authority (NBHA) in New Bedford, Massachusetts, needed to lower its energy costs, it used sustainability measures to do so. For the NBHA, sustainability has been the driving force for the town’s public housing hub in the past two years, with myriad heat, water, and energyrelated changes, but the process itself has breathed new life into its finances to create an overall more sustainable operation. Because the NBHA doesn’t charge tenants for utilities, utility costs were getting to be out of control. “It was clear that we needed to do something to lower our energy costs,” says Steve Beauregard, executive director of the NBHA, “or we weren’t going to be in business much longer.” The NBHA installed photovoltaic panels on 12 buildings at its Bay Village site and on 13 buildings at its Westlawn development, resulting in substantial savings in its electric costs. Although the systems went live just over a year and a half ago in November 2011, they have already generated more than 110,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity. The authority also received just more
$330,000
Amount NBHA will save just by upgrading exterior high-pressure sodium lights to LEDs
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APPROACH OPERATIONS
“Energy-efficient design made good business sense long before it got sexy.” James Cox, Greensboro Housing Authority
than $100,000 in funding from the Low Income Affordability Network (LEAN) to install micro-CHP units in three statefunded duplex buildings. These units took the place of furnaces that had been in use for nearly 25 years. The transformation of the NBHA extends well beyond these examples; thanks to the Low Income MultiFamily (LIMF) Program. For interior lighting upgrades, the organization installed more than 9,000 CFL bulbs in tenant-owned light fixtures and added motion-sensor CFLs to buildings with common interior hallways and offices, saving more than $168,000. On building exteriors, the NBHA used LEDs instead of the 900 existing high-pressure sodium lights, saving more than $330,000. And more than 200 old fridges were replaced with Energy Star Frigidaire refrigerators, which should save $125,000 in utility costs. All told, savings are upward of $620,000.
3
Number of housing properties that received micro-CHP systems, which are replacing 25-year-old furnaces
Now, the housing authority is in the process of upgrading to more waterefficient toilets in hundreds of its units. “Many of our units still have 3.0 GPF toilets, so this upgrade will be a substantial saving in their water costs,” says Anne Shoemaker, the director of modernization. Public housing units in New Bedford now also benefit from exterior weather stripping around doors and doorways, new door sweeps, foam insulation, hot and cold pipe insulation, and new pipefitting on clothes-dryer transition ducts. Shoemaker emphasizes the importance of having a complete team of architects, engineers, and contractors on the same page for such substantial undertakings to work. “There’s no way anything can get done at a place like this otherwise,” she says. “You also have to have an executive director who’s going to put a priority on this. That’s what [Steve Beauregard] does . . . he views the housing authority as a business.” gb&d —Kelli Lawrence
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Smart strategies for sustainable funding Greensboro Housing Authority leverages private capital for project financing The Greensboro Housing Authority (GHA) is the largest provider of affordable housing in Greensboro, North Carolina, housing more than 10,000 individuals in 19 separate communities. The agency implements and maintains programs that promote education, homeownership, youth achievement, wellness, and self-sufficiency as well as implementing sustainability initiatives. But money is tight. “The housing authority has to find creative ways now to be viable in the future,” says James Cox, vice president of real estate development. “With economic conditions as they are, we have to think outside the box.” Cox initially came to GHA in the late 1990s as a project developer for Urban Atlantic (UA), a private Maryland-based developer at the forefront of implementing sustainability initiatives in urban areas. When GHA received funding from HOPE VI, the HUD program that funded the revitalization of public housing projects across the country, the agency hired UA to leverage the Greensboro funds. Cox’s job was clear: “If we got $20 million,” he says, “I had to turn it into $100 million.” Today, with support from HOPE VI having ended in June 2011, GHA has to work even more diligently to find the necessary funds. The agency created an in-house development office; Cox applied and was hired to stay on permanently. He says private equity is increasingly one of the creative solutions GHA considers. In 2011, GHA extended its federal Energy Performance Contract (EPC) with Ameresco through 2019, which allowed the agency to leverage private capital for more than $3.9 million of project financing at Ray Warren Homes, a 236-unit
development. With those funds, GHA installed new furnace and HVAC systems, water-conservation retrofits, and roof replacements. The same year, GHA partnered with the City of Greensboro to perform a comprehensive energy assessment for the all GHA properties. The agency now has a profile for each community and is formalizing a sustainability plan so that when funding becomes available, GHA knows exactly where it can go. “In development going forward, we have a checklist that goes into the design process,” Cox says. “Green initiatives are simply part of the culture here now.” In 2012, an American Recovery and Reinvestment Act competitive grant funded apartment renovations and the construction of a new community center at Stoneridge, a 50-unit senior housing community. The center is the first GHA facility to be constructed to LEED Silver certification standards. “Energy-efficient design made good business sense long before it got sexy,” Cox says. “Conservation strategies caught on because they had to, especially for non-profits.” Public housing has a very different face than it did 50 years ago. GHA operates 2,203 units of public housing throughout the city with communities ranging in size from 11 units to 430. As in the past, tenants’ rents are based on income, but being eligible is defined differently now. Based on entry-level salaries in the current economy, professionals like schoolteachers and firefighters might qualify for rent subsidies where they would not have before. And with mixed-income housing, amenities are standard regardless of income, so one’s ‘bracket’ is not immediately apparent. “Everybody’s living together in one big happy community,” Cox says. Cox approaches his job as aggressively as a private developer to make sure it stays that way. “Our properties don’t ‘make money,’” he says. “But when it’s all said and done, we’re still in the realestate business.” gb&d —Annie Fischer a message from AMERESCO
Ameresco is a leading North American energy-efficiency and renewable-energy services provider. We deliver customer value, environmental stewardship, and sustainability through services that also include supply management and facility renewal. In the public-housing sector, Ameresco’s customers have invested more than $400 million in energy and water improvements.
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April 18-19, 2013 Sacramento Convention Center
A green revolution is unfolding, and California has the policy climate, public support, technology innovation and history of commitment to sustainability to remain at the leading edge of this revolution Whether setting aggressive renewable energy goals, enacting the nation’s first mandatory green building code, or launching a pioneering effort to retrofit millions of buildings constructed before the state had energy standards, California continues to set the pace for green policy, practice and economic opportunity. The Green California Summit is the largest annual gathering of public sector decision makers - and their partners in the private sector - who are working to ensure a green future for the Golden State.
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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List 44
los angeles streetcar
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John kane
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mercy housing
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Warren wilson COLLEGE
Shiraz Tangri wants to bring back 1901 The North Carolina developer dreams big
Renovation and reuse for a good cause An unequaled pledge to the environment
gbdmagazine.com
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TRENDSETTERS
The City of Angels had better pu does today. Which is why Shiraz up his next big idea: Los Angele
$47m
Revenues the proposed streetcar is expected to generate for the City of Los Angeles over 25 years
Los Angeles isn’t the only city trying to bring the streetcar back: Milwaukee, Detroit, and Sacramento, CA, all have funding-approved streetcar projects in the works.
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blic transit in 1901 than it Tangri is doggedly talking s Streetcar. By Matt Alderton
O
ftentimes, moving forward requires looking back. When Angelinos began discussing how to revitalize their city’s core, they retraced their footsteps by nearly a century to a period when downtown Los Angeles was alive with residents, businesses, and nightlife—and streetcars that connected them. Now a streetcar is not exactly a trolley, tram, bus, or ‘people mover;’ the modern streetcar will integrate with regular traffic on the road, but it is on a set rail, which is one of the many benefits of incorporating streetcars as opposed to other forms of public transit. With the historic streetcar a part of LA’s history, Los Angeles Streetcar Inc. aims to make it part of the city’s future as well. It all started on Broadway. Home to a thriving commercial and theater district in the 1920s and ’30s, it now sits largely vacant, neglected and ramshackle like a sun-kissed Chernobyl. “Broadway, which was the shopping and entertainment district of downtown in its heyday, was becoming increasingly abandoned and dilapidated,” says attorney Shiraz Tangri, who serves on the board of Bringing Back Broadway, an initiative formed in 2008 with the purpose of redeveloping the downtown boulevard. Tangri is also the general counsel for LA Streetcar, which spun off of Bringing Back Broadway with the sole mission of bringing a modern streetcar system to downtown Los Angeles.
51,329
The number of people living in downtown Los Angeles in 2011, up from 35,884 in 2000
“The people who move downtown want to be in a more pedestrian-friendly environment. They’re making a personal choice to get out of their cars.” Shiraz Tangri, Los Angeles Streetcar
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As part of its effort, Bringing Back Broadway sent a group of representatives to tour the revitalized downtowns in Portland and Seattle. In the past 10 years, both cities have enjoyed a renaissance in their central business districts that they attribute in large part to their streetcar systems, Portland Streetcar and the Seattle Streetcar Network, which began service in 2001 and 2007, respectively. “The message from the people in Portland and Seattle was very clear: if you want to get downtown to the next level of urban development, you need an urban circulation system,” Tangri says. Streetcars are nothing new for the City of Angels. In fact, the Los Angeles Railway began operating intra-city streetcars, called Yellow Cars, in 1901. At its peak, that system included 1,250 trolleys and more than 20 streetcar lines, including one that ran down Broadway. When railroads and trains gave way to freeways and automobiles, Los Angeles traded its streetcars for buses and ceased operations altogether in 1963. Of the many public-transit options, it was decided that a new, modern version of the old streetcar system was the best way to stimulate economic development along Broadway. As Tangri says, “Streetcars inspire transit-oriented developmarch–april 2013
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TRENDSETTERS Los Angeles Streetcar
4
Miles of track that LA Streetcar would like to have installed by late 2015
The new Los Angeles streetcars will be very different from their early-1900s counterparts, which were similar to a San Francisco trolley car. At its peak, the old streetcar system had 1,100 miles of track and 900 electric cars.
Dialogue Shiraz Tangri Los Angeles Streetcar general counsel Shiraz Tangri is leading the charge for a new, modern transit system in downtown LA. We asked him about his personal stake in the project.
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Why are you personally involved in this project? I was born in India. I immigrated to New York when I was a young kid. I grew up in the suburbs but was an urbanite at heart and moved to New York City when I was 16. I considered myself a lifelong New Yorker, so when I moved to Los Angeles in my late twenties, I didn’t have a driver’s license. I thought public transit should be all you need if you live in a real city. Unfortunately, Los Angeles had a reputation for being a city of sprawl and suburbs. It was a car mecca where
nobody walked; there was no convenient public transit. Because I didn’t drive, my options were limited. I had to be downtown for work, and the cultural myth of Los Angeles was that downtown was a nonentity. How did you get involved in this project? I was an environmental lawyer, and I moved to Los Angeles to work on big environmental cases. That was in 1999, which is also when the Staples Center came online downtown. It was
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9,300
The number of jobs the downtown streetcar is projected to create, including 7,200 new construction jobs and 2,100 permanent jobs
18
The number of hours every day—seven days a week—LA Streetcar’s proposed system will run
“The cost to the vast majority of residents will be under $100 a year. If you look at folks who are already paying hundreds of dollars in parking fees a month or risking a $70 ticket every time they park their car and miss the meter, it’s a no-brainer.” Shiraz Tangri, Los Angeles Streetcar
ment by providing development-oriented transit.” Unlike buses, streetcars’ routes can’t be easily changed or cancelled, and because they stop more frequently, streetcars can have more development potential than light rails. With a light rail, developers typically only build within a couple thousand feet of the stops, but because streetcars stop every block or two blocks, they increase accessibility to commercial space. “Where you see a public-sector commitment to run a system for decades and put rails in the ground so you know the [system] will go by your door, you see a massive spike in private-sector investment,” Tangri says. The large amount of pedestrians and cars in downtown LA means a system that crosses traffic at every block is infeasible. But a streetcar doesn’t need the right-of-way because it runs along with traffic. “When a streetcar isn’t there, a bus, car, or bicycle can go there,” Tangri
says. “It fits well with the notion of a multimodal urban environment.” Streetcars also are clean—they are electric-powered, have zero-emissions, and consume minimal energy, making them economically and environmentally advantageous. “The people who move downtown want to be in a more pedestrian-friendly environment,” Tangri says. “They’re making a personal choice to get out of their cars and limit their vehicle miles traveled by living close to where they work. A modern streetcar system appeals to those folks.” LA Streetcar is counting on that appeal. Although its proposed streetcar system—a four-mile, fixed-rail loop along Broadway, Eleventh, Figueroa, Seventh, and Hill streets—would ultimately be operated by the City of Los Angeles, building it will require a public-private partnership. Of the project’s $125 million construction budget, $1 million was contributed by the city and $10 million
a big turning point for a lot of folks in thinking about downtown as a place you’d stay once you left your office building. From that point forward there was a growing movement to [revitalize] downtown. As I got more involved in the community, I became more interested in planning and land-use issues. I worked on a couple of really large, notable projects, and, from those, served on a number of different downtown task forces. When [the Bringing Back Broadway initiative] created Los Angeles Streetcar Inc., [Los
Angeles City Councilmember José Huizar] asked me to serve as his representative on its board of directors.
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Why this project, and why now? There are half a million people who come downtown every day. It’s the hub of our freeway system, and it’s the hub of our rail system, which has been growing in a big way . . . for the last decade. One, there are a lot of real-estate development folks who are interested in downtown.
$1.1b
The estimated value of development to be catalyzed by a streetcar system in downtown Los Angeles
from the former Community Redevelopment Agency. Another $51.5 million will be sought from federal grants, and the remaining $62.5 million would come from downtown residents, who voted on the issue in December 2012. “It’s essentially a parcel tax,” Tangri says of the tax, which is based on a property’s land area, with property owners located directly along the streetcar line paying 45 cents per square foot, those located one to two blocks away paying 32 cents per square foot, and those living three blocks away paying 16 cents per square foot. “The cost to the vast majority of residents will be under $100 a year. If you look at folks who are already paying hundreds of dollars in parking fees a month or risking a $70 ticket every time they park their car and miss the meter, it’s a no-brainer.” With local funding secured, the next step is obtaining matching federal dollars, then determining a funding source for operating the system once it’s built. Construction is hoped to begin in 2014 with service beginning in late 2015. “Los Angeles is a city that’s going to continue to grow, and we’ve reached our limit with how big our roadway system can get,” Tangri says. “We hope that the [period in which] people in Los Angeles only drove their cars will eventually be a comparatively small blip in the city’s history.” gb&d
Two, there has been a major residential boom here—the number of market-rate units has grown substantially—so there’s greater interest in transit from people like me who are transplants from other cities, looking around and saying, “Why is no one walking in Los Angeles?” Three, there has been a major effort by folks concerned about historic preservation to look at what can be revitalized downtown. We think all of those reasons contribute to why the level of support for this project is incredibly high right now.
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John Kane
The eco-visionary at Kane Realty has big plans for retail in Raleigh
The site along the I-440 beltline adjacent to Six Forks Road in Raleigh, North Carolina, once housed a small, decaying shopping mall. That was until John Kane, CEO of Kane Realty Corporation, got a hold of the property. Today, it’s a glowing example of sustainable redevelopment, home to a mixed-use community that attracts 8.4 million visitors a year—and is still growing. Kane shares the ins and outs of the North Hills project with gb&d. Interview by Julie Schaeffer
Is sustainability a part of everything you do? It’s one of many things we offer, and it’s a big part of the North Hills Raleigh Mall project, where we’ve been recycling for the past 12 years. We bought it and the adjacent properties and have been renewing the entire area piece by piece. It’s a large project. How big exactly? It’s evolving. We have 1 million square feet of retail space, 500,000 square feet of office space, one full-service hotel built and another under construction, and 900 residential units with another 400 under construction. And there’s a lot more to come. We’ve done 10 projects so far within the acreage and will probably do another 20 before we’re finished. Such a development isn’t cheap. What’s the total cost of the North Hills Expansion? It’s hard to say, but by the time we’re finished, it could be as much as $2 billion. How did this project come to you? I live about a mile from the site, and I saw that it was great piece of real estate that just needed a new direction. I’ve been doing development for a long time, and the opportunity to recycle an old mall that was in a really good location fit my skills and interests naturally. Was it difficult to find the funding? We bought the land in pieces over a fiveyear period. We have different sources of backing—some traditional bank financing, some institutional financing, some friends and family.
“People definitely appreciate the fact that we recycled this whole area, and they like the walkability. I live about a mile from the site. It was great piece of real estate that just needed a new direction.” John Kane, Kane Realty
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Tell me about the major sustainable features. It’s pedestrian friendly. People live in apartments and walk to work; they stay in hotels and walk to business and leisure activities. We recycle whatever we can; we have solar panels on a lot of roofs; and there are three charging stagb&d
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The Green Report North Hills Expansion Pedestrian friendly The walkable design of the North Hills area benefits both residents and hotel guests, who can walk to work or shops and restaurants. Recycling Developer John Kane says the property recycles anything that can be recycled, and the program has been in place for 12 years. Solar panels Rooftop solar arrays on various buildings generate clean, renewable energy. Charging stations Three stations offer owners of electric vehicles the opportunity to charge their cars. LEED Gold The 17-story Captrust Office and Retail Building was completed two years ago and achieved LEED’s second-highest ranking.
tions for electric cars. We’re conscious of how the things we do affect the environment and, in some cases, have backed it with formal accreditation. We completed a 17-story office building two years ago that’s LEED Gold. What response have you received from retailers and visitors regarding the sustainable elements? I think for some people sustainability is important. REI is a tenant of ours, and obviously, they’re very into sustainability. For other people, it’s less important. But people definitely appreciate the fact that we recycled this whole area, and they like the walkability. But we have the fiduciary responsibility to try to do the right thing by the environment. gb&d
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Captrust Office & Retail Building at North Hills Certified LEED Gold for Core & Shell
Site Water Energy Materials Air quality Innovation TOTAL
a message from WASTE INDUSTRIES
Since 1970, Waste Industries has provided solid waste services to commercial, governmental, industrial, municipal, and residential customers while promoting sustainability through C&D recycling, cardboard and comingled recycling, CNG vehicles, a universal waste program, food waste digesters, and landfill-gas-to-energy projects. Waste Industries provides cost-effective and environmentally sound solutions. HIGHER STANDARDS. LOWER IMPACT.
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Built to LEED standards and delivering much more. Mercy Housing is the developer of Jefferson Park Terrace, which is designed to meet LEED Silver certification standards, exceed California’s Title 24 building energy efficiency requirements, and provide 60 units of affordable housing. It’s a combination that we’re proud to support with expertise, advice and comprehensive financial solutions.
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“Bank of America Merrill Lynch” is the marketing name for the global banking and global markets businesses of Bank of America Corporation. Lending, derivatives, and other commercial banking activities are . Securities, strategic advisory, and other investment banking performed globally by banking affiliates of Bank of America Corporation, including Bank of America, N.A., member FDIC. Equal Housing Lender activities are performed globally by investment banking affiliates of Bank of America Corporation (“Investment Banking Affiliates”), including, in the United States, Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Incorporated and Merrill Lynch Professional Clearing Corp., both of which are registered broker-dealers and members of FINRA and SIPC, and, in other jurisdictions, by locally registered entities. Investment products offered by Investment Banking Affiliates: Are Not FDIC Insured May Lose Value Are Not Bank Guaranteed. ©2012 Bank of America Corporation
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Mercy Housing Shuttered fast food restaurants and motels are the common landmarks of blighted American cities, but opportunity can rise from that struggle. One housing organization is sparking new life in some of California’s unlikeliest places. By Seth Putnam
Photos: Michael O'Callahan
For more than 30 years, Mercy Housing has been shaping lives. It’s a Coloradobased company that specializes in affordable housing, and although it started small, the operation has spread quickly and now has 11 regional offices across the nation. To date, Mercy Housing has created 40,000 affordable housing units worth $2.6 billion, changing the lives of more than 136,800 residents. And it’s not just about providing housing options to people who had none before, it’s about pioneering ways to think about the future of our cities. Numbers on paper provide a bird’seye view of the work Mercy Housing is doing, but what does that work look like at street level? To find out, we adjust the microscope on two of the company’s latest California initiatives: Boulevard Court, the renovation of a defunct Budget Inn in Sacramento, and Jefferson Park, a reclaimed burger stand in Los Angeles that boasts a long, surprising history. BOULEVARD COURT SacrAmento, CA The cable TV show Breaking Bad focuses on drug culture in the southwestern United States. In one scene, a drug-enforcement officer takes his young nephew to a roadside motel frequented by meth addicts and prostitutes to scare him straight. In Sacramento, an old, battered Budget Inn could have served as the set for that scene, judging by the number of drug- and prostitution-related emergency calls that originated from its premises. For years, the residents of central Sacramento watched the motor inn just off Highway 99 become a place to avoid. Rusty signs hung off-kilter, and scorched brown weeds grew freely through cracks in the uneven pavement. “It was a neighborhood nuisance,” says Stephan Daues, Mercy Housing’s regional director of housing development in Sacramento. “One year, the Budget Inn had the highest number of calls for sergbdmagazine.com
vice anywhere in the city.” But it wasn’t always that way. In the early 1960s, the corridor served south Sacramento’s business district and offered easy access to the state fair and other attractions. “The motels used to be very strong contributors to the local economy,” Daues says. It didn’t last. As the economy declined, so did the motel. The once-populated motor inn became the kind of last resort that could percolate a potent crime cocktail. But thanks to Mercy Housing and its public and private partners, all that has changed. “Problem area” isn’t a phrase that can be used to describe the situation anymore. Using the bones of the old motel, the Boulevard Court apartments—74
new studio and one-bedroom units—represent a new, powerful opportunity for disabled residents who were previously homeless. Getting started wasn’t without its challenges. The neighborhood had other reasons it was suffering, not just the Budget Inn, so the planners had to consider how they could change the culture of the area at large. Ultimately, they decided to use the building’s existing footprint to reduce rubble and to maintain the design continuity of the Stockton corridor, which draws heavily on Spanish and Southeast Asian influences. They gutted the structure down to its framing, expanded the lobby, and added a community building where
From Blight to Blessing For years an increasingly dangerous liability to central Sacramento, the Budget Inn along the Stockton Corridor has been given another chance at life as the Boulevard Court apartments, 74 units of housing for previously homeless disabled individuals. Mercy Housing and its project team took the disused structure, wrapped it in HardiePlank siding, and added photovoltaics and solar thermal panels to cut utility costs and reduce its environmental footprint. They also added a 1,500-square-foot community building with meeting rooms and a kitchen. And that’s not all— Boulevard Court is the first project in an initiative to take other area motels and transform them into healthy, sustainable housing.
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TRENDSETTERS Mercy Housing
“Many of these folks are trying for the first time in a long time to live in permanent housing and deal with the issues that caused their homelessness in the first place. It’s very challenging to do that on this scale, and it’s working. This is the turning point.” Stephan Daues, Mercy Housing
residents could gather for financial and time-management courses. They also used the enclosed courtyard to create an added sense of security. Anders & Falltrick, the architect tapped for the job, came up with a creative plan to break up the visual mass of the building and use simple, economical techniques to vary the imposing 600-foot roofline and give
Stephen Daues
Dialogue Stephan Daues & Ben Phillips Let’s talk about Mercy Housing’s mission—what’s the elevator pitch? Stephan Daues: Our mission is to alleviate poverty. And affordable housing plays a key role in doing that. If you talk about trying to end the cycle of poverty in our most challenged urban and rural areas, it relates to these core needs: education, health care, and housing. It’s integral. Your website talks about 95 million people being in substandard or homeless living situations. That’s a staggering number, almost a third of our country’s population. How do you even begin to approach that? Daues: You approach it on different levels. Luckily, I can tackle it project by project. But Mercy Housing as a whole is in the position of local, state, and national leadership to tackle it at a policy level, too. We have to both increase the funding for affordable housing and make sure we’re implementing it efficiently.
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it more depth of perspective. In addition, it spiced things up with homage to Spanish-mission design by including arches, a clay-colored roof, and a stucco finish on the front of the building. It has plenty of environmental benefits, too, starting with the fact that tons of waste was diverted from landfills by adapting the existing structure to its new use. Once that decision was made, it was all about sustainable construction techniques. “We wrapped it with a modern, state-of-the-art HardiePlank system,” Daues says. “On the southwest side, the new pitched roof is equipped with a photovoltaic system and water-heating collectors. It’s a very attractive building that’s quite recognizable as the original motor inn.”
One year in, Daues and his team have seen an incredible acceptance of the tenants by the community at large in a way that shows Mercy Housing and its partners that their approach is the right one. “Many of these folks are trying for the first time in a long time to live in permanent housing, abide by a lease, and deal with the issues that caused their homelessness in the first place,” Daues says. “It’s very challenging to do that on this scale, and it’s working. This is the turning point.”
What is the funding strategy for projects such as these? Ben Phillips: In the case of Jefferson Park, the commercial financing is all coming from Bank of America; they’re both the mortgage lender and the equity investor. But frequently as much as half of the cost isn’t covered by commercial financing, and that’s where public financing comes in. This land was acquired by the Redevelopment Agency of LA. There’s also federal funding from the LA Housing Department and a grant from the Federal Home Loan Bank. And there are funds from Los Angeles County.
What’s the next hurdle to clear? Phillips: Some of the green elements that are going into affordable housing—especially the ones that add cost—aren’t going into market-rate housing, whether that’s because of the nonprofit’s mission or because of funding requirements from donors. So, there’s a cost differential, which is a real political problem. It’s difficult enough to justify and get support for public expenditures on social programs, but the reality of having two separate markets of residential development can be a challenge. If we can bring some uniformity to the market, it would certainly help. Daues: We’re at a point of historically low levels of public financial support for affordable housing. The cuts we’ve experienced over the last few years have imposed a devastating blow on our ability to even keep up the supply, let alone produce more. In the trenches, we’re hotly debating our priorities for our limited resources and trying to figure out how to keep this issue on the public agenda.
There are a few decades of sustainable, affordable housing experience between the two of you. How have you seen the industry change over time? Phillips: In California, at least, things that used to be considered “green” features are now considered standard in affordable housing. On one level, they’ve been adopted as good practice by private companies like Mercy Housing, but we’ve seen lots of changes on a policy level, too. All the basics, especially indoor air quality, like no-VOC paint, formaldehyde-free cabinets, recycled-content carpets, etc., are now a given.
JEFFERSON PARK los angeles If you found yourself in the Jefferson Park district of Los Angeles any time between the 1950s and ’90s, a burger
Ben Phillips
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A Healthier Menu
joint on Western Avenue was the place to be. Originally called Mr. Fatburger, it represented more than just a succulent ground-beef patty and chili fries. It was a cornerstone in the community—a gathering place patronized by professional athletes and immortalized in hip-hop lyrics from the West Coast to the East. Founded in 1947 by an AfricanAmerican woman named Lovie Yancey, the little walk-up bloomed into first a national, then a global chain. But while the company flourished and changed its name to just Fatburger, the original location floundered. The original joint had been closed for the better part of a decade, the walls became prey for graffiti taggers. People would dump garbage on the lot. The awning hung ajar, creaking from a lack of maintenance. For a while, the dilapidated old site was used to store buses. It was an eyesore. Mercy Housing saw an opportunity to salvage a piece of cultural history and provide living space for people without homes. They broke ground in 2012 on a new complex that would create 60 affordable housing units while preserving the Fatburger building. “This site is significant because of its legacy,” says Ben Phillips, one of Mercy Housing’s vice presidents and the director of housing development in LA. “That a business started by an African-American woman during the 1940s grew into a national chain and still exists to this day is pretty historic. There are a lot of photos and stories centered around musicians who would go to the stand after their gigs late at night. It was a fixture for many decades.” Part of the contract agreement for the project was to keep the original Fatburger gbdmagazine.com
joint intact, so Mercy Housing plans to restore the little stand to the way it appeared back in 1952. It will serve as both a visual and physical nexus for residents, a bridge between the neighborhood’s cultural past and its evolving future. Those designs for the future are lofty. On the site, the company will develop one-, two-, and three-bedroom units that look like apartment buildings connected to the historic stand. The units are for use by individuals whose income levels are, on average, 50 percent of the area’s median income; for a family of four in LA, that’s around $30,000 per year. “Wages in Southern California often don’t keep up with housing costs,” Phillips explains. He thinks that the strength of the building design will play a significant role in helping residents sculpt stable lifestyles, and his team took special care to erect façades that were appropriate to their soundings. Along Western Avenue, the building profile features urban frontage. Not so on the opposite side, which sits next to bungalows on 30th and 31st streets and so has a distinctly residential flavor. There, they outfitted the apartments with front porches to encourage more community interaction. Phillips also highlights the work-live design of the units, which he hopes will encourage entrepreneurship. “These spaces provide us the opportunity to carry on another facet of Lovie Yancey’s legacy with Fatburger: the spirit of small businesses,” he says. “This is a neighborhood of Los Angeles that needs economic development, and we think this is a project that will support that.” That’s the sort of forethought that pervades the entire project, especially
The original Fatburger location continues to revolve around food though the fare is a little healthier now. The site is being developed by Mercy Housing into Jefferson Park, an affordable housing development for Los Angeles residents making 50% of the area’s median income or less, and a big part of the plan is the property’s edible gardens, which will be maintained by residents and fertilized through a composting program that Mercy Housing plans to initiate. Its other green features, besides the historic preservation of the Fatburger building, include mini-split air systems, high-efficiency windows, optimized insulation, and solar panels.
in Mercy Housing’s attention to green features. The team is shooting for a LEED Silver certification. “It gets high points in a number of areas that aren’t particularly sexy,” Phillips laughs, giving the apartments’ proximity to the new Metro Expo Line as an example. “It has bicycle parking, and it’s low-income housing, which automatically gets it some points.” All of these advance the site toward Silver, but the building has a few other highlights that show Mercy Housing’s interest in the future of sustainability. As a whole, the project significantly exceeds Title 24, California’s strict energy-efficiency code, with mini-split air-conditioning and heating systems, high-efficiency windows and framing techniques, and optimized insulation. There’s photovoltaic panels on the roof, but the crown jewel of the property is in the landscaping, which is a series of edible gardens that the residents and staff will harvest and maintain. It also has a composting system to cycle waste back to the gardens as fertilizer. In addition to providing a space that’s both sustainable and affordable, Mercy Housing offers self-improvement programs for its residents. Even though the programs are voluntary, Phillips and his team have seen an overwhelming participation rate. “Our residents will be living with any number of challenges or disabilities,” Phillips says. “The intent of this property is to help stabilize people’s lives and to put them in a position to pursue their own hopes and dreams.” gb&d march–april 2013
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Warren Wilson College is inarguably one of the greenest institutions in America. What’s the secret to its wholly conscious culture? Interview by Benjamin van Loon
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he Sierra Club, The Daily Green, the National Wildlife Foundation, and the Princeton Review all agree: Warren Wilson College (WWC)—the 1,000-student private liberal arts college in Asheville, North Carolina—is one of the greenest colleges in America. It has a 300-acre working farm and a 600-acre maintained forest. Its EcoDorm, completed in 2003, was the first LEED-EB Platinum building on a college campus anywhere, and its newer buildings, including Orr Cottage and Village dorms, continue this constructive tradition. We sat down with Jason Lackey, design and construction supervisor, and Steve Farrell, campus architect, who spoke together about WWC’s plans for a sustainable future. What makes Warren Wilson different from other environmentally conscious colleges? The main appeal at WWC, a ‘working college,’ is what we call the Triad. Students come to receive a four-year liberal arts degree, but they also participate in separate service and work programs. Every student works 15 hours a week on one of our 112 campus crews; electrical, landscaping, plumbing, HVAC, dining, heavy duty, the farm, or one of our carpentry crews. Also, before the students
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Steve Farrell (left) and Jason Lackey
graduate, they are required to complete a community engagement commitment. Academics are at the front of all of this, and it’s the students who are the biggest proponents of this Triad program. Does this approach encourage student participation beyond the bare minimum? It’s actually the students who are push-
ing us by setting the tone and moving toward a resilient culture to save as much energy, material, and water as possible. We built the first LEED-certified college dorm in North Carolina, and it was the students who insisted on this project. But beyond that, the students helped us build the dorm. We recently did an ESCO [audit] on campus, and when the team came in for the appraisal, they saw that gb&d
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The EcoDorm was constructed using structural insulated panels to produce a tight building envelope, cutting down on energy use and improving indoor air quality.
Miles of hiking trails on campus at Warren Wilson College in Asheville, NC
On Warren Wilson’s idyllic campus, students work on the college farm or on carpentry, electrical, or landscaping crews to fulfill their obligation of 15 hours of work per week, a vital aspect of the college’s approach to education.
photos: Samsel Architects Photo
unlike the other institutions they audit, our students had already picked all of the low-hanging fruit: Light bulbs had been changed, lights had been turned off, doors had been made to fit, windows had been closed. The students are obsessed with conservation. What are the benefits of educating in this way? Many of our students already have minds for sustainability, which is why they come to WWC, but once they’re here, they can turn that energy toward pursuing degrees targeted at environmental change, and they can experience all of that on campus. Also, because the students are working and volunteering, when they graduate, they not only have a gbdmagazine.com
degree, but they have experience as well. Someone can major in environmental studies, use his or her service hours in our insulation program, which installs new insulation in the homes of lowincome families, and he or she can also work on our electrical crew. Once these students graduate, they will ideally have the ability to solve new problems in the modern professional world. Someone once said of our school that we don’t grow vegetables, we grow citizens. How does this integrated style of education play into campus landscape and design? WWC is located on some of the most beautiful real estate in the world. We work diligently to keep the small
All wood for the EcoDorm came from the college grounds, either reused or timber-milled and finished on campus. The school only harvested as much on-site wood as was deemed appropriate to not upset the ecosystem.
charm of a private institution while maintaining our expectation of being a leader in green building and sustainable practices. Green building and sustainability were things we practiced far before they became marketable terms, and this is clear with our buildings like EcoDorm, which was the first dorm to receive LEED-EB Platinum, a certification which we received retroactively. The students in that building set march–april 2013
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“We accept the top-down challenges presented by LEED and the Living Building Challenge, but we also want to challenge the larger community to find ways to meet these challenges from the bottom up.” Jason lackey, warren wilson college
sented by LEED and the Living Building Challenge—and their market transformations are profound—but we also want to challenge the larger community to find ways to meet these challenges from the bottom up. Every situation is unique and needs local response in order to be effective. gb&d
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their own targets and sign contracts stating what is and is not acceptable in the building, from an energy perspective. There is a red light in the mechanical room, and if it goes on, it means that the building is exceeding the students’ self-imposed Btu per square foot, and they do what they can to keep the light off. The dorm also has a composting toilet and the building itself is surrounded by an organic, edible landscape that the students living in the dorm must tend.
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Can you tell us about some upcoming projects at WWC? We have a new classroom building that is in the pre-design phase while we’re trying to figure out what to do with it from a sustainable and resilient culture standpoint. We’ve also got our eye on a utility-scale photovoltaic array; we’re figuring out if this would be appropriate for us. We’re also focusing on energy-use intensity. Because WWC has such a large farm, our usage is rather high, and we’re working to keep pushing that down. We accept the top-down challenges pre-
Acreage of Warren Wilson’s maintained forest—twice the size of the school’s working farm
a message from ROLYN
We thank Warren Wilson College for giving us the pleasure of working with them. Sustainability is woven into the fabric of Warren Wilson College, and when renovations were needed, they looked to Rolyn. Rolyn reused all non-contaminated wood and cement fiber materials and recycled the gutters, flashing, drip edge, and roof shingles. Eco-friendly, phosphate-free cleaners, eco-friendly finishes, and no-VOC paints were used. The R-value of the structure was increased by installing high-insulation windows and also by double insulating the exterior of the building with recycled rigid foam.
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Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List
places of worship
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introduction
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prayer pavilion of light
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westchester reform temple
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st. nicholas eastern orthodox church
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green mosque proposal
The meaning of ‘sacred’
An inspired space for a Phoenix megachurch
Defining Jewish architecture, curing social ills
Mind-boggling innovation on a tight budget
A religious complex for the 21st century
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cathedral of christ the light
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Oakland’s durable, daylit landmark
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Places of Worship contemporary RELIGIOUS DESIGN IN AMERICA
St. Nicholas Eastern Orthodox Church in Springdale, AR, was a budget build that used its funding constraints to innovate. Read more about Marlon Blackwell’s masterpiece on p.66.
The word ‘sacred’ literally means ‘set apart.’ But architects can’t just set a place apart and hope for the best. There’s an experiential aspect to the sacred that, in the context of design, is less a question of program than it is of understanding. Can you use design to reflect and understand the sacred? Can the sacred be experienced in a human-made space? Can a sacred space be technically integrated while still being ‘set apart?’ Through their use of sustainable strategies, metaphorical design, and collective use of light as an architectural material, the projects studied in this portfolio—including DeBartolo Architects’ Prayer Pavilion of Light and Rogers Marvel’s Westchester Reform Temple—attempt to offer spaces ‘set apart’ yet integrated with their environments to create experiences as personal as they are universal.
photo: tim hursley
By Benjamin van Loon
GREEN TYPOLOGIES places of worship
The Pr ay er Pav ilion of Light A ‘l a n t er n on a hill’ a nd not hing mor e
When it comes to building churches, contemporary American Christianity often eschews flourish for function. However, the Prayer Pavilion of Light, by DeBartolo Architects for the 9,600-member Phoenix First Assembly Church is both modern and meditative. It uses experiential landscape design and holistic lighting strategies to create what the congregation calls a ‘lantern on the hill’ in the heart of the Valley of the Sun. “When we were designing the building, the client asked us to imagine the chapel as a lantern on a hill,” says principal Jack DeBartolo III, who collaborated with his father, Jack Jr., on the design. “With a Noguchi lantern as inspiration, we began to think about this idea of creating a chapel that could literally be shaded by glass but also use the glass as a source of illumination for both interior and exterior experiences.” As a place for reflection and contemplation, the 2,500-square-foot pavilion was designed for a Christian tradition that specifically elevates the experience of praying, so the architects treated the walk to and from the pavilion as an ambulatory representation of the practice of prayer. The cubical glass pavilion is located on the southeastern portion of the megachurch’s 65-acre campus that sits at the base of a large desert mountain preserve. The pavilion uses its elevated position on the side of Stoney Mountain to overlook the church campus and the sprawling city skyline. “When we were designing this building,” DeBartolo says, “we were really thinking about the movement of people on the campus relative to the way people really experience the different ministries available to them.” The pavilion was the fourth and final installment of DeBartolo Architects’ fourphase master plan, which included the construction of an early childhood education center in 2000, a Youth Pavilion two years later, and a Children’s Pavilion in 2004. All are located on the southern end of the church campus, leading visi-
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At night, the glass pavilion at Phoenix First Assembly Church is illuminated by hundreds of LED fixtures mounted between the double skins. The ‘lantern’ changes color when lit, creating a different environment for each shade.
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site plan
PROJECT
GREEN
LOCATION Phoenix Size 2,500 ft2 (chapel), 2,000 ft2 (support building) Completed 2007 Program Christian prayer chapel
CERTIFICATIOn Not applicable Site Located on rehabilitated site Exterior Doubled-glass skin to create thermal chimney, shading Landscape Local and native flora Light 100% daylighting, LED lighting at night HVAC Efficient system delivered underground for cooling
TEAM ARCHITECT DeBartolo Architects Client Phoenix First Assembly Church General Contractor Arthur Porter Construction Lighting Roger Smith Lighting Design Landscape Michael Boucher Landscape Architect
Lantern wall section
photos: bill timmerman
On three sides of the building, sliding-glass doors retract to blur the line between indoor and outdoor space. When the doors are opened, the chapel is transformed into a pavilion able to accommodate thousands of visitors.
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“With a Noguchi lantern as inspiration, we began to think about this idea of creating a chapel that could literally be shaded by glass but also use the glass as a source of illumination for both interior and exterior experiences.” Jack DeBartolo III, DeBartolo Architects
Read DeBart olo’s explan ation o f Isamu Noguc hi’s influen ce on th e chapel design , p.162
Jack DeBartolo III
tors toward the prayer pavilion on a path that begins between the Youth and Children’s pavilions. The gently inclining, 600-foot-long processional path winds through a hillside landscape designed by landscape architect Michael Boucher and planted with native Sonoran flora. The path rises 28 feet from the garden entrance to the chapel mount where visitors are then welcomed into a courtyard with benches, shade trees, and a 70-footlong black reflection pool bordering the plaza’s eastern edge. A ceremonial flame burning in the center of the pool glimmers off the water’s glassy surface that also reflects the 50-foot-high steel cross rising from the pool. Although glass structures are rarely ideal for desert architecture, in order to achieve the ‘paper lantern’ experience, DeBartolo saw that an element of transparency was needed. To achieve the dual functions of glass working as a shade and as a source of light, DeBartolo says the team experimented with various louvers and perforated scrims but decided on the idea of shading the glass with glass. The glass cube is thus formed in a double façade; the inner enclosure comprises triple-paned glass panels supported
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by the chapel’s structural Vierendeel truss sides and is separated by a five-foot air gap from the outer laminated frittedglass enclosure. Aside from creating an enveloping thermal chimney, the space between the glass walls provides ample daylighting while also housing Roger Smith Lighting Design’s color-changing LED bands, which light the building interior and exterior at night. The night-lighting is a literal polychromatic ‘lantern on a hill.’ “We wanted to create a building that was highly controllable in terms of light,” DeBartolo says. “We were inspired by how James Turrell uses light—using it to colorize a building through imperceptibly slow color changes.” The chapel, which seats 250 and is open 24 hours a day, year-round, welcomes visitors from its western side with ceremonial bronze doors, and the northern, eastern, and southern portions also fully open via stacking and sliding glass doors to surrounding courtyards such that, from a distance, the structure appears to be floating. Further reinforcing the separation of sacred from service, DeBartolo located the chapel’s restroom, mechanical, and administrative needs in an adjacent
2,000-square-foot rectangular concrete structure. Informed by an architectural tour of Europe and the work of Peter Zumthor, DeBartolo and his father saw how separating these functions complemented the sacrosanct nature of the chapel. “The word ‘sacred’ literally means ‘set apart,’ and we saw this project as an opportunity to separate the pragmatic elements from the chapel itself,” DeBartolo says. “The chapel is a single-use room, and we’ve connected it to an elegant support building that has a dialogue with the chapel.” This dialogue occurs through the connection of the HVAC and mechanical services, which join the adjacent structure and all of its equipment to the chapel via insulated underground ductwork. “These practical elements always challenge the idea of making a sacred space,” DeBartolo says. “This site was really unique because it gave us space and the opportunity to literally pull those programmatic needs outside of the building.” The pavilion foregoes the need for an interior lobby—and additional square footage—by treating the courtyards as a type of outdoor lobby, creating less distinction between interior and exterior spaces and increasing the experience of the prayerful instant. “Phoenix First Assembly, as a Christian church, doesn’t want to elevate a building to any other quality beyond being just a building,” DeBartolo says, “but at the same time, it has given them a place they never thought they would have.” If the American inheritors of the Protestant legacy have lost anything from their Catholic forebears, it is the idea of architecture as a type of prayer, meaning that the connection between creator and created was excluded. Through its innovative use of light, landscape, and location, the Prayer Pavilion of Light promotes a sensory experience that integrates the physical and spiritual as well as interior and exterior spaces. gb&d gb&d
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photos: Paul Warchol
W estchester R efor m Temple R epa ir ing t he wor ld, a nd t he ways in w hich w e build
Jewish author and playwright David Mamet argues in his book The Secret Knowledge that Judaism—as both a cultural and religious tradition—has never been grounded in a place long enough to develop a ‘look.’ Rather than being tied to a particular geography or aesthetic tradition, Jewish religious architecture often responds to the particularities of its environment, suggesting that even as Judaism continually references the past, it does so through the foil of the present. In response to this chameleonic tendency, the Westchester Reform Temple, an gbdmagazine.com
he temple’s site lighting uses T faceted light poles that don’t angle any higher than 90 degrees in order to avoid adding unnatural lighting to the nighttime environment and making the building Dark Sky Compliant.
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“The bands are interrupted with skylights, which not only serve to bring light into the sanctuary but reflect metaphorically that the world is broken.” Robert Rogers, Rogers Marvel Architects
LOCATION Scarsdale, NY Size 50,000 ft2, 17,000 ft2 new construction Completed 2009 Cost $12 million Program Reform Jewish sanctuary and religious school Awards Chicago Athenaeum, American Architecture Award; Chicago Athenaeum Green Good Design for Architecture; AIA New York City Project Merit Award
TEAM ARCHITECT Rogers Marvel Architects Client Westchester Reform Temple Mechanical Engineer Collado Engineering Structural Engineer Robert Silman Associates Civil Engineer Langan Engineering and Environmental Design Acoustical Engineer Jaffe Holden Landscape Dirtworks Lighting Jim Conti Lighting Design General Contractors E.W. Howell Co., Kane Contracting LEED Consultant Buro Happold Consulting Engineers
GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Silver Site Master plan includes existing structures Materials Sustainably sourced cedar, gypsum, fly ash, low-VOC paints, carpets, and adhesives Light Daylight introduced through skylights and glass-louvered wall Energy High-efficiency HVAC, underfloor heating Solar PV cells power Ner Tamid sanctuary light
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award-winning, LEED Silver synagogue in Scarsdale, New York, by Rogers Marvel Architects (RMA), attempts to create its own Jewish sacred space. The original sanctuary was designed by Marcel Breuer in 1959 and was expanded in 1964 by Percival Goodman. A second building on the nine-acre site, the Center for Jewish Life, was added by Peter Gisolfi in 1998, thus accounting for an extant 50,000 square feet to be reimagined in RMA’s master plan, which was completed in 2009. The plan converted the Goodman sanctuary into a 14,000-square-foot religious school and created a new 17,000-square-foot sanctuary that can hold up to 1,250 people. Robert Rogers, FAIA, principal at Rogers Marvel, made this sanctuary the central spiritual metaphor for the synagogue. “This was the first synagogue we had designed,” Rogers says. “We’re working with extremely knowledgeable clients, and it allowed us to really focus on what makes a space sacred.” The sanctuary, situated on an eastwest axis to face Jerusalem, is designed around the concept of tikkun olam, which means repairing, healing, or restoring the world. The dynamic sanctuary space is wrapped in seven architectural bands made from sustainably sourced cedar—a reference to Solomon’s temple—and plaster, a contemporary referent. “On the ceiling, the bands are interrupted with skylights, which not only serve to bring light into the sanctuary but reflect metaphorically that the world is broken,” Rogers says. “And it is the imperative of its people to bring about its restoration.” At the front of the sanctuary is the Bima, a platform that holds the ark and the Torah scrolls. The congregation faces the Bima, which is housed in the seventh band of the sanctuary in front of a low-E glass, louvered wall that introduces diffused daylight into the space. The glass is chrome-mirrored on the underside, and the topsides are coated in blue, reflect-
photos: Paul Warchol
PROJECT
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ing the garden outside. “The glass offers a way to break up the daylight and also provides an obscure, idealized view of the garden,” Rogers says. An ark made of olive ash is suspended by narrow aluminum fins in front of the eastern wall and appears to be frozen in mid-air behind the Bima. Using olive ash hearkens back to the original ark outlined in the Torah, but the ark at Westchester is also designed to Sephardic scale, showing the importance of music and song in Jewish ceremony. Jaffe Holden, the acoustical consultant for the project, used the seven bands to amplify and preserve sound while masking the electrical and mechanical elements. A bronze Mobius collar wraps around the ark and is lit by a solar-powered sancgbdmagazine.com
tuary lamp called the Ner Tamid, which translates to ‘eternal flame.’ “In Judaism, the study of Torah is never-ending, always revealing something new,” Rogers says. “The idea of surrounding the ark in a Mobius element has a very clear spiritual significance, as does an eternal flame that is powered by the sun.” Westchester also includes low-VOC finishes, fly-ash concrete, and an efficient heat-distribution system underneath the floor, contributing even more to its LEED Silver certification. “It’s really difficult to get LEED for a sanctuary, but this project had a moral imperative,” Rogers says. “It was important to the congregation that it be an example for the community, and rather than simply building to green standards, the certification, in a way,
ABOVE The ceiling at the Westchester Reform Temple is made from sustainably sourced cedar and plaster. All materials came from local or regional sources, including concrete from White Plains, NY, gypsum plaster board from Aliquippa, PA, and cedar from an FSC-certified forest in Woodbury, CT. OPPOSITE A detail of the Ner Tamid, which uses solar power. Behind it, the glass louvers are chrome-mirrored on the underside and coated in blue on the top.
authenticates that mission.” By incorporating both functional and symbolic realizations of repairing and healing, the Westchester sets a distinct precedent not only for the design of sacred buildings but also for future Jewish architectural identity. gb&d march–april 2013
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GREEN TYPOLOGIES places of worship
St. Nichol a s E a ster n Orthodox Church Ada p t ing iconogr a ph y for a n unlik ely space
Perhaps more than any other Christian denomination, Eastern Orthodox Christianity is distinct for its repentant sensuousness and angelic iconography. For this reason, the St. Nicholas Eastern Orthodox Church in Springdale, Arkansas, is in high contrast to the religion’s historically Byzantine aesthetic, using light, orientation, and modernist pragmatism to complement the experience of the Orthodox liturgy. Although it seems minimalistic, the aesthetic language for the church was determined as much by artistic conjecture as it was budgetary constraint. And according to Marlon Blackwell, though limiting, these controls lent themselves to a truly unique sacral experience. “This project is interesting because it gave me an opportunity to create a type of sacred space in a unique form,” says Blackwell, principal of Marlon Blackwell Architect in nearby Fayetteville, Arkansas. “But the parishioners could only afford around $100 per square foot of the 3,600-square-foot building, and they wanted to keep the metal shed that was on the site.” When the church acquired the site, it likewise acquired the extant prefab shop building that, for budgetary reasons, the church was committed to preserving. Sustainably speaking, this was an incidentally intuitive control and limited the number of breaks and changes Blackwell would make to the structure. “They wanted various elements you normally see in Orthodox churches,” Blackwell
PROJECT LOCATION Springdale, AR Size 3,600 ft2 Completed 2010 Cost $405,000 Program Orthodox Christian sanctuary Awards 2012 AIA National Small Projects Award, 2011 World Architecture Festival Winner in Civic and Community Buildings, 2011 American Architecture Award, 2011 Chicago Athenaeum American Architecture Award, 2011 Gulf States Regional AIA Design Merit Award, 2010 Arkansas State AIA Honor Award
TEAM ARCHITECT Marlon Blackwell Architect Client St. Nicholas Eastern Orthodox Church General Contractor Lourie Construction Civil Engineering Bates & Associates Structural Engineering Myres Beatty Engineering
GREEN CERTIFICATION Not applicable Structure Aggressive adaptive reuse of prefab shop building Exterior Doubled exterior cladding limiting thermal gain Mechanical Heat recovery system reducing energy usage Site Minimized parking area
BEFORE
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photo: tim hursley
Marlon Blackwell kept the structure of the original shed but put box-rib metal panelling on the exterior. The lighting toys with shadows to animate the otherwise unornamented façade.
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“All of the familiar Orthodox elements are present in this project, but the difference is that we had to include all of these things within the DNA of a metal building.” Marlon Blackwell, Marlon Blackwell architect
says, “but because they also wanted to keep the prefab building, we used it as an invitation to take a different strategy.” In Orthodox churches, the sanctuary forms the conceptual center of the structure, as the representation of the liturgical experience. Traditionally, Orthodox churches are oriented eastward, citing the light of the rising sun and its dissolution of darkness as an icon for Christ. The extant prefab structure on the Springdale site was situated opposite the eastern axis, which Blackwell corrected by adding a narrow addition to the western side of the structure. This enfolds the narthex—the vestibule that leads to the main worship space—and allows for a skylit red tower, designed to mimic the experience of stained glass, to flood the end of the narthex as worshippers pause and transition into the sanctuary. “All of the iconography, the iconostasis, and all of the familiar Orthodox elements are present in this project, but the difference is that we had to include all of these things within the DNA of a metal building,” Blackwell says. “Rather than being external, all of these elements are internal.” This notion of internality is subtly reflected in the building exterior with three windows and a double-high skylight tower acting as the only interruptions in the box-ribbed metal shell. Interior natural flourishes such as the suspended white-oak millwork in the narthex, gentle skylighting, and natural white-oak floors in the sacred spaces promote a sense of peace and intimacy.
The sanctuary is oriented on the traditional east-west axis, and a long translucent transom window fills the space with soft eastern light on Sunday mornings.
AFTER BEFORE
From Garage to Sanctuary The original building had three high-lift garage doors, a mezzanine, and an office space. The office space was removed, and the western façade of the mezzanine was taken off to accommodate a 10-foot, narrow expansion that extended the width of the sanctuary. A 30-foot-wide transom window softly lights the morning services.
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Domes are an important of Orthodox churches, but Blackwell didn’t want to disturb the flat roof of the building. The project team secured an old satellite dish and embedded it in the ceiling to create the dome you see here.
Just before the blood-red light of the tower, an icon of St. Nicholas hangs above a long custom white oak cabinet where parishioners light votive candles as they enter.
photos: tim hursley
In addition to the material elements, Blackwell says he also wanted to restrict the amount of light coming into the building. “We wanted to create a space that had more shadow than light,” he says, “so when light comes into the space, it makes it very atmospheric.” The clear glass skylight at the top of the tower features a red laminated, cross-shaped window on the east side, which introduces a red light to the space and signifies the blood of Christ. A blue laminated window is placed in the corner over what will be a baptistery, and a yellow window allows light into a short staircase that leads to classrooms on the second floor. “We really focused on how light was introduced and mixed in the building, and how it would be useful during the services,” Blackwell says. Because of the limited project budget, the building relies strongly on reuse and repurposing of extant materials. The dome in the sanctuary, for example, is a downturned satellite dish that the contractor acquired for two cases of beer. gbdmagazine.com
Coated in a plaster skin and finished with an icon decal, the dish is at once practical, unique, and functional. “This project really underscores the continuation of our focus on architecture anywhere, on any scale, for any budget,” Blackwell says. “We have a lot of projects focused on being as reductive as possible through form, thus allowing the box to become expressive through profile.” Complementary to the Orthodox tradition, the church is itself an icon, architectural and spiritual. gb&d
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The 25th sura of the Qur’an refers to the servants of the Most Merciful as those who “walk upon the Earth in humility.” The proposal for the Green Mosque in Pewaukee, Wisconsin, reflects the essence of this passage—that the walk of the faithful is communed as much in his physical footstep as it is in his architectural footprint. The proposal is by Pasadena-based designers Onat Oktem, Ziya Imren, Zeynep Oktema, and Uri Tzarnotzky, and the building won the Stand-Alone Building category for the 2010 Faith in Place ‘Building: Problem or Solution?’ contest. “The religious buildings we’ve built over the past 100 years tend to be solving 14th-century problems because that’s the architecture they’re responding to,” says Clare Butterfield, executive director for Faith in Place. “This competition was built around the idea of the problems we have now, which have to do with ecological limits as well as the changing face of religious communities. We asked what a building would look like that solves the problems we have now.” Competition guidelines called for the proposals to be tied to a certain place—in this case, the north-central Midwest—and respond to the needs of that particular community. By locating the Green Mosque in the western suburbs of Milwaukee and providing services such as lecture halls, a library, and a soup kitchen, the Green Mosque functions as a community centerpiece rather than a building with an insular function. The plans also detail a double-hull system in the building, creating a thermal buffer zone to facilitate heating and cooling functions while also promoting calm in the mosque interior. Respondent to the diverse precipitation of the humid continental climate, the mosque includes solar thermal wells and green roofing to capture water and reduce heat island effects. The Islamic process of Wudhu ablution, which requires adherents to wash
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photos: samantha simmons; renderings: Onat Oktem, Ziya Imren, Zeynep Oktem and Uri Tzarmotzky
Gr een Mosque Proposa l T r a dit iona l Muslim r ef er en t s meet today ’ s t echnologies
Clare Butterfield, executive director of Faith in Place
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“It’s a very peaceful and meditative place but incorporates a lot of references to modern technologies and energy-efficient design.” Clare Butterfield, Faith in Place
their hands, arms, face, and feet prior to prayer, further necessitates the careful treatment of water. Rain and wastewater from the process is purified and reused for watering the on-site vegetable garden, which cultivates corn, onions, and potatoes for the soup kitchen. Low-flow plumbing, low-E finishes, and recycled materials are also used in
the project, effectively lowering building energy use while promoting reliance on the local economy for construction. “Islam is particularly steeped in its traditions, and this mosque challenges these ideas by incorporating new building techniques, rather than simply referring to the Islamic architectural traditions,” Butterfield says. “It’s a
very peaceful and meditative place but incorporates a lot of references to modern technologies and energy-efficient design.” Historically, Islam integrates sustainability into its design and iconography, but projects such as the Green Mosque seek to bring this effect beyond mere aesthetics and into the very mechanics of the religion. Although the proposed mosque won the 2010 competition just for the building plans and renderings, Faith in Place also remains active in promoting these green initiatives across religious movements. It has been an integral partner in everything from making the first solar Islamic center in America in 2008 at a mosque in Bridgeview, Illinois, to being involved in the greening of the LEED Platinum Jewish Reconstructionist Congregation Synagogue in Evanston, Illinois. gb&d
PROGRAMMING the green mosque The Green Mosque team wanted to design not just a place of worship but also as a religious complex with social activities. The complex comprises the main mosque building, a library, education and lecture halls, and a soup kitchen to emphasize the importance of community and social gatherings.
The double-hull system in the mosque creates a thermal buffer zone. This calms the prayer-area environment and keeps the building warm in the winter; the glass also creates a spiritual atmosphere.
Ablution water and rainwater is collected, purified, and reused for watering the vegetable garden with a drip-irrigation system.
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The graphic element at the focal point of the sanctuary is made of 154 panels with a total 94,423 perforations letting light through to create the image of Jesus Christ.
places of worship GREEN TYPOLOGIES
photo: Cesar Rubio, ©Skidmore, OwingS & Merrill
the C athedr a l of Chr ist the Light Ligh t w eigh t, susta ina ble , a nd c at holic in t he pur est sense of t he wor d
Originally derived from the Greek katholikos, the word catholic means universal, or pertinent to all. If modern architecture is defined by abstraction, the Cathedral of Christ the Light in Oakland, California, designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM), is abstract in the most catholic sense of the term. The 250,000-square-foot church complex, with its distinguishable 136-foot-tall, glass-clad cathedral, overlooks the northwestern arm of Oakland’s scenic Lake Merritt. It sets an expressive foreground for the church, which forms the communal center for more than 500,000 Catholics in Alameda and Contra Costa counties. Traditionally, Catholic architectural history is as stately as it is iconic, not only for the way it reflects the strength of the Catholic theological tradition but also for its assertive and at times authoritarian assumptions. Although customarily reverential in its grandeur, Catholic architecture is often firmly rooted in its European and Gothic genealogy, and—perhaps at the price of being a 1,500-year-old legacy—it frequently fails in its aesthetic expression to abide by the apostle Paul’s injunction to “be all things to all people.” Through its innovative use of site development, urban planning, and spatial orientation, the Cathedral of Christ the gbdmagazine.com
Light draws its abstractions both from universal religious experience and the Catholic liturgy to create a truly comprehensive program. In addition to the cathedral, the campus includes a mausoleum, parish hall, conference center, a garden, diocese offices, archive and library, rectory with housing for 12 clergy, a cathedral store, a parking structure, a free legal clinic, and a free health clinic. However, as Craig Hartman, design partner at SOM and designer of Christ the Light, says, “We made all of these dependencies secondary to the cathedral itself, which is slightly turned on the orthogonal campus plan so that its long axis engages the long axis of the lake, while the dependencies surrounding the cathedral engage the surrounding urban elements.” The 1,350-seat cathedral is symbolically oriented to mirror its penitent function by being situated in the city and positioned to overlook the lake, and for Hartman, it was this type of religious awe that inspired the architecture. “We were trying to discover what constitutes the spiritual quality of a physical space,” Hartman says. “The essence of sacred space isn’t luxurious materials and iconography, or even architecture. To stand within a majestic grove of sequoias with delicate light filtering through the overhead canopies is to experience
spiritual space. It was that ineffable, poetic quality of light that can ennoble even the most modest of materials that we were searching for in the design of the cathedral.” With this model in mind, the cathedral begins with 15-foot-high concrete walls, formed with fly ash, a recycled material, and slag. In addition to forming a bold and sculptural backdrop, the walls function to create thermal mass while also performing an integral role in the structure’s thermal inertia system. “This is a passive system,” Hartman says. “We’ve cut small grills in the floor under the pews, and we allow cool air harvested overnight to come into the cathedral in the morning, and it remains there even as the building heats during the day. During the winter, we use hot water in the floor slabs to create radiant heating, just like the Romans did in the first millennium.” The wooden walls are made from Douglas fir pieces, sourced from renewable forests, that are ribbed and louvered together as they ascend to the oval ceiling, which is made of faceted aluminum and diffuses light transferred through the glass oculus on the cathedral’s roof. The oculus takes the form of a gigantic Vesica Piscis, a shape formed at the intersection of two circles that share the same radius. march–april 2013
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“It was that ineffable, poetic quality of light that can ennoble even the most modest of materials that we were searching for in the design of the cathedral.” Craig Hartman, Skidmore, owings & Merrill
PROJECT LOCATION Oakland, CA Size 250,000 ft2 Completed 2008 Program Catholic cathedral and multiuse development Cost $113,000,000 Awards 2010 AIA National Honor Award for Interior Architecture; 2009 AIA National Honor Award for Architecture; 2009 Faith and Form magazine / Interfaith Forum on Religion, Art and Architecture Design Award for Religious Architecture: Liturgical/Interior Design; 2009 Forest Products Society Wood Engineering Innovation Award; 2009 IIDA Interior Design Award
Nam eos nobit exerem laborerum exceperio. Name vera dolupic ienderum eos aditis ut que numet, occus, optaque q
ARCHITECT Skidmore, Owings & Merrill Architect of Record Kendall/Heaton Associates Client Catholic Diocese of Oakland Structural Engineering Skidmore, Owings & Merrill Interior, Product, and Furniture Design Skidmore, Owings & Merrill Electrical Engineering The Engineering Enterprise Mechanical Engineering Taylor Engineering Civil Engineering Korve Engineering General Contractor Webcor Builders Landscape Architect Peter Walker & Partners Lighting Consultant Claude R. Engle Lighting Consultants
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GREEN certification Not applicable Site Mixed-use development with religious and community functions Exterior Fritted glass, translucent laminate glass, clear low-E glass Interior Sustainably sourced Douglas fir HVAC Passive thermal inertia system, radiant hot-water floor heating Daylight 100% daytime reliance on natural sunlight
The cathedral’s interior volume and exterior shape are both derived from rigorous geometries. The interior wooden structure comprises two spherical segments while its pellucid exterior skin is formed by two conical segments of fritted glass, translucent laminate glass, and clear low-E glass. White aluminum mullions, set on a 10-by-5-foot grid pattern, frame the glass. “The fritting has a geometric design pattern to give it a very organic quality,” Hartman says. “And given this tapestry of translucent and opaque patterned glass, the building image changes throughout the day; at times it appears very solid and at other times becomes very ephemeral and luminous.” The interior and exterior forms meet as concentric circular segments atop the concrete base. The cathedral’s lightweight, high-strength structure was gb&d
photos: Cesar Rubio, ©Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
TEAM
In addition to the visually dynamic relationship between the interior wood and concrete, the latter acts as thermal mass, part of the passive cooling system.
GREEN TYPOLOGIES PLACES OF WORSHIP
“Given this tapestry of translucent and opaque patterned glass, the building image changes throughout the day; at times it appears very solid and at other times becomes very ephemeral and luminous.” Craig Hartman, Skidmore, owings & Merrill
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Wanting to create a beautiful, enduring landmark with the lightest carbon footprint possible, SOM designed the cathedral to be lit only by daylight.
photos: Timothy Hursley, ©Skidmore, OwingS & Merrill
made by lacing the two shapes together with compressive struts of wood and delicate tensile rods of steel. Further into the realm of abstraction, behind the altar on the cathedral interior is a 58-foot-high icon of Christ drawn from a Romanesque sculptural relief circa AD 1140 located on the west façade of the Chartres Cathedral in France. The ancient bas-relief sculpture is recast as an aluminum veil, with the image of Christ rendered in light passing through 94,000 laser-cut perforations. In addition to the thermal inertia and comprehensive daylighting systems, longevity was an essential aspect for the construction of the cathedral. The former home of the Catholic Diocese of Oakland was at the Cathedral of Saint Francis de Sales, which was irreparably damaged in 1989’s Loma Prieta earthquake. Christ the Light is set on a friction-pendulum, seismic base-isolation system. The elasticity of the wood will also serve to offset ground tremors, so although the cathedral is lightweight, it is also strong. “The diocese wants this building to last 300 years,” Hartman says. “Part of making sustainability viable in California is making buildings withstand earthquakes, which is why we’ve baseisolated the building.” Since the cathedral was completed in 2008, it has not only affected change by creating a multiuse center for greater Oakland’s Catholic community, but through its publically accessible community programs and services, it has fostered a sense of universality—or Catholicism—that has brought new life to Oakland’s Uptown area. “In terms of its function, but also its technologies, this is a building very much made for this time and this place,” Hartman says. “Oakland is a diverse, multicultural city, so the intention was to create a building form that was welcoming to all of these cultures while also specifically honoring the Catholic liturgy.” gb&d
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VERBATIM
“The intent is to tell a story about LEDs that encourages people to use them wisely and avoid pitfalls.”
verbatim
Gateway is a Department of Energy-sponsored demonstration project. It looks at LEDs being used in real, honest-togoodness projects, tracks how easy it is to specify, order, and install them, and how well they work over time. We talk to installers, maintenance people, and users, and we get feedback on how people do or don’t like the products. We also monitor energy use and conduct life-cycle cost analyses. The intent is to tell a story about LEDs that encourages people to use them wisely and to avoid pitfalls. The hope is that people will do a better job of specifying LEDs and that they’ll install products that people like and that will begin saving energy as soon as possible. Short- and long-term testing is an important part of the project. Some products are sent to photometric labs when they’re new so we know how many lumens they deliver, how much power they draw, what the color is, what the light distribution is, etc. Then we decide with the client how far down the road we’re going to take those same products and send them back for photometry. This allows us to track how products are doing over time. We have a range of projects that we look at. Some involve outdoor street lighting, parking garages, and highend hotels. We even have results on museums that were published recently, which I’m very happy about because they tell a wonderful story about the visual effects LEDs
N aomi M iller The lighting expert explains her research at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and what LEDs need to reach maximum efficiency As told to Julie Knudson
About Naomi Miller landed at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory as a designer and scientist in the Solid State Lighting Program after ten years at her own lighting-design studio in Troy, NY. She is a fellow of the IESNA and the IALD. Her work bridges the gap between technology and application by helping the industry overcome hurdles in LED use.
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VERBATIM Naomi Miller
Naomi Miller Up Close & Personal
The New XPAR38
lighter, brighter, highest lumens per watt
What was your first job? After MIT, I couldn’t afford grad school, so I went to live with my parents in Detroit, and I got a job in what was probably the first lighting group in the country, at Smith, Hinchman & Grylls Associates, which is now SmithGroupJJR. If you weren’t in your current field, what would you be doing? I’d be a chef. I love to eat, and I love to cook. What inspires you? Spaces with good lighting and good architecture.
well for the first year, but the fixture was too What is your hidden talent? hot for the LED Painting. I haven’t explored many mediums yet, product and the but oil painting gets my juices flowing. lamps degraded – 14 watts – 0.9 Power Factor in light output. – 1000 lumens – Patented Optic & Thermal We also found – Dimmable & Fixed Wattage – CREE LED’s can produce, their impact on some lamps that are shifting – Ultra Lightweight - 236g. – 50,000 Hour Life – 2700K, 3000K & 4000K art conservation, and their – 5 Year Performance Warranty slightly yellow after a year’s – 120v - 220v – Proprietary Crimp Fin Technology life-cycle cost implications. operation. We don’t know We also have projects looking what’s going on there or how at LED products in offices and to prevent it from happening classrooms. It’s an interesting yet, but we’re checking into it 1.888.778.9864 • www.MSiSSL.com program that gathers a lot and will provide an update to of technical and experiential the original Gateway report information and tries to tell a when we know what the GBD_MSi 3.6875x4.9375.indd 1 10/11/12 3:07 PM story in a readable way. solution is. Part of the job There have been a lot of of Gateway is to identify any obstacles to getting people problems, inform specifiers to embrace LEDs. They’re and manufacturers about the often expensive because issues, and then explain how they’re new technology, and to fix them. you don’t want to spend the Gateway is just one of the money unless you know it’s projects I work on. I moved going to give you a good enhere for an opportunity to ergy story and be a desirable make a difference in the and durable product. Color lighting industry in terms has been funky in past years, of energy efficiency. As a and you don’t want to specify designer in upstate New York, a product where the client I worked on LEED and nonis going to be unhappy with LEED projects, but energy efthe color results, especially ficiency was always my focus. in applications where color Working for PNNL, I can really is critical. Energy efficiency work toward lighting energy has been marginal in some efficiency, reminding the Photo Credit – Mike Sinclair applications, especially when industry that there’s more Davidson Hall completed by Paragon Architecture and Creative Ink Architects compared to fluorescents. The to quality lighting than just great news is LEDs are improv- lumens per watt. Here, I’m Davidson Hall Heath & Sciences at Crowder College ing quickly. There are already in a position to help engiLEED Gold Certified / FEMA 361 Community Tornado Safe Room products that excel visually neers understand what issues and save significant energy. specifiers and users need to Paragon Architecture utilizes the Paragon Approach executing We’ve had some surprising know about and what issues innovative thinking, and quality, sustainable design that findings along the way. For they deal with on projects enriches the community. Focused expertise in: • Education example, some LED products in different environments. If • Healthcare aren’t happy being dimmed. LED products become more • Public Safety / Justice They may produce flashing or responsive to those needs, • HighTech & Commercial jittery effects—behavior that’s they’ll be adopted sooner and unacceptable. Some LEDs in will save significant energy Springfield & Joplin Missouri | (417) 885-0002 | www.paragon-architecture.com Gateway studies performed more quickly. gb&d Describe yourself in three words. Passionate. Obsessive. Goofy.
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ARCHITECTURE
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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List 80
Seidman Cancer Center
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Form and light for better treatment A LEED Platinum technology hub
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Transparent, translucent, and opaque panels bring light into the cancer center lobby, but the varying transparencies keep the space private and protected from glare and excessive heat throughout the summer.
INNER WORKINGS
Seidman Cancer Center Cannon Design’s innovative building form for this Cleveland hospital creates a surprising space full of ambient light
The 375,000-square-foot Seidman Cancer Center in Cleveland, Ohio, is a ground-up project by University Hospitals designed to give patients and their families a comfortable, inviting, and sustainable place to heal. With a design spearheaded by Carl Karlen, AIA, LEED AP, an associate architect and sustainability coordinator at Cannon Design, the project is registered for LEED certification and employs daylit spaces, a healing garden, and sophisticated individualized controls to improve patient well-being. Here, Karlen walks us through the building. By Julie Knudson
Dramatic Lighting The building features a distinctive, sloping accent on the front face (No.1). Once patients and visitors enter the building, the reason for that slope becomes apparent. “You enter, and you’re in an open space somewhat akin to being inside the opening of a large tent,” Karlen says (No.2). The large, contiguous space was difficult to heat and cool because of its size, but it offered the opportunity for some dramatic lighting.
“It’s all high-efficiency lights,” Karlen says of this space. “We ran lighting software models to see what the most efficient and attractive way to install the lights would be.” The team spent a good deal of time determining how to create an inviting, ambient glow and reduce glare. Lighting sources were carefully placed and concealed, and the final result allows the light to wash the space, making it softer and more comfortable.
The upper floors of the Seidman Cancer Center are dedicated to the nursing units, and patients can see the Cleveland skyline and out to Lake Eerie in the distance.
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INNER WORKINGS Seidman Cancer Center
“We studied individual lighting controls to maximize patient comfort, which can contribute a LEED credit. We followed the intent of that credit, which was to give these individual patients control over their environment.” Carl Karlen, Cannon Design
PROJECT LOCATION Cleveland, OH Size 375,000 ft2 Completed 2011 Program Cancer treatment
TEAM ARCHITECT Cannon Design Client University Hospitals Associate Architect Array Healthcare Facilities Solutions General Contractor Gilbane Building Company Landscape Architect Visionscapes
GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED certified (expected) Site Designated parking for hybridelectric vehicles, accessible via public transit Materials 95% of construction waste materials diverted from landfill Water High-efficiency plumbing fixtures Lighting Individual lighting controls, daylight and occupancy sensors Energy Rooftop solar panels, operable solar shades, fritted glazing Landscape Water-efficient landscaping
Offering Control In areas such as the infusion bay, where the cancer patients sit while undergoing chemotherapy, comprehensive lighting studies were conducted to determine how to allow more finely tuned lighting control (No.3). Because the treatments in these areas of the hospital are often overwhelming for patients, the design team was eager to make these spaces as comfortable and inviting as possible. The studies the team conducted looked at not only the individual lighting controls but also at lighting temperatures and their effects on the space. “We studied individual lighting controls to maximize patient comfort, which can contribute a LEED
credit,” Karlen says. “We followed the intent of that credit, which was to give these individual patients control over their environment.” Hello, Sunshine The building envelope uses an extensive amount of glass in a complicated form, a major challenge for the design team (No.4). The architects had to model the form repeatedly to make sure it would hit the correct energy targets. The large amount of glazing on the southwest wall was a particularly tough nut to crack. After numerous models and glass tests, the team eventually developed a balance of reflectivity on the glass with frits of varying thicknesses in
different places. “It met the energy model for that space individually, but because that area is a component of the entire hospital, everything was heavily studied,” Karlen says. Glare studies were followed by evaluations of heating and cooling, and daylight sensors were installed to moderate the amount of internal lighting used when daylight was available. New Ideas “The building’s exterior looks great, but I think the structure’s shape really puts the power on the interior,” Karlen says. The curve of the building defines portions of the interior space, which was something the design team
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photos: Kevin G Reeves (interior)
The hospital site is shaped so that lower public floors, particularly the radiation therapy and infusion departments, have access to the healing garden, which also forms a transition between the University Hospital grounds and its neighbor, Case Western University.
The Seidman Cancer Center sits across the street from the NeoGothic Church of the Covenant, which was built in 1911.
The 10-story building houses different departments on each floor, all containted between two vertical exterior walls.
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INNER WORKINGS Seidman Cancer Center
Cannon Design used nature-inspired colors, textures, and patterns to provide strong visual clues to patients and visitors.
“The intent was to put [patients] in a place that would not be expected—that was not institutional or clinical.” Carl Karlen, Cannon Design
took advantage of to offset the typically frightening feel of a cancer hospital. “These are not the most fun places to be for anybody, not for the patient and not for the family,” Karlen says. So the Cannon team flipped the conventional notion of hospital design on its ear. “The intent was to put them in a place that would not be expected— that was not institutional or clinical. We wanted something that would have an entirely different feeling to it.” The curve on the outside soars above visitors, leading up to a glassy space surrounded by reflective surfaces and natural wood tones. Green Spaces As with many new health-care projects, Seidman features a
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healing garden designed to inspire patients, their families, and the hospital’s staff. Abundant natural daylight, vibrant plant life, and the sound and visual impact of moving water help create a peaceful, healing atmosphere. “It’s a place to go to contemplate, and just be in nature,” Karlen says. “You can be in a little cozy corner, or you can be in a sunny place.” A green roof tops one portion of the building and is directly visible through the floor-to-ceiling glass of the infusion area. The garden is just beyond that, and a larger park area lies across the street. “It’s almost like a carpet of green right up to the glass,” Karlen notes, “so people sitting in the infusion chairs feel like they’re in a park environment and not in the hospital.” gb&d gb&d
INNER WORKINGS
Information Technology Facility, University of Iowa Tornadoes, snow storms, man-made catastrophe—nothing shuts down this IT building, which used the latest energy and security systems to reach LEED Platinum status
What the new Information Technology Facility (ITF) at the University of Iowa lacks in aesthetics, it compensates for in pragmatic, sustainable innovation. With an outer shell designed to withstand F3 tornados and a rooftop strong enough to support 30 pounds per square foot of accumulated snow, it would be tough to bring this building down. Completed in December 2011, this $30 million, 43,000-square-foot building is the fifth LEED-certified building at the university but is the first campus project to achieve the LEED Platinum level. Hugh Barry, the University of Iowa’s project manager, takes us through the energy-saver. By Benjamin van Loon
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GREEN
LOCATION Iowa City, IA Size 43,000 ft2 Completed 2011 Cost $30 million Program IT facility, data center
CERTIFICATION LEED Platinum Air Indoor air quality optimized by ventilation, thermal comfort, and green cleaning Materials 55% FSC-certified wood, 32% of total construction materials recycled Transportation Bicycle storage, carpool parking, shower facilities Energy 71% energy savings Landscape 7,800-square-foot bioretention cell with 1,500 plantings
TEAM CLIENT University of Iowa Architect SVPA Architects Engineer EYP MCF Civil Engineer Shive-Hattery Structural Engineer Charles Saul Engineering Landscape Architect Confluence General Contractor Cardinal Construction Electrical Hunt Electric Mechanical Ryan & Associates Construction Management Ryan Companies US
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Centralizing Functions
Sustainably Sourced
As a result of the functions they house, IT facilities must be responsive to the dynamic needs of an IT schedule. The university had two data centers, but both were found to be deficient in almost every critical infrastructure category, including architectural, mechanical, electrical, protection, and security. To address this, the ITF centralizes the university’s IT functions and combats adverse extrinsic weather effects through continuous insulation, multiple buffer systems, and the use of small high-efficiency windows to reduce potential tornado debris damage.
During construction, 341 tons of construction waste was diverted from landfills, 86 percent of the total. Almost half of the construction materials were sourced within a 500mile radius, and 55 percent of wood construction materials were FSC-certified. Low-VOC paints and finishes are used throughout. The structure also has high thermal-value building materials that exceed ASHRAE 90.1 standards by at least 30 percent, thus allowing for increased energy efficiency.
Team Assembly
Contributing to the ITF’s LEED Platinum status are walls made from precast concrete sandwich panels equipped with edge-to-edge continuous insulation (No.1). The structure reduces permeability by using nonconductive material to connect the exterior concrete wythes and resist solar heat gain by used a non-perforated, whitemembrane roof. Hardware in the ITF is Energy Star-rated. The plumbing fixtures are electronically activated and have ultra-low water flow, and electrical UPS units are 92 percent efficient when operating at 80 percent load.
To successfully design and build a green IT facility, University of Iowa needed a strong team. It tapped SVPA Architects of Des Moines for the design and Ryan Companies for full-time construction management, and Cardinal Construction acted as the general contractor. EYP Mission Critical Facilities designed the mechanical, electrical, fuel oil, plumbing, fire protection, and telecommunications aspects of the project. The LEED certification was facilitated by The Weidt Group.
Platinum-Level Conservation
The Information Technology Facility is a new LEED Platinum-certified data center facility at the University of Iowa. Thermal values of building materials exceed ASHRAE 90.1 Standards by 30%, and 86% of construction waste was recycled. For optimal efficiency, its exterior uses a precast sandwich wall system with edge-to-edge continuous insulation.
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Hawkins Partners Inc. landscape architects
greenroofs
green infrastructure
INNER WORKINGS Information Technology Facility, University of Iowa
“There was a high risk of losing computer services due to the inadequacy of our old facilities. That was the instigation for a new data center.” Hugh Barry, University of Iowa
green streets
s c o n n e c t i n g p e o p l e w i t h c o m m u n i t y | w w w. h a w k i n s p a r t n e r s . c o m Local Landscape In 1996, the University of Iowa completed a Campus Urban Forest Study to quantify local flora, and the ITF’s landscape is informed by this study, using oak hickory and oak savannah trees to help the structure correspond with the surrounding campus landscape. An on-site bio-retention cell receives 86 percent of building water runoff. The cell is divided into two sections to separate pre- and post-developed storm water; the latter is relegated to a detention pond with a shoreline reinforced by a 3-D turf mat. Efficient Mechanical The most prominent energy drains in an IT structure are directly tied to the computing and server data halls, which must be kept cool and dry to ensure continued system functionality (No.2). With the solar load reduced on the building exterior, a 44-degree, campus chilled water supply and 405-ton backup aircooled chiller system ensures
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consistent and uninterrupted temperature regulation. Computer room air handlers (CRAHs) are placed perpendicular to data center cabinet rows, creating aisles that are alternatingly hot and cold, a new industry standard for efficient data centers. Enhanced Protection Although the center is made to withstand exterior abuse, power interruptions threaten the integrity of the data systems. With sustainability and reliability in mind, critical data center electrical loads are protected by two 600-kilowatt uninterruptable power supply (UPS) systems in an N+1 configuration, which further guarantees against failure. In addition, the ITF incorporates a two-megawatt, prime-rated backup generator with selective catalytic reduction exhaust scrubbers to help meet the EPA Tier 4i requirement. A 15,000-gallon underground fuel-oil storage tank is located on-site, providing emergency fuel for 72 hours of full-load run time. gb&d gb&d
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Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List 89
Introduction
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Yotel NYC
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Glenn Heinmiller
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Brooklyn Academy of Music Fisher Building
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Parans Skylight
Behold, lights are glowing greener
Michael Cummings finds the perfect purple The IALD chair talks origins and efficiency
Cline Bettridge Bernstein enhances history Wasco Products offers Swedish ingenuity
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Claremont University Consortium Administration building
Adventurous lights renew a fringe structure
108 Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center
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R E V O L U T I O N A RY SU N T R AC K I N G T E C H N O LO G Y
YOU!
Where the sun revolves around
Natural, healthy sunlight… even 4 floors below
The Parans Solar Receiver system tracks the sun and brings natural sunlight to inhabitants far inside the interiors of a building where it was never possible before. Optical fibers transfer sunlight through the building’s structure to the indoor environment so the itegrity of the insulation value of the roof or wall is not compromised.
Wasco Products, Inc. | 85 Spencer Drive, Unit A | Wells, ME 04090 | (800) 388-0293
W W W. WA S CO S K Y L I G H T S . CO M
Philips Color Kinetics congratulates Focus Lighting for their innovative use of LED lighting solutions in memorable, award-winning lighting designs
Since 1987, Focus Lighting has created unique and successful lighting design solutions for hotels, resorts, retail, restaurants, museums, nightclubs, offices, and private residences around the world — many incorporating LED lighting solutions. Focus Lighting designed the entry portals and showroom at the Philips Color Kinetics headquarters to demonstrate the astonishing range of its LED lighting technology. Philips Color Kinetics headquarters, Burlington, Massachusetts, USA. Lighting Design: Focus Lighting. Photography: John Brandon Miller Cloud, interactive light art installation for Boffo Show House, New York, New York, USA. Lighting Design: Focus Lighting. Photography: Ryan Fischer
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FEATURES
Glowing Greener Without lighting, our cities are unnavigable. Our lives, unmanageable. Architecture, just shapes in the dark. Today’s luminaries haven’t changed their minds about why lighting design is important, but ever-changing technologies allow little rest for the weary. In this portfolio, light functions as a servant to majestic architecture, a symbol of hope, the key to brand identity, and the topic of our dialogue with today’s leading designers. The future, it turns out, is brighter than ever.
A stairwell in the Kauffman Center, p.94
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FEATURES GLOWING GREENER
Michael Cummings leads an illuminating tour of Focus Lighting’s work on Yotel NYC
Purple Haze Yotel NYC, which opened in 2011 just off of Times Square, has a lavender glow that seems to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. It emanates lazily from the walls, the ceiling, and the computerized concierge counters. The New York location is the first free-standing hotel by this hip, ultra-modern London brand, which entrusted the seasoned lighting design firm Focus Lighting to bring its unique identity to life in LEDs. Michael Cummings, a principal designer at Focus Lighting, walks us through the hotel and discusses the finer details of the design. —Lindsey Howald Patton
project Location New York City Size 230,000 ft2 Completed 2011 Awards 2012 IALD Award of Merit, 2012 Lumen Award of Merit, Illuminating Engineering Society
TEAM Lighting Design Focus Lighting Architect Rockwell Group (US), Softroom (UK), Arquitectonica General Contractor Tishman Construction
GREEN Certification LEED Gold Energy Use 1 watt per square foot Sources Philips Color Kinetics, Lighting Science Group, Traxon Space Japanese pod-hotel style hotel uses space efficiently
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Small is smart. “The interior design was inspired by the business-class airline cabin and Japanese pod hotel—a modern, sleek look with a small-is-smart, modular approach. Yotel gave us guidelines very early in the project that clearly stated its brand identity. Beyond that strong central core, we and the Rockwell Group had almost unlimited creative opportunities in the design process for bringing that identity to life.”
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GLOWING GREENER FEATURES
Light and video. “At night, the rounded-corner ceiling panels in the Club Lounge can turn Yotel purple, or they can do a kinetic lighting effect. Inside each of the panels is a grid of RGB LED nodes; they are spaced six inches apart on a center grid and backlight a translucent rubber material. That grid basically becomes a low-resolution video screen that can show clouds passing by overhead, or little water droplets falling into a puddle.”
The Focus team conducted a series of shootouts to find the perfect purple. In the end, it was the amount of blue in the mix of RBG that made the difference.
A little coziness. “The Castore floor lamps in the lounge area near the restaurant really helped create some visual definition and add a little warmth and coziness as an ambient, glowing light source. Actually, those globes are one of the only incandescent light sources in the entire project.”
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The perfect purple. “As you walk or drive by, you really can’t miss this façade. It’s lit with Yotel purple on a textured-cast panel wall system with a slight, subtle relief at the top. We did a whole series of shootouts between different lighting manufacturers to determine the right output and the right color—that perfect purple. It was really the blue in the mix of red-blue-green that made a subtle difference, and Traxon had it.”
Philips Color Kinetics were used in Mission Control’s retail case and throughout the hotel, where an ambient glow created with indirect lighting was chosen over decorative fixtures.
“It has a 2001: A Space Odyssey feel to it. The LED technology really worked well to highlight the sleek, modern interior design.” Michael Cummings, Focus Lighting
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Decisions for Mission Control. “On the fourth floor, you’re in what is called Mission Control, which is a concierge area and the main amenities floor. All of the accents on the ceiling are Lighting Science Group MR-16 retrofit LED lamps in Lightolier trackheads with magnetic transformers. We went back and forth between using a light fixture with an integral LED versus a light fixture that could accept a retrofit LED lamp. We consider this for any given project, but for this one, we opted to go for the retrofit because we wanted the owner to take advantage of continuing advances in retrofit LED technology.”
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GLOWING GREENER FEATURES
A Conscious Conversation with today’s leading lighting designers
Yotel’s small guest “cabins,” which were inspired by Japanese pod hotels, have minimal lighting. Fluorescent tubes give off a soft purple glow for a branded experience, but guests can also switch it to white.
LEDs for ‘futuristic.’ “The predominant use of LED technology throughout the property really worked well to highlight the sleek, modern interior design. In addition to the brand identity purple, we used the pure white LED to create a kind of futuristic, modern space. It has a 2001: A Space Odyssey feel to it.”
Redeye vs. hotel. “To make the leap between the purely functional lighting of the interior of an airline cabin to Yotel’s interiors, we created a lot of flexibility in the dimming system. One of my colleagues took a trip to Dubai, and to wake people up, the airline actually used a color-changing ceiling effect that mimicked a sunrise. It wasn’t just all the lights blinking on—it was gentle. That’s what we tried to do at Yotel, create a composed mood within each space.”
A series of hidden, vertically mounted pin spotlights creates a theatrical atmosphere for the Yobot, which dances in and out of beams of light as it checks guests’ luggage.
Why did you choose to specialize in lighting design? FRANCESCA BETTRIDGE CLINE BETTRIDGE BERNSTEIN LIGHTING DESIGN I was in the right place at the right time. I was in design school, and Carroll Cline asked me to come and work for him. For people who have been in the industry for a long time, there were a lot of opportunities and circumstances that led to openings in what was then a young field. FRANCESCA BASTIANINI LUMEN ARCHITECTURE I have a background in theater and psychology, so I’d been doing lighting for theater before moving into architectural lighting. I think the psychology plays into wanting to create spaces where others are comfortable, where people can find joy in their environment. GLENN HEINMILLER LAM PARTNERS If you scratch the surface of many architectural lighting designers, you’ll find theatrical lighting designers underneath. It was my passion for lighting design that got me into stage lighting, not the other way around. Lighting intrigued me, and I saw the theater as a way to explore it. MICHAEL CUMMINGS FOCUS LIGHTING The subconscious impact that lighting has on people was very compelling to me, how even subtle shifts of lighting can create a huge shift in the way people feel or perceive their surroundings. The art of that subtlety is what drew me in and what still drives me to this day. It’s a lovely medium to work in. Difficult, but lovely.
The conversation continues on p. 97
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FEATURES GLOWING GREENER
In the Shadows Glenn Heinmiller is the chair of the IALD’s Energy and Sustainability Committee and a principal at Lam Partners. His work is rarely in the spotlight itself but always vital, and it is his integrity and deference that make him a master. We sat down with the luminary to explore his mind and watch the gears turn. Interview by Seth Putnam
e’re always interested in origin stories; where did your interest in lighting begin? When I was a kid, I was always playing with light bulbs and switches and extension cords and stringing them around the house. My father was an engineer for General Electric, and our house was sort of a 1950s ‘home of the future.’ The living room was all lit with fluorescent tubes behind architectural valances. We had colored spotlights over the dining table, and there was a low-voltage remote control system that GE was really pushing at that time. It’s all been superseded now. And you pursued architectural lighting design right away? Actually, I started out in theatrical lighting. If you scratch the surface of many architectural lighting designers, you’ll find theatrical lighting designers
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At the Kauffman Center in Kansas City, Missouri, Lam Partners aimed spotlights to provide a soft, even wash across the sides of the undulating building form.
CASE sTUDY Kauffman Center for Performing Arts
underneath. I’m a little unique here at Lam Partners because the tradition is architecture. I realized my passion was lighting, and I evolved to a point where I found that architectural lighting design was where I needed to be. It was my passion for lighting design that got me into stage lighting, not the other way around. Lighting intrigued me, and I saw the theater as a way to explore it.
Photos: gelnn heinmiller/lam partners
How did you come to be with Lam Partners? While I was at another job, I took a continuing education class in architectural lighting. It was taught by Paul [Zaferiou], who’s now one of my partners. That led to a job here, and I got hired in 1995 and got put to work.
When Paul was teaching that class, did he strike you as someone who could be a good mentor? Absolutely. Paul and Bob bought the firm from Bill Lam, and it became very flat structurally [regarding hierarchy]. The environment is a fantastic place to learn and get involved with amazing projects quickly. We don’t compartmentalize people and stick them in a corner and tell them to do the same thing over and over again. Have you had opportunities to invest in others, as Paul did you? Yes. Seventeen years later, I’m serving that role to some degree with others. To me, mentoring is about giving people the opportunity to learn and grow and
When Lam Partners set out to design the lighting for Kansas City’s magnificent new performance center, which includes a theater, a symphony hall, and an event space, it was a job with hefty challenges. The architecture resembles a series of nested clamshells and was extremely complex. “It’s funny, because you look at the concert hall lighting and think, ‘What’s the big deal?’” Heinmiller says. “You don’t see complicated details because they’re designed to be unseen.” That is to say, don’t be fooled. Creating a design that seems effortless usually requires exactly the opposite, and here, Lam Partners collaborated with Derek Porter Studio (p.158) to showcase a stunning landmark.
“To me, mentoring is hiring people with potential. You look for people who have that spark, that drive, and you set up the conditions for them to go crazy—in a good way.” Glenn Heinmiller, Lam Partners gbdmagazine.com
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In the Helzberg Concert Hall, daylight washes down from skylights, interacting with the metal mesh. In the lobby (below), a color wash is created by lights reflected off of the carpet, an effect achieved through numerous rounds of elaborate testing.
do good things. It’s hiring people with potential. You look for people who have that spark, that drive, and you set up the conditions for them to go crazy—in a good way. There are no bad ideas, and we encourage everyone to put their ideas on the table. It’s not about people making mistakes and learning the hard way; it’s more about letting everybody contribute to the discussion, as opposed to the guys with the experience dictating the solution. We’re constantly going to each other with challenges and solving problems together.
KAUFFMAN CENTER DETAILS Location Kansas City, MO Size 356,000 ft2 Completed 2011 Lighting Design Lam Partners, Derek Porter Studio Architect Safdie Architects Engineer Arup, W.L. Cassell & Associates Contractor J.E. Dunn Construction Group Awards IES Illumination Award of Merit (2012), A|L Outstanding Achievement Award (2012)
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It provides freshness and a diversity of opinion. Right. It’s the same way that we work with our clients. ‘Collaborative design’ is an overused buzzword, but I think we really practice it. We work best when we’re seamlessly integrated into the design team and not just seen as technicians. The architects who understand what we offer treat us like equals, and we all sit around the table and throw ideas out. The best projects, when you get everything done, are the ones where you don’t remember whose idea was whose.
CASE sTUDY US Institute of Peace It’s the roof that shines at the brand new headquarters for the US Institute of Peace, just a stone’s throw from the Lincoln Memorial in DC. Reminiscent of a dove’s bright wings spread for takeoff, it posed a unique lighting challenge because it had to glow from all vantage points. As with most of Lam Partners’ projects, and especially those with Safdie Architects, the lighting sources needed to reveal the architecture without being seen themselves. So Heinmiller and his team designed the fixtures to disappear by concealing them. And that was just the beginning. The rest of the building is a masterpiece, from custom linear fluorescent pendants in the offices to a ceiling in the amphitheater that serves as its own fixture.
The push for sustainability may help shine a spotlight on the fact that lighting needs to be incorporated in the early stages of design. What’s been your strategy for approaching projects as an integrated team member? You have to start off the project with a full understanding of the program, the context, the owners’ goals, and the architect’s vision. That’s what the first meeting should be. It’s surprising how often that doesn’t happen. Even if it’s a type of project you’ve done before, say, a school, you always want to make sure you’re not just assuming it’s like all the others. Maybe there’s some new objective or teaching methodology that’s going gb&d
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A Conscious Conversation continued…
What’s one innovation you’re waiting on? GLENN HEINMILLER LAM PARTNERS I always wish I were enough of a visionary to have a clever answer. Ten years ago I wanted a hundred-lumen-per-watt source that I can dim and that never burns out. LED is approaching that. The other breakthrough I’m looking for is on the business side. The way fixtures are bought, sold, and delivered is stuck back in the Dark Ages. NELSON JENKINS LUMEN ARCHITECTURE I want the ability to have fixtures that potentially could work off of photovoltaics and the sun, and not have wires in them in the traditional way so they can live and breathe with the building and not be consuming resources at the same time.
The glow from the building provides most of the site illumination at night, and Lam Partners installed in-grade adjustable accents to light the overhang, extending the glow outside to the roof’s lowest point.
photos: timothy hursley (us institute of peace); gelnn heinmiller/lam partners (kauffman cetner)
FRANCESCA BETTRIDGE CLINE BETTRIDGE BERNSTEIN LIGHTING DESIGN
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I’d like to see more advances in higher LED light output and having more options for controlled use; to get a narrower beam, you sometimes need a big aperture. I’d also like to see more control for glare and color consistency. MICHAEL CUMMINGS FOCUS LIGHTING I think there’s a very ingrained appreciation for firelight as safety; evolutionarily, our brains are wired to accept that as the right light. So to have an LED that mimics the color shift of an incandescent or halogen bulb, I think that would help. MICHAEL HENNES CLINE BETTRIDGE BERNSTEIN LIGHTING DESIGN What seems to be on the verge is good, easy, and inexpensive control solutions for lighting because that allows you to start making it easier for people to control their light levels, energy, and color balance.
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FEATURES Glenn Heinmiller
INSTITUTE OF PEACE DETAILS Location Washington, DC Size 150,000 ft2 Completed 2011 Lighting Design Lam Partners Architect Safdie Architects Engineer Buro Happold Contractor Clark Construction Awards IES Illumination Award of Merit (2012), IALD Award of Excellence (2012), A|L Outstanding Achievement Award (2012), GE Edison Award (2011)
The Institute of Peace’s curving auditorium ceiling has dimmable T5HO forward-throw cove fixtures that provide general lighting without blemishing the architectural forms. The stairs (bottom left) are illuminated solely by compact fluorescent sources hidden in plaster niches at the stair sidewalls.
With the Institute of Peace, what was your starting point for trying to convey something as abstract as peace? You know, conveying a specific concept wasn’t necessarily the thought process. What we were doing was lighting and revealing the architecture. We had worked with Moshe Safdie on a number of projects, and we understood his style. What was a driver on this project was the illumination of the translucent roof. It was such a design challenge that it dwarfed everything, and we really had to start there. If you want to interpret the roof as a dove of peace sitting on top, which some people have, then our lighting is just supporting that. Bill Lam’s fundamental philosophy was that lighting and architecture really are the same thing; if you don’t have light, you’re not going to see the building. The light should reveal the architecture, not fight it or be stuck onto it. You guys are known for an ethical approach, even when not mandated by the client. The Kauffman Center, for example, is a building that isn’t known foremost for its green design, but you still looked at it from a sustainable perspective. How?
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You can have great energy efficiency, but if it’s a miserable place to be, what’s the point? In the Kauffman Center . . . in many cases we had to use halogen, which is one of the least efficient lighting sources, but there are ways to minimize even that energy, like the halogen infrared technology we used in all the lamps. We’re on a dimming system with com-
plex programs, so they’re only on to the level they’re needed. At the back of the house—the stuff you never see in the photographs—is maximum energy efficiency. A side note is that Missouri is one of the few states that has elected not to adopt an energy code, but we made . . . energyefficient design choices . . . because it was the right thing to do. gb&d gb&d
photo credit: Tim Hursley (Upper Left); Glenn Heinmiller/Lam Partners (all others)
to be applied. We just started work on a project that has very aggressive net-zero energy goals, so that imposes another whole layer of challenges. You have to talk that through before you even get to any design solutions.
Philips Color Kinetics salutes Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design for their innovative approach in meeting design challenges with creative, energyconscious solutions.
Since 1985, Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design has been creating award-winning, sustainable designs that enhance the grace, utility, and comfort of architectural spaces. CBBLD pioneered the use of energy-efficient LED solutions in architectural lighting. Versatile, reliable, and innovative, CBBLD is a valuable partner to leading architectural and interior design firms. www.philipscolorkinetics.com
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Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design lights up the New York streets with a contemporary and efficient plan for the Richard B. Fisher Building
Brooklyn Academy of Music’s New Curb Appeal PROJECT LOCATION Brooklyn, NY Size 40,000 ft2 Completed 2012 Cost $50 million Program Theater, performance space, classrooms, offices
TEAM LIGHTING DESIGN Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design Owner Brooklyn Academy of Music Owner’s Representative Jonathan Rose Companies Architect H3 Hardy Collaboration Architecture Theater Consultant Auerbach Pollack Friedlander MEP Engineer ICOR Associates Construction Manager E.W. Howell Graphics Design Pentagram
GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Gold (expected) Site Uses and expands on existing building Roof Accessible green rooftop garden Materials Low- and no-VOC materials used throughout Water Rooftop storm-water collection and reuse Energy Low-energy mechanical and lighting
The Richard B. Fisher Building is the first addition since 1987 to the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM). The newly renovated and relit LEED Gold structure houses a new theater and uses lighting to enhance and complement the building’s visionary program. “It was essential for the building to have a street presence, and our lighting design creates an energy that is visible from the street,” says Francesca Bettridge, principal at Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design (CBBLD), lighting designers for the $50 million project, which was completed in 2012. “We also had to work with a landmarked façade, so everything we designed was sensitive to the existing fabric and welcoming to the surrounding community.” The project, which began in 2007, adds a sixstory building behind a historic two-story brick façade marked by three arched entryways that are now illuminated by recessed metal halide MR16 uplights. Accent lights using the same lamp are discreetly mounted above the side entrances to light the sidewalk. Recessed fluorescents in the second floor windowsills cast soft light onto window shades that act as scrims. A thin profile LED strip near the cornice illuminates the building name while banner signs internally lit with LEDs make the building visible from down the street, effectively
The theater was inaugurated in September 2012 with a performance called “Eclipse,” a collaboration between choreographer Jonah Bokaer and visual/light installation artist Anthony McCall.
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The front entrance of the Fisher Building is an old citadel in the Fort Greene neighborhood of Brooklyn, which is a New York Citydesignated historic district.
Recessed fluorescents in the second floor windowsills cast soft light onto window shades that act as scrims.
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A Conscious Conversation continued…
How can lighting design highlight or advance the green aspects of a building? MICHAEL CUMMINGS FOCUS LIGHTING So there’s the obvious answer: low energy, low heat gain, and low maintenance. But I think there’s also how green aspects affect the human experience. You can do the math and say, One watt a square foot, I’m done—and that’s great on paper. But I think we need . . . to be conscientious of the quality of light and creating the feel of a space and an emotional connection with people. NELSON JENKINS LUMEN ARCHITECTURE Lighting should just be part of good architecture, solid architecture, which you would want to be environmentally conscious. MICHAEL HENNES CLINE BETTRIDGE BERNSTEIN LIGHTING DESIGN With the trend toward sustainability in general, we all have to learn how to create more from less. Understanding how the light affects surfaces, how to use fixtures that have a decorative glow and give a sense of lightedness to a space, understanding room finishes and daylighting, and how to pull all of these things together—that’s what needs to be taken into account. FRANCESCA BASTIANINI LUMEN ARCHITECTURE It’s thinking not just of the light fixtures, but their integration with the control system. That’s what allows the people who are occupying the space to actually have it function as it’s designed.
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A bar/lounge area is located adjacent to the Fishman Space, a 250-seat theater within the Fisher Building, and is accessible by a staircase with colorchanging LED risers.
“Our goal for this project was to use these different lamps to create a unified composition of light and a warm atmosphere for the people using this space.” Michael Hennes, Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design
reintroducing the building to the block with a fresh and warmly animated character. An illuminated mural in the lobby can be seen from outdoors and draws people inside. Interior lighting for the lobby and theater uses low wattage halogen lamps, as the spaces required dimming. 3000K fluorescent, ceramic-metal-halide, and LED sources are also used throughout to reduce overall energy use and improve lamp life. “Mixed-use performing arts projects inevitably use more lamp types than a single-function building,” says Michael Hennes, senior associate for CBBLD. “Our goal for this project was to use these different lamps to create a unified composition of light and a warm atmosphere for the people using this space.” Events held within the building, such as the inaugural ‘Eclipse’ performance—which used a comprehensive lighting installation by artist Anthony McCall—directly and indirectly highlight the importance of light for bringing new life to a forgotten space. gb&d —Benjamin van Loon gb&d
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The Parans receiver, which can be mounted on roofs or walls, follows the sun thanks to two built-in motors and a sun-tracking program. It automatically shuts off at night. Bundled fiber-optic cables then transmit the light up to 60 feet. Each reciever can power an impressive six L3 spotlights.
A revolutionary Swedish skylight from Parans lands in the United States
Letting the Light One In There’s no doubt the sun is a powerful resource. With it, photovoltaic cells make electricity, and our skin makes vitamin D. The Parans skylight, developed in Sweden and now available in the United States through Wasco Products, brings more of the precious commodity to interior spaces. The daylight-harvesting system uses fiber optics to pipe sunlight into buildings. The benefits are obvious for spaces where external light can’t reach, but corner offices and penthouse suites have something to gain as well. Where direct sunlight is full of harmful UV rays and windows let in heat-producing infrared, Parans filters them out leaving full-spectrum, visible light. “For people suffering from [Seasonal Affective Disorder], doctors typically prescribe one of two things: anti-depressants or full-spectrum lighting,” says Jeff Frank, CEO of Wasco Products, Parans’s exclusive American vendor. Research has verified sunlight’s health benefits and power to promote work, learning, and oddly
enough, buying, too. “Even though it’s very costeffective from an energy-saving standpoint,” Frank says, “the biggest reason some of our nation’s major retailers use daylight is because they know sales increase in daylit buildings.” Here’s how the Parans system works: The receiver uses a GPS system, paired with two built-in motors, to follow the sun and automatically shut off in the dark. Fiber-optic cables, which are bundled in sets of six and come in 15-foot increments, transmit the light to the luminaires. With three energy-free models and one hybrid, there’s an option for any space within 60 feet of a receiver. One receiver powers six L3 spotlights, just less than two inches in diameter, which can focus 700 lumens (lm) each. Powered by two cables, the L2s are two-square-foot panels emitting up to 1,400 lm in two varieties: pure (sunlight) and hybrid (sunlight and LED). The L1 comes in two sizes, small (17.7 x 17.7 in), which emits the same amount of light as the L3, and medium (35.4 x 17.7 in), which puts off double the light at double the size. Parans, welcome to the USA. gb&d —Michelle Markelz
“For people suffering from [Seasonal Affective Disorder], doctors prescribe one of two things: anti-depressants or full-spectrum lighting.” Jeff Frank, Wasco Products gbdmagazine.com
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o mask the old maintenance building’s T utilitarian exterior, LTL Architects and Lumen Architecture collaborated on a contemporary cedar screen studded with baton-shaped white LEDs. The lighting is seamlessly integrated in the architecture, blending with the wooden structure that is the building’s skin as it changes from wall to entryway to canopy.
Blurring Lines & Lights
Lumen Architecture pushes at the field’s boundaries on an experimental revamp of a university office
FEATURES GLOWING GREENER
The digital garden installation, executed by the Brooklyn artist Jason Krugman, consists of more than 6,000 bicolor LED pixel boards. The installation peacefully fades from cactus green to deep blue and back again as people pass by.
PROJECT LOCATION Claremont, CA Size 42,000 ft2 Completed 2011 Program Educational sector, administrative offices Awards 2012 Lumen Award of Merit, Illuminating Engineering Society
TEAM LIGHTING DESIGN Lumen Architecture Client Claremont University Consortium Architect Lewis.Tsurumaki.Lewis Architects LED Artist Jason Krugman Studio, Electro-Kinetics Architect of Record Grant / Takacs Architecture Structural Engineer John Labib and Associates Landscape Architect AHBE Landscape Architects
GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Silver (expected) Site Adaptive reuse of existing maintenance building Materials Cedar screen, LED interior and exterior lights, bamboo desks and furniture, recycled plasticbottle felt Energy Lutron Ecosystem controls, 168 Solatube skylights, highefficiency dimmable fluorescents Landscape Extensive native plant garden, water circulation , elevated interior succulent garden
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he decade-old warehouse at the southeastern edge of campus had no notion that it was destined to become Claremont University Consortium’s (CUC) new administrative hub. The transformation from a simply functional facility housing a workshop to an architecturally stunning, LEED Silver-certified, cheerful work environment was to be executed by Lewis.Tsurumaki.Lewis Architects and spectacularly lit by Lumen Architecture. With offices just a few hundred feet away from each other in New York City, the two firms worked in close collaboration to bring something to life out of the existing, unbecoming space in Southern California, blurring the line between where one discipline ends and the other begins. This fusion of architecture and lighting is most evident on the façade. A golden screen of narrow cedar slats sweeps along the side of the building with white LED lights pegged in at random intervals to create an ultra-modern shell covering the existing building. The gaps between the slats allow glimpses of the original structure, particularly near
the windows, where they expand to allow more sunlight through. The wooden skeleton widens at the entrance to frame the entryway. In the back of the building, the skeleton morphs into a brise soleil shade for the outdoor café. During the day, those exposed Plexineon White 1X fixtures are camouflaged, but at night they set the building and the Sonoran Desert shrubs aglow. The interior weaves sunlight and electric light together—with sunlight stealing the show. Because the HVAC and mechanical systems are located in the warehouse’s ceiling, skylights really weren’t an option. “There was not really an opportunity to just puncture the ceiling and let the sun come through,” says Francesca Bastianini, a designer at Lumen. Solatubes, however, would be perfect. Solatubes are basically the skylight’s chimney-shaped cousins. There are 168 of them installed on the roof of the building today, and each reflectivecapped dome conducts the sunlight down into a space through ultra-reflective tubing. These gain an advantage against the skylight when it comes to low-angle sunlight because Solatubes can easily grab small amounts of light
The conference rooms contain a mixed blend of fluorescent and Solatube fixtures, which in various shapes and sizes create a playful, starry-night effect.
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“You can see the structure in the final rendition of the building, yet it’s still beautiful. You’re not covering it up but bringing out a quality in the space that’s quite special.” Nelson Jenkins, Lumen Architecture
and still diffuse bright, direct midday sun. In the Claremont building, the Solatubes are interspersed with circular fluorescent fixtures, similar in shape to the Solatubes but distinguishable by a slightly warmer color temperature— which was actually the client’s choice, explains Nelson Jenkins, principal and founder of Lumen Architecture. “At first, we thought we would match the electric light and daylight in terms of color temperature, but [the client] actually wanted to have a difference so that people would know which one was electric and which one was daylight,” Jenkins says. Suspended beneath the fixtures is a system of baffles, another gesture that screens the building’s original components. Through these abstracted cloud shapes, which are wrapped in recycled felt, the light is constantly changing in subtle ways. As clouds pass overhead, light shifts within the diaphanous baffle structure, connecting the CUC employees to the outdoors as they work. The subtle partnership between sunlight and electricity had to be managed thoughtfully because too many green hopes are dashed to pieces when an automated system gets to be so annoying that office workers plaster duct tape over the sensors. Lumen chose the Lutron Ecosystem; as photocells and occupancy sensors pick up on the level of light, the system imperceptibly intensifies or dims the fluorescents to balance out the Solatubes as needed. With all the electric lighting on, the CUC building’s system averages about one watt gbdmagazine.com
per square foot and far less when the fluorescents are dimmed during the day. It started with a warehouse, and, in some ways, a warehouse it remains today. But the end result—a fusion of modern, sustainable architecture with an old, functional space—builds upon what was already there to make something more imaginative. “There’s a peekaboo type of effect,” Jenkins says. “You can see the structure in the final rendition of the building, yet it’s still beautiful. You’re not covering it up but bringing out a quality in the space that’s quite special.” gb&d —Lindsey Howald Patton Pendant lights pierce the ceiling in the office’s kitchenette (above) while in other parts of the building, a baffle system, wrapped in recycled plastic-bottle felt, obscures the ceiling’s mechanical systems.
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Banner Health: Hope Glows The MD Anderson Cancer Center is a lantern in the dark for Arizona patients
In the east valley of Phoenix, a lavender lantern glows at the entrance to the Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center. Towering 70 feet above the first-floor awning and giving the center a unique identity, the Lantern of Hope is a symbol, a shelter, and an art form. Cannon Design’s Sara Schonour, who works in the company’s Boston office, led the design of the structure, which is three tiers of tube steel, patented GORE TENARA Architectural Fabric, and water-jet cut metal paneling that combine to create a silhouette of the Palo Verde tree against the soft backlight—a quality that won the design an International Association of Lighting Designers (IALD) Award of Excellence. The image of the tree represents healing and is carried through the interior design of the building for a cohesive reminder of the haven that the center provides. On the center’s second and third floors, visitors can sit inside the lantern and
The design on the ‘lantern’ mimics a Palo Verde tree, which is common in the Arizona desert and represents the healing quality of the cancer center. The structure glows lavender to represent the oncology community, but it can be programmed to match any color in the RGB spectrum.
: Water-Cut Aluminum Panels Panels are copper-bead blasted to create a matte natural finish : Structure A structural frame sits between the fabric and the metal, providing support for the lantern. Two columns offset from the corner allow the lantern to float. : Tensile Fabric With a 40% light transmittance, light trickles through the patterned exterior metal during the day. At night, the fabric is illuminated with color-changing LEDs. : Transparent ETFE Membrane A transparent membrane with minimal structure allows maximum daylight and exterior views.
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A Conscious Conversation continued… The patented GORE TENARA Architectural Fabric used in the Lantern of Hope is the same material that makes up the retractable roof over Wimbledon.
How has LED technology changed the way that you approach lighting design? NELSON JENKINS LUMEN ARCHITECTURE Well, LED is one of the fastest developing aspects of lighting design and energy. It’s quickly becoming the light source to use in lighting design and in lighting, whether it’s in cars, street lights, or buildings. GLENN HEINMILLER LAM PARTNERS It absolutely doesn’t change the way we approach design. It does change the technical solutions we recommend. The choice of light source can be a complicated analysis. Sometimes LED is the best choice, but not always. In some ways it’s made life more complicated because you have to educate people that LED isn’t the silver bullet for energy savings. It’s a tool—a new technology that’s changing every day—and it makes more sense as time progresses. But the answer is, it depends. MICHAEL CUMMINGS FOCUS LIGHTING I have many answers for that, but the first is a more extensive client education process. It’s easy when you’re talking in the language of incandescent and halogen sources because everyone knows what it’s like to live or work or shop somewhere that’s lit like that. But the evolution of LEDs has pushed us to reinvent the education process. When we design, we do a presentation where the client is an audience member and we compose each view as little vignettes. Light is such a subjective medium—I say ‘bright,’ you say ‘bright,’ they’re two totally different things. So we try very hard throughout that education process to create a visual dialogue with the clients so that the expectations we’re creating are fully understood by them.
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A Conscious Conversation continued…
The water-cut pattern on Banner’s Lantern of Hope contains more than 10,800 unique openings
Misinformation about energy savings has been a problem. How can we combat this issue? GLENN HEINMILLER LAM PARTNERS We had this conversation last Thursday with a school’s facilities maintenance guys, and they wanted to know about LEDs because they heard they . . . last forever. But LED might not be best for a classroom. The important thing is to use the light source with the least amount of energy but that still meets your objectives. You have to . . . have the conversation individually, and it takes time. NELSON JENKINS LUMEN ARCHITECTURE One thing with energy savings is how it will be used. The common compact fluorescent lamp in your residence is going to be more energyefficient than your incandescent lamp. However, if you’re going to be dimming your incandescent lamp down to like five percent, and your compact fluorescent lamp doesn’t dim at all, it doesn’t make it more energy efficient. MICHAEL CUMMINGS FOCUS LIGHTING We’ve been discussing the idea of submitting an energy tax return. Everyone would be allowed a certain number of BTUs per year, and at the end of the fiscal year, when you submit your property tax return, you’re also taxed on how much energy you use above what you are allowed, and try to use that information as a way not just to enforce, but inform and incentivize. gb&d
“The community of Phoenix had needed something like this for so long. Building the lantern was a beacon that help was on the way.” Steve Eiss, Banner Health experience its glow by sunlight. Lit from the bottom by 45 IP66 long-life LEDs, the lantern’s radiance, executed by Delta Diversified Enterprises, gradually dissipates at the top like a natural flame. “The community of Phoenix had needed something like this for so long,” says Steve Eiss, a senior project manager for Banner Health. “Building the lantern was a beacon that help was on the way.” gb&d —Michelle Markelz a message from delta diversified enterprises inc. eneral contractors in the Southwest know they always can depend on Delta G Diversified Enterprises Inc. for the special electrical construction/design needs associated with health-care facilities. Some look to Delta for complex multimilliondollar electrical installations while others are building an addition or remodeling an existing facility. Since 1971, Delta has traditionally worked to provide the most cost-efficient, quality electrical solutions possible, but we are especially proud of our pioneering LEED projects and membership in the USGBC since 2007.
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Sustainability is essential, and gb&d is essential to sustainability. DELTA DIVERSIFIED ENTERPRISES, INC. ELECTRICAL CONTRACTORS
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VERBATIM
“Opportunities still exist to redevelop sites, and that’s what we specialize in. It keeps us busy, and yes, we see a future in it.”
verbatim
My interest in the environment and green buildings began back in the late 1970s— in college for me. We had an energy crisis, and it became front and center during the Carter administration. As a result of that, I did a lot of work, a lot of research and schooling on these things. That’s where I caught the bug, and it never left me. Being a part of a family business—and that we’ve been able to do this now for three generations—is certainly a source of pride. Over the past 85 years we’ve built a portfolio of residential, mixed-use, and retail. Some we manage, and some we’ve built. Frankly, a portion of those buildings need fixing, so I’ve been doing a lot of research and planning on that and how to facilitate that process. I don’t see us leaving urban development as an area of expertise. A good 98 percent of the work we’ve done has been in NYC. As the population grows, zoning changes and opportunities still exist to redevelop sites, and that’s what we specialize in: brownfield sites and new development. It keeps us busy, and yes, we see a future in it. The mixed-use project on 161st street in Jamaica, Queens, is for the Greater Jamaica Development Corporation, a nonprofit organization that’s headquartered next to the project site. They are trying to foster development in the area and on occasion they identify parcels of land that they own and want to see a certain
S teve N B luestone The New York real estate developer discusses the recurrent potential of urban development, his company’s commitment to Queens, and his secret life as an English folk dancer As told to Ashley T. Kjos
About Steven Bluestone is one of the five managing owners of The Bluestone Organization, a third-generation family business that builds, develops, and manages buildings in the New York City area. Steven’s personal interest in the environment dates back to the 1970s and can be seen in the home he and his wife designed and built 13 years ago, where they still live today.
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type of development happen. Portions of the residential building are dedicated for low-income tenants, some portions are for workingclass families or workforce housing, and a percentage is dedicated for market-rate housing. Every tenant gets a similar apartment, and they are intermingled throughout. One of the critical factors for us being selected [for the project] was that we also made the commitment to use a portion of the building as our headquarters. So our staff and our office, our whole operation is moving there. We told them we were making a commitment not only to the building but also to the area. We’ll be out in the area, going to the stores, buying food, taking our lunch breaks—helping the community commerce.
steven bluestone Up Close & Personal What was your first job? I began after college with a tool belt and a broom in the construction field. I started at the bottom and worked my way up, gaining knowledge of different trades. If you weren’t in real-estate development, what would you do? I’d have to be working with my hands, creating things, creating art, buildings, landscaping. If I didn’t have to work, I’d be on my bicycle just riding across the country.
One of the things that has worked out well has been [our] use of insulated concrete form systems; you end up with a really strong, airtight and watertight wall with a lot of insulation. They give us
What inspires you? You know, I asked my wife this question—she said the trees and the woods behind our house, because I always go grab dead trees that look beautiful and think about what to do with them, [how to] use them in sculptural projects. But really, anything or anybody that is out there doing things that make sense, that make an impact. Describe yourself in three words. Maybe not in this particular order, but dedication, trustworthiness, and honesty.
incredible reductions in our heating and cooling at really no extra cost. We’ve also been rethinking how we ventilate. Instead of putting large fans and shafts on the roof to take away stale air, the new concept treats each dwelling unit or apartment as its own small building. We do a lot of air sealing and then ventilate sideways through the apartment using small fans and small ducts. It uses less energy and the stack effect to heat and cool efficiently. We are now going to use mini-split air-source heat pumps in every apartment for the Greater Jamaica Develop-
LEFT The Bluestone Organization is working on this project in Jamaica, Queens. There are two towers above a common parking garage at this site. The company has completed myriad projects throughout the New York City area since it started in 1930.
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What is your hidden talent? Ah yes, my secret life. It involves participating in the traditional English folk dance form of Morris Dancing. I belong to a group, and we practice and tour. There’s a whole culture and community to it. It has taken me all over the country, as far west as California and also across the Atlantic to England, where it originated.
ment Corporation project. These small, central systems will create more comfort and the system will be quieter and give the tenants more individual control at lower costs because of the tight envelope of the building. One person to whom I want to give credit is Henry Gifford. He has a more unique and intuitive approach to designing than many licensed engineers out there, and he’s been key for me. He’s teaching me a lot, and we’ve been busy measuring things like the heat pumps that we’ll use in this project. Henry’s been an important part. GF55 Partners are people that we get along well with; they listen, and we’ve done a lot of successful projects with them. They were the architects on our first extremely green building. We told them what systems we wanted to use and they helped us to package it all. gb&d march–april 2013
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Green Technology for The Blue Planet
E.W. HOWELL IS PROUD TO HAVE PARTNERED WITH WEISS/MANFREDI ON THE BROOKLYN BOTANIC GARDEN VISITOR CENTER Energy-efficient designs will determine the future of construction. Solutions for façades and skylights that harmonise architectural and technological demands will therefore play a key role.
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245 Newtown Road, Suite 600 • Plainview, NY 11803 • 516.921.7100 592 Fifth Avenue, 7th Floor • New York, NY 10036 • 212.930.1050 www.ewhowell.com
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The Schüco modular system offers an extensive range of mullion / transom curtain wall systems, using which a variety of different architectural concepts can be implemented. www.schuco-usa.com
Clean Energy from Solar and Windows
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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List 116
Play
Brooklyn Botanic Garden Visitor Center
A green oasis in an urban jungle
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Cornell Plantations Welcome Center
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Endémico Resguardo Silvestre
Calling a truce on form vs. function
A minimalist hotel in Mexico’s wine country Learn
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Jean Tyson child development study center
How “cottages” accommodate education
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white tank Branch library
Innumerable resources for the Arizona wild work
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Manitoba Hydro place
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cambridge discovery park
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One Oak Park
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Archway studios
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Stowell & Friedman offices
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aia colorado headquarters
Tracking a giant’s success after four years
An office campus aiding wetland preservation
Disguised sustainability in Houston
Reusing London’s 10,000 old viaduct arches
Client-inspired interior design
A tight budget brings better lighting live
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simpatico Prototype
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dani ridge house
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third + bond
A prettier kind of prefab
A disappearing house in Big Sur
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Brooklyn brownstones come in green
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Edge Condition
spa c e S PLA Y
The Brooklyn Botanic Garden’s serpentine new visitor center is half city, half nature By Benjamin van Loon
SHEDDING ITS SKIN. Weiss/ Manfredi’s visitor center at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden is a gateway to a greener world, seeming to slough off the built environment and allowing its guests to do the same.
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photos: Albert Večerka/Esto; diagram: WEISS/MANFREDI
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hile Central Park sits in the center of Manhattan like a defiant, 843-acre glimpse into a world that might be, the new visitor center at the comparatively diminutive 52-acre Brooklyn Botanic Garden welcomes the public to a version of New York City as it is meant to be. With its lanceolate living roof, curving glass walls, and 42,000 square feet of freshly planted landscape, the $28 million, 22,000-square-foot visitor center, as designed by Weiss/Manfredi Architecture/ Landscape/Urbanism and completed in May 2012, responds to the ongoing gentrification of Brooklyn by conciliating the city’s diverse ecological past with its rapidly evolving urban future. “We’re very much concerned with working at the intersection of landscape and architecture,” says Michael Manfredi, principal and founding partner at Weiss/Manfredi. “In working on this visitor center, we really wanted to blur the distinctions between what is architecture and what is landscape. In that sense, the building literally melts and transitions into the garden, creating a new building typology and way of looking at buildings.” This transitory schema is an iteration of the greater legacy of the Brooklyn Botanical Garden (BBG), which is to function as a natural oasis in the midst of a concrete and steel sea. Founded in 1910, the BBG is set on a scalene plot of land, This sketch shows Weiss/Manfredi’s “city to garden” idea, using the building to transition visitors from an urban environment to nature.
flanked by Flatbush Avenue on the west and Washington Avenue on the east, and affixed to the northeastern section of the 585-acre Prospect Park, which was designed by Central Park architects Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux in 1867. Although the Prospect Park area has a diverse social history, it is set in a largely residential borough. With the exception of the expansive Beaux-Arts Brooklyn Museum and Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Arch and a handful of other landmark commercial and residential structures in the immediate vicinity, the native vocabulary is defined by modesty and pragmatism, accented with a warm, pedestrian patina that renders Brooklyn streetscapes simultaneously insignificant and iconic. Respondent to this manifold heritage, Weiss/Manfredi’s intent for the visitor center at the botanical garden resists the contrarian strain of modern sustainable architecture by favoring function over form. However, its plan, which began in 2005, was still carried out with creative insistence. “When we first sat down to interview, we saw that the BBG had a master plan that located the visitor center near the center of the garden,” recalls Marion Weiss, principal and founding partner at Weiss/Manfredi. “We suggested a new location for the building that would greet you at the city edge, on Washington Avenue, and lead you into the garden so that you could shed the experience of the city and discover the garden through the visitor center.” The planned location was a parking lot the BBG shares with the Brooklyn Museum. While programmatically sensible, this site failed to account for what would have been an abrupt transition between cosmopolitan and botanic areas. “Realistically, you can say that we started the project almost 20 years ago as residents of Brooklyn and people passionate about the [botanical garden] as an extraordinary urban oasis,” Weiss says. march–april 2013
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HIDDEN AWAY. Viewed from within the existing botanical garden, the new visitor center disappears intentionally into the greenery.
PROJECT
GREEN
LOCATION Brooklyn, NY Size 22,000 ft2 Completed 2012 Cost $28 million Program Visitor center with exhibition galleries, orientation room, gift shop, event space Awards New York City Public Design Commission Award for Excellence in Design, The Chicago Athenaeum’s Green Good Design Award for Green Architecture, ENR New York Best Projects 2012
CERTIFICATION LEED Gold (expected) Landscape 42,000 square feet of new botanical plantings Roof 10,000-square-foot specially curated living roof Curtain Wall Custom-fritted, low-E insulated glass and aluminum mullions Geothermal 28 ground-source thermal wells Materials Recycled concrete, steel, and site-harvested ginkgo wood Thermal Mass Building nested in existing berm
ARCHITECT Weiss/Manfredi Architecture/Landscape/Urbanism Client Brooklyn Botanic Garden General Contractor E.W. Howell Construction Manager LiRo Group MEP/FP & IT Jaros, Baum & Bolles Consulting Engineers Landscape Consultant HM White Site Architecture Environmental Consultant Viridian Energy & Environmental Geothermal/Geotechnical Langan Engineering and Environmental Services Lighting Design Consultant Brandston Partnership Curtain Wall Consultant R.A. Heintges & Associates Structural & Civil Engineering Consultant Weidlinger Associates Consulting Engineers
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A PLANTED PORTAL. At night, the main atrium becomes a lantern amid the trees, topped with a green roof. For more on how the visitor center is lit, turn to p.121.
photos: Albert Večerka/Esto
TEAM
Weiss/Manfredi’s new location was a bermed grove of mature ginkgo trees that opens up to the city on Washington Avenue. A sigmoidal path, originally designed by Frederick Olmsted, cuts through the center of the grove and the geometry of the visitor center submits to that topography while nesting into the extant berm, rather than willfully imposing itself upon it. Functionally, this allows for natural thermal mass and a more efficient envelope without interrupting the flow of the site. Viewed from the garden side, the structure is hardly distinguishable from the surrounding landscape, and this is aided by both the gentle architectonics of the building as well as the 10,000-squarefoot living roof hosting more than 40,000 plantings, which include warm and cold season grasses, perennials, and bulbs. Armando Petruccelli, a project manager for Weiss/Manfredi, notes that the BBG did have to relocate its world-renowned herb garden, yet the visitor center’s new green roof actually gives the garden an opportunity for another collection. “It’s an experimental green roof that the BBG will be curating,” he says. The roof also minimizes and collects storm-water
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ALL ABOUT THE GLASS Distinct in its use of high-performing, ceramic frit-patterned insulated glass, the building utilizes Ecklet/St. Gobain glass with a ClimaCool SKN 072 low-E coating. Curved units are similarly composed by Precision glass. The exterior canopy, also with Ecklet/St. Gobain glass, continues the ceramic frit-pattern lamination and allows for daylight to enter the interior while minimizing heat gain.
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“We really wanted to blur the distinctions between what is architecture and what is landscape. In that sense, the building literally melts into the garden, creating a new building typology and way of looking at buildings.” Michael Manfredi, Weiss/Manfredi
dried and converted into the lining of the 2,500-square-foot event space, which is adjoined to the visitor center via a shaded breezeway. There was a previous visitor center on-site prior to 2005, but it lacked a program sufficient for supporting the Brooklyn Botanical Garden’s 900,000 annual visitors. The new center accounts for ticketing, information and exhibition galleries, an orientation room, gift shop, and an additional 2,500-square-foot event space that will accommodate private functions and public gatherings. As it was completed in May 2012, LEED certification is still underway for the project, but the BBG has a goal of LEED Gold, which will be bolstered by the center’s ‘enhanced commissioning’ process. “Energy consumption was one of the primary components we wanted to address,” Petruccelli says. “We were able to reduce this consumption by designing a geo-exchange system which is comprised of 28 ground-source thermal wells, which serve the cooling and heating demands of the building.” High-performance fritted glass that forms the curtain walls of the building
complements these energy consumption demands by helping to reduce heat gain and infuse the interior with daylight illumination. Overflow storm water collected on-site is diverted to the park’s Japanese pond. Architectural concrete and steel for the structure was partly sourced from recycled elements, but the architectural elements—including a custom, pleated copper roof designed to mimic the botanical garden’s McKim, Mead & White Administration Building, built in 1917—are necessarily minimal, suggesting that the new visitor center is just as cooperative with the landscape as it is with Brooklyn’s dynamic urbanism. “At 52 acres, with a network of paths and different curated landscapes, the garden is a place of discovery,” Weiss says. “Being able to design a building that is as much embedded within as it is extending the systems of pathways, discoveries, and unfolding vistas—and the extent to which the building can capture those identities—is really about inverting the paradigm of a building freestanding on the landscape as an object. Where the building begins and where the garden ends becomes very ambiguous—very strategically and very purposefully.” gb&d a message from E.W. Howell E .W. Howell is a well-established general construction and construction management firm celebrating more than 120 years of building excellence. With offices in Manhattan and headquarters on Long Island, we provide construction services throughout the region to a diverse group of clients including retail, education, government, cultural, and health-care organizations.
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photos: Albert Večerka/Esto
runoff, diverting it into two separate rain-garden plazas on-site, which are part of the greater 42,000 square feet of new landscaping—featuring more than 60,000 new plantings—created by Weiss/Manfredi and landscape consultant HM White. In the upper terrace area surrounding the visitor center, Weiss/Manfredi and HM White designed a stepped set of terraces, each planted with unique flora to mediate between the green roof and the ginkgo trees at the ridge of the berm. Plant identities are amplified along the urban edge of the site with street tree plantings, further melding interaction between the city and botanic environment. “It was important for the BBG to incorporate new cultivars of plants that are native to the region,” Petruccelli says. “These species aren’t identical to what is in the garden but are specific to the center itself, further emphasizing the idea of a new collection.” Elements of the ginkgo landscape were diverted during construction. One ginkgo tree was relocated to a different portion of the grove, and another ginkgo tree, unable to be relocated, was kiln-
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HOW THE VISITOR CENTER IS LIT The Brooklyn Botanic Garden Visitor Center is more landscape than architecture, yet the building is just as visual as it is experiential. The subtlety of the center’s lighting reinforces its role as half city, half garden.
Atrium / Event Space Uplighting: Ceramic metal halide fixtures, manufactured by LSI, are attached to the steel columns in the event space to reflect soft ambient lighting off the leaf-shaped acoustic ceiling. Downlighting: Also attached to the steel columns, these LSI-made surface mounted halogen fixtures with 100W lamps provide an additional lighting layer and are used to illuminate the inset wood floor, furniture, and people occupying the space. These lights are fully dimmable to set the mood, controlled by the Lutron Grafik Eye 3000. Adjustable accents: Recessed Kurt Versen MR16 lights in the ceiling provide front lighting for special functions.
NATURAL ORDER. (Clockwise from top) The lining of the daylit event space is wood from a gingko tree, kiln-dried after it couldn’t be relocated. The building became part of the botanical offerings, with a tiered green roof planted with distinct species. A view of the plazas shows the potential for discovery and exploration via sloped and curving pathways.
Reception Gallery / Breezeway Uplighting: Wall-mounted MH asymmetric forward-throw uplights, manufactured by Elliptipar, are controlled by an astronomical time clock provided by Douglas Controls to create ambient lighting for the space. Tracklights: Ceiling-mounted recessed, flangeless, two-circuit track lighting with accent ceramic MH track heads, manufactured by LSI, provides accent lighting for exhibits and occupants. monumental Stair Modified Bega B8032LED and B8031LED exterior recessed LED steplights are mounted in concrete and ornamental steel risers and provide warm white lighting at night. outdoor Plazas (opposite) Compact, 9W, fluorescent steplights are mounted into the finished concrete wall and moderated by an astronomical time clock on relay zone. Pathways (this page, left) Arklight VaporProof AVB-21 surface mounted vapor-tight lights with screw base self-ballasted CFL lamps and opal glass diffusers are mounted to steel bollards. Tree Groves CMH adjustable accent lighting, from BK Lighting, are mounted using the PowerPipe II stake system that hides the integral magnetic ballast in the ground while causing minimal disturbance to nearby tree roots. Gift Shop (not pictured) Pendant, mounted, and suspended from the ceiling with aircraft cable, the Erco Hi-Trac lighting system’s integrated fluorescents provide ambient uplighting reflecting off the ceiling, while a two-circuit track powers the ceramic MH accent lighting for merchandise.
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In the heart of the garden Form vs. function is outdated. The team behind the Nevin Welcome Center at Cornell Plantations create an aesthetic and educational hub for all visitors. By Russ Klettke
The earliest American landscapedesign theorists in the 19th century— Frederick Law Olmstead and A.J. Downing among them—argued that landscape design be included among the fine arts. In contrast, modern practitioners fight to establish their role as architectural functionalists. Such has been the push and pull of managed exterior environments, where some consider the goal to be about beauty and form while others think landscapes are about fashioning vegetation, topography, and water to meet needs and accomplish objectives. The latter category includes environmental and economic sustainability, including how each serves practical human imperatives. Cornell Plantations’ new Brian C. Nevin Welcome Center provides its own response to this debate, its design—how it functions and what it brings to the plantations—proving that the balance between inside and outside can be blurred. With a sprawling mix of natural and constructed landscapes encompassing 4,500 acres near Cornell University (the facility is a unit of the university’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences) in Ithaca, New York, the answer is that both landscape ideologies can merge Brian C. Nevin Welcome Center Certified LEED Gold for New Construction v2.2
Site Water Energy Materials Air quality Innovation TOTAL
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in this one building, and many others. And it’s not without precedent—the region is known for river-cut gorges and waterfalls, and the nearby Finger Lakes make the area a perfect microclimate for vineyards and winemaking enterprises; here, man and nature coexist peacefully and productively. Since the plantations’ founding in 1944, it existed without a built structure for several generations, but it always had landscape designers to ensure the beauty and environmental responsibility of the land. Support for the plantations picked up in the late seventies, and landscape development accelerated. “Strong alumni support, progressive leadership, and a resurgent interest in gardening and the environment have contributed to our growth,” says Don Rakow, who serves as the Elizabeth Newman Wilds Director at the Plantations. Cornell Plantations needed a building for all the visitors it was receiving, and in 2011, it added the LEED Goldcertified welcome center, designed by Baird Sampson Neuert. Nestled within well-established botanical gardens, an arboretum, natural forest, and agricultural research facilities, the 6,239-square-foot facility, which greets up to a half-million visitors each year, was created to accomplish four goals. The first of these was to establish a nexus for the complex, a single gathering place for visitors to the plantations. Indeed, this is where form and function blend quite well; the building includes a reception area, gift shop, accessible restrooms, café, 100seat multipurpose room, conference rooms, and kitchenette that all work in unison to enable learning and social
ABOVE The Nevin Welcome Center is nestled in the heart of the botanical garden, at the base of Comstock Knoll, surrounded by new bioswales that manage storm water.
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photos: Cornell University Photography
These ipe louvers, featured on the south and east façades, limit solar heat gain in summer and allow natural light penetration from a low-on-the-horizon sun during the winter.
RIGHT Guests entering the Nevin Welcome Center first walk into a two-story atrium that has a reception desk and gift shop. The second floor has a 100-seat auditorium that is used for education and outreach programs.
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“The center has become a hub for local organizations, continuing education classes, and a place for students with laptops.” Don Rakow, Cornell Plantations
PROJECT LOCATION Ithaca, NY Size 6,239 ft2 Completed 2011 Program Visitor services (including retail), classrooms, entertainment Awards Canadian Architecture Award of Excellence; AIA NYS Chapter Award of Excellence
TEAM CLIENT Cornell Plantations/Cornell University Architect Baird Sampson Neuert Landscape Architect David Cutter, Cornell University General Contractor Welliver
GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Gold Materials 100% locally sourced stone, ipe, recycled steel Water Green roof to trap and hold rainwater Energy 50% of heat from solar collectors, passive cooling, sun-shield louvers, double insulated windows Landscape Bioswales, native plantings, educational programs
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functions. “It’s now become a place for faculty retreats, for local corporate board meetings, weddings, bar mitzvahs, and graduation parties,” he says. The reason for such popularity might lay in the second goal, which was making sure the building easily blended into the botanical landscape. A dozen gardens already dotted the plantations’ botanical garden and several more were added around the center, including a tropical plants bed. All these landscape and garden features help the building blend seamlessly with its surrounding terrain. One of the new gardens is the “Six Friends” East Asian Garden, which is still being planned. When completed, it will be a 7,500-square-foot garden with pine, willow, and Japanese maple trees, plus bamboo, lotus, and large stones, which are all symbolic references to East Asian traditions. This garden, designed by Marc Peter Keane, faces the building’s second-floor classrooms. New bioswale gardens also blend aesthetics and environmental strategy. Any rainwater runoff from the parking areas drains into the bioswales, and a full-time gardener tends to the plantings throughout the growing season, producing a backdrop of sneezeweed, milkweed, Joe Pye weed, winterberry, American hornbeam, and seven cultivars of native switchgrass, all of which can tolerate flooding and drought periods.
The third goal was to blur the lines between indoors and outdoors, achieved by embedding the two-story structure into a hillside, and construction materials, primarily stone and wood, were chosen to blend the built and natural environments. The fourth goal was to be a model of green building design. The welcome center does this with polyethylene glycol-filled rooftop solar collectors that provide about half the building’s heat in winter via floor-embedded coils, as well as with a natural ventilation system that in the summer incorporates thermostatically controlled vents that open to pull in air from the north side of the building while warm air exits via rooftop vents. Plus, fixed louvers made of ipe wood cover the exterior on the south and east sides to limit solar heat gain in summer and allow natural light penetration from a low-on-the-horizon sun during the winter while its green sedum rooftop adds extra insulation. This melding of form and function expands the plantations’ impact. “The center has had a transformative impact on Cornell Plantations,” Rakow says. “Many of the groups now using the facility had never been here before. It’s become a hub for local organizations, continuing education classes, and a place for students with laptops.” In other words, the new space attracts people who might be stressed about board reports or economics midterms and plops them into a peaceful, beautiful environment they might not have experienced before, and even the most time-pressed visitor who glances at the bioswales and gardens cannot help but pause for an impractical moment to take in its welltended beauty. gb&d gb&d
photos: Cornell University Photography
Bioswales can be far more than function. Those shown above and right add to the overall landscaping but also control storm water.
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S P O T L I G H T PLAY
Endémico Resguardo Silvestre Gracia Studio
Just south of its border with the United States is Mexico’s wine-growing region, Valle de Guadalupe, on the Baja Peninsula. Now, thanks to the vision of Gracia Studio, raised cube structures dot the hillside, among huge boulders and vineyards. The nearly two dozen wood-and-steel boxes serve as the rooms of Endémico Resguardo Silvestre, a hotel operated by Grupo Habita and designed to offer something akin to “luxury camping.” To minimize their impact on the natural landscape, the high-end cabins are raised off the ground, and their Corten steel and wood will weather over time to blend in with their background. This minimalist “camping” has all the great views and nature experience without having (or, getting) to sleep on the ground. gb&d
PHOTOS: LUIS GARCIA
With individual structures for each room, Endémico Resguardo Silvestre is minimalist building at its best—simple and sustainable.
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spa c e S LEARN
Kids, cottages, and communities
The new child development center at the University of Arkansas had to be two different things: a child-care facility and an academic building. How a dedicated team designed its way out of a tight spot. By Jennifer Hogeland
Project
Green
Location Fayetteville, AR Size 23,398 ft2 Completed 2012 Program Classrooms, playrooms, outside play area
Certification LEED Silver (expected) Site Near mass transit, on walkable campus, asphalt parking lot removed Materials Stone from regional quarry, low-VOC paints and adhesives Water Greywater collection system for toilet flushing Energy Ground-source hydronic HVAC, high-performance glazing, foam and cellulose insulation Landscape Native and droughttolerant plants
Team CLIENT University of Arkansas Architect Miller Boskus Lack Architects General Contractor Milestone Construction Services
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This new child-care center uses a cottage style to let in natural light and match the structures in the existing residential area.
The University of Arkansas has offered child development programs on campus for more than 70 years to serve both its students’ academic and child-care needs. Each year, enrollment has increased, and people who used the building began to feel that the separate nursery school and infant development facilities weren’t effective. When the university asked students and staff what they were most interested in improving, early childhood programs was at the top of the list. “This sparked the chancellor’s commitment to constructing a new facility that could serve families with a full-time child-care option while benefiting our undergraduate and graduate students majoring in fields that need to observe children interacting,” explains Doug Walsh, executive director for business and operations for the Jean Tyson Child Development Study Center at the university. Vernoice Baldwin, academic director for the center, adds, “The gift from the Tyson family allowed us to construct something that would fit the needs of the students as well as the children.” gb&d
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“The selected site had to be a buffer between the institutional buildings of the campus and the small-scale residential neighborhood.” Audy Lack, Miller Boskus Lack Architects
The new academic and child-care building needed to meet three main objectives: first, satisfy the center’s three-prong mission of being a space for teaching, research, and service; second, architecturally fit within campus structures and a residential neighborhood; and finally, meet the university’s sustainability goals. “The selected site lies on the campus fringe and had to be a buffer between the institutional buildings of the campus and the small-scale residential neighborhood,” says Audy Lack, AIA, LEED AP, a project architect at Miller Boskus Lack Architects. The building form’s challenge was to blend into the residential and institutional environments while creating an inviting, home-like atmosphere for the children. To achieve this, the team worked to break the building down into smaller modules that represent the scale of the surrounding neighborhood. Those modules are seen as “cottages,” which exhibit a similar scale to the houses along the street. The structure was also set back from the street, and front porches on the cottages continue the street’s harmonious edge. Baldwin says the concept of little communities is present in early childhood education, and the design of the Tyson Child Development Study Center helped contribute to that community feel. “The idea was to give children visibility of the next age group and to have contact with the other teachers,” she says. To meet the health and wellness goals of the center, two large rooms permit children to get exercise regardless of the weather. “A multipurpose classroom sits between the playrooms,” Walsh says. “One-way glass allows students and parents to observe the children interacting with each other.” Healthy diet is part of the children’s education. The playground design includes raised garden boxes so children can plant and harvest fruits and vegetables, and the kitchen features three large observation windows so that gbdmagazine.com
ABOVE, LEFT The new building provides child care for kids and learning opportunities for students studying childhood development. BELOW To help the children learn about food and agriculture, planters were built on the property.
children can watch the cooks prepare food using the kids’ harvest, reinforcing healthful eating habits. General contractors at Milestone Construction Company ensured the building would maximize energy efficiency with the installation of foam and cellulose insulation and high-performance glazing systems. “Fresh air and natural light were a high priority in the
design of this facility and will greatly enhance the sustained health of the building,” Lack says. The center broke ground in summer 2011, and classes moved in the following year on August 1, 2012. The building is on track to receive LEED Silver certification due to the energy-efficient systems, natural light use, low-VOC products, and rainwater collection. gb&d march–april 2013
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MILESTONE CONSTRUCTION COMPANY, LLC
General Contractor
|
Design/Build
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Construction Manager
Milestone Construction Company is a full service construction management/general construction firm led by Sam Hollis, President & Co-Founder, and Travis Ruff, Co-Founder, primarily serving Northwest Arkansas and its surrounding communities. In the pursuit of excellence, Milestone provides quality workmanship combined with a personalized element designed specifically for the individual client’s needs. Milestone has the capacity to handle construction projects varying in size from renovations and interior tenant finish projects to large multi-million dollar developments. Milestone has concentrated on commercial projects in Northwest Arkansas, directing the focus on pre-construction and construction services of a negotiated nature. Pictured above: The Jean Tyson Child Development Study Center at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR.
2002 S 48th Street • Springdale, AR 72762 • Phone 479-751-3560 • Fax 479-751-4841 • www.mstonecc.com
Consultants Inc.
Experts in GREEN building systems commissioning and reviving poorly performing buildings Synergy Consultants, Inc. 38 Church Avenue, Suite 201 Wareham, MA 02572 P 508-273-2320 • F 508-273-2322 E info@synergyconsultants.net • www.synergyconsultants.net
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STUDIOGEE Architecture LLC is a design-focused architectural firm committed to creating environments that enrich the lives of our clients and the public life of the communities in which they are built.
Architecture 1214 West 6th Street, Suite 216 | Austin, TX 78703 | 512-322-0055 www.studiogee.net gb&d
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This new library is so far removed from Phoenix that public water and sewer systems didn’t exist.
S P O T L I G H T LEARN
white TANK Branch LIBRARY DWL Architects
Photos: Bill Timmerman
In the foothills of the White Tank Mountains near Waddell, Arizona, sitting among the cacti and sagebrush, is the White Tank Library and Nature Center, the first LEED Platinumcertified library in Arizona and the fourth in the country. Responsive to the extremely hot and thunderstorm-ridden climate, the DWL Architects-designed building has a solar array on its roof that, in coordination with insulation, light sensors, shading, and reflective roofing, increases the building’s energy efficiency. The 35,000 books in the library are not the building’s only contents—making up the nature center in the southeast portion of the building are an information center and an animal habitat room with snakes, gila monsters, rodents, and other native animals. Just steps from the nature center is a trailhead linking visitors to 25 miles of hiking trails that take them through the Arizona landscape. gb&d
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spa c e S W OR K
putting ‘hydro’ under the microscope Manitoba Hydro Place was heralded as one of the greenest office buildings ever built. Is it? By Benjamin van Loon
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very city has its architectural icon, and although Winnipeg is home to the notable Winnipeg Clinic building and the Winnipeg Art Gallery, Manitoba Hydro Place towers above the rest, literally and environmentally. Designed by KPMB Architects and built at a cost of $278 million in 2009, the award-winning, 700,000-square-foot ‘Hydro Building,’ as it’s called by local residents, was certified LEED Platinum in May 2012, setting a bold precedent for the company’s 800,000-member customer network. The Hydro Building received a lot of press when it opened, but now—four years after the fact—is when Manitoba Hydro’s true commitment to sustainability can officially be quantified, tested, and developed. Tom Akerstream, director of facilities for the Hydro Building, was the energy and sustainability advisor for the design of the building. “The objective we set for ourselves when were designing the Hydro Building was to see that it was the most energy-efficient and sustainable office tower in North America,” Akerstream says. When the company began implementing sustainability measures, it had what Akerstream calls the ‘submarine
approach,’ in which an energy-efficient building cuts itself off from the environment. The Hydro Building, on the other hand, was the first to move toward a climactically responsive design. Rather than cutting itself off from the environment, the structure interacts with it. Within the meteorological context of Winnipeg, a humid continental climate with hot summers and frigid winters, a glass office building is an unconventional choice in the extreme weather,
buildings, and we’re currently hitting 70 percent. When we get all of the bugs worked out, we expect to increase that.” The Manitoba Hydro labor force is sectioned in two separate buildings. Two thousand employees occupy the Hydro Building, and 800 employees occupy another office building in Winnipeg. With comparable staff ratios between the two locations, Manitoba Hydro has been able to quantify the objectives it set for itself with the construction of the Hydro Building. The first objective, Akerstream says, concerned the quality of the space. “We’ve had around a day and a half less absenteeism per employee in the Hydro Building as compared to the other Manitoba Hydro office,” Akerstream says, “and with 2,000 employees, that creates around 3,000 extra man-days of productivity.” Although the sustainable potential of the Hydro Building could be forecasted during its design phase, the proven success of the program has become a barometer both for the ongoing functionality of the building and for other large building projects using the same sustainable model. “In one sense, we didn’t know how to run a climactically responsive building because we didn’t
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but the design boasts revolutionary energy efficiency. It maximizes low-grade solar-thermal energy, natural wind, and year-round fresh-air exchange, and it has not only met but also exceeded energy-savings targets set by KPMB. “The ‘submarine approach’ will give you an average of 50 percent energy savings,” Akerstream says. “Our original target for the Hydro Building was 60 percent better than the model national energy code for
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photos: Eduard Hueber
The Hydro Building’s original target was 60 percent better than code. It’s currently hitting 70 percent. And that number is only climbing.
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FIVE Best Things about working at Manitoba Hydro a Air Quality. Most office buildings have between 30 and 40 percent air exchange in the winter. The Hydro Building? 100%, year-round. s Window Seats. No elbowing other employees to get a seat by the window. Everyone in the Hydro Building gets one. d Workstation Ergonomics. Bigger monitors, customizable workstations, and operable windows for all. f Accessibility. 80% of Winnipeg bus routes go by the Hydro Building, and 70% of the employees commute by bus. g Urbanism. There’s no cafeteria in the building, which promotes a more active downtown community.
The green roofs on the Manitoba Hydro building give employees an outdoor space, help with storm-water runoff, and add to thermal insulation.
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“Part of our objective is to change the market. It would be great to see someone make a better building next year.” Tom Akerstream, Manitoba Hydro
Manitoba Hydro Place, four years after completion, validates the evidence for smart design and development. Employees are healthier, and so are the planet and the utility company.
PROJECT LOCATION Winnipeg, MB Size 695,000 ft2 Completed 2009 Cost $278 million Program High-rise office building Awards 2009, CTBUH Tall Buildings Award; 2009 Arch Daily Building of the Year, Office Category; 2010 Association of Consulting Engineering Companies Buildings Award; 2010 SAB Canadian Green Building Award
TEAM CLIENT Manitoba Hydro Architect KPMB Architects Executive Architect Smith Carter Architects + Engineers Advocate Architect Prairie Architects General Contractor PCL Constructors Canada Climate Engineer Transsolar Landscape Hilderman Thomas Frank Cram Building Envelope Brook Van Dalen & Associates
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have any other buildings to compare it to,” Akerstream says. “We’ve learned that we need to have a good understanding of what is happening with the outside climate, and now we’re using that knowledge to advise builders to achieve this same level of energy efficiency.” In addition to employees and tourists, more than 11,000 architectural and engineering professionals from around the world have visited the Hydro Building to observe and learn about its systems. “Some of these people were surprised by how open we are about our project, but we were successful,” Akerstream says. “Because Manitoba Hydro is a leader in energy conservation, part of our objective is to change the market, and it would be great to see someone make a better building next year.” gb&d
a message from AECOM AECOM provided mechanical and electrical engineering services for the design and construction of Manitoba Hydro’s new 65,000-square-meter (700,000-square-foot), 23-story headquarters office tower in downtown Winnipeg. Designed to set a new standard for office building design, the new headquarters is a state-of-the-art, world class, “cold climate” sustainable, and energy-efficient building. The project exceeded its targeted energy savings of 60 percent and a LEED Gold certification achievement, by 10 percent while earning a more prestigious LEED Platinum certification. The project has been recognized with several provincial, national, and international awards for its holistic approach to design and sustainability. Photos: Eduard Hueber
CERTIFICATION LEED Platinum Site Proximal to 95% of Winnipeg transit routes and numerous amenities Air 100% fresh, pre-conditioned air, year-round Water 78-foot-tall atria waterfall for humidifying and dehumidifying Energy Passive solar radiant, geothermal Roof Rooftop garden terraces
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The two towers have a total of three six-story atria that form the ‘lungs’ of the building, helping it recirculate air to provide 100% fresh air at all times.
A hard look at Manitoba Hydro Place Q: Does the Hydro Building really have clean air year-round? A: It does. The 115-foot solar chimney creates a passive ventilation system, and the 78-foot waterfalls in the atria scrub the air clean, replacing the air in the building every 20 minutes. Q: Just how big is the closed-loop geothermal system? A: The biggest in Manitoba. It has 280 six-inch-diameter boreholes that penetrate the site 400 feet underground. Q: Do employees really use the bus routes to commute to work? A: Yes. Prior to construction, 95% of employees were commuting to work by car. Now, 70% of the employees are taking the bus to work.
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Wetland Real Estate Cambridge Discovery Park rests squarely on the tenet that commercial building must be planned with the site in mind
When complete, the 27-acre Cambridge Discovery Park will include six different buildings for offices and laboratories.
Interview by Russ Klettke
The financial imperatives of urban real estate often mean consuming green space with structures. But Jim Cronin of The Bulfinch Companies and ADD, Inc. architect Larry Grossman managed to do the opposite. Home to the new, LEED Gold headquarters of Forrester Research, a global research and advisory firm, the redevelopment of Cambridge Discovery Park outside Boston sets a high bar. What kind of site was this and how would you describe it now? Jim Cronin: It was previously occupied by circa-1950s office structures, and yet it’s technically a wetland. The land area— 27 acres—and adjacent Alewife Brook Reservation represent the third-largest campus in Cambridge, after Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. At-grade surface parking lots formerly consumed a substantial amount of the open space. Who decided this would be a LEED building and why? Cronin: LEED certifications are almost required in new Boston-area commercial construction but not by government mandate. Sustainable structures net better rents and resale values and allow tenant companies to attract better employees. [The Forrester project] was a build-to-suit tenant, so it had substantial input into its final design. What features did Forrester like? Larry Grossman: The master plan allows for “urban wild” landscaping. Forrester, which occupies Building 200/300, particularly likes the glass curtain on the two-story lobby, which allows a strong visual connection with the outdoors. Were there special challenges on this project? Grossman: The development sits on a floodplain alongside the Little River, which flows through Cambridge. We designed all buildings to sit above the high
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watermark with ponds that take rainwater runoff for natural filtration into the ground, reducing the storm-water load on the city sewer system. What features did you put into the building to help it achieve LEED Gold certification? Cronin: The certification is for the Core & Shell, which includes the building envelope and the HVAC mechanical systems. It uses a HEPA filter system in addition to other superior indoor-airquality systems: low-VOC adhesives, coatings, paints, and sealants. Ninety-six percent of the construction waste was recycled, including the demolition from the previous structures. The landscaping is drought resistant and water-efficient plumbing fixtures are used throughout. Workers are within walking distance of stores and restaurants as well as a commuter train stop. Zipcars are available on-site, and there are electric-car chargers in the garage as well as bike racks. And shuttle buses run to the T-system station. Are you planning future sustainable projects? Cronin: As a member of the USGBC, Bulfinch is committed to constructing
PROJECT LOCATION Cambridge, MA Size 820,000 ft2 (when completed) Program Lab, research and development, office space Awards GoGreen Award, City of Cambridge for storm-water management design
TEAM DEVELOPER The Bulfinch Companies Architect ADD Inc. Client Forrester Research General Contractor John Moriarty & Associates (base building and tenant build-out) Engineers AHA Consulting
GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED-CS Gold, LEED-CI Platinum Site Wetland preservation, reduced building footprint Envelope Tight building envelope to conserve energy Water Water-efficient landscaping, ponds for rainwater runoff Energy Highly efficient heating and cooling systems Landscape Allows seasonal flooding to naturally percolate under structures
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Cambridge Discovery Park’s master plan includes a total of five buildings, two of which are completed and total 350,000 square feet. It is the third largest campus in the area, after Harvard and MIT.
Design for corporate buildings requires knowledge of the corporate work environment and the technical systems that users rely upon. Owners expect quality services, responsiveness to corporate goals, and added value for the complete project. E/B/E has the required knowledge and skills.
Services include, but are not limited to: • Plans and Specifications LEED-certified structures in the future and has adopted the Building Owners and Managers Association of Boston best practices. That includes a 30-percent reduction in energy consumption, heat island reduction, transportation alternatives, and green cleaning. gb&d
• Electrical Engineering • HVAC Engineering • Plumbing Engineering • Fire Protection Engineering • Energy Modeling • LEED Services • Investigative Reports
a message from ADD Inc. ADD Inc.’s design of Cambridge Discovery Park places contemporary architecture in the urban wild of the Alewife Reservation to return river frontage to nature and foster a scientific hub’s development. This award-winning project is among the many created by ADD Inc. from its offices in Boston and Miami.
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24 Greenway Plaza, Suite 601 Tel. 713.840.0177 Houston, TX 77046 Fax 713.840.8677 Website: www.ebeemce.com march–april 2013
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The exterior of the One Oak Park in Houston is a dual-pane, low-E coated glass curtain wall.
the unseen green Real estate developer Peyton Collins discusses the smart, sometimes unnoticed energy-saving features of Houston’s One Oak Park Interview by Julie Schaeffer
PROJECT LOCATION Houston Size 150,000 ft2 Completed 2009 Program Office space
TEAM CLIENT Means Knaus Partners, The Carlyle Group Architect Gensler Mechanical Engineer E/B/E Inc. Civil Engineer R.G. Miller Engineers General Contractor Tribble & Stephens Structural Engineer Haynes Whaley Associates LEED Commissioning Rennell Associates
GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Gold
Site Water Energy Materials Air quality Innovation TOTAL
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One Oak Park in Houston doesn’t look particularly green. That’s because most of its eco-friendly elements are hard to see, including the fact that its zones are metered separately so that systems don’t run unnecessarily; each floor can be “turned on” by itself. Peyton Collins, managing director of the Texas region for commercial real estate firm Means Knaus Partners, explains what is sustainable on the LEED Gold office property.
What are some of the sustainable features that make this building unique? We configured the building so parts could be used separately. The air-conditioning is set up, for example, so you can run one floor. We also metered all of the 110-volt equipment in the space including the lights. So, if a tenant wants to use the building after hours, we don’t have to turn the whole building on. We turn on the parts that are used and charge only the tenant using them for the energy. You saved 300 oak trees during development. How did you do that? There were 300 oak trees in an outer circle surrounding the Haliburton build-
ing on the south end of the park. They needed to be removed to create a more efficient land plan, so we took those 300 trees and relocated them throughout the park at the major intersections. We won a couple of awards for doing that. What were some challenges you found along the way while working on this project? In our LEED category, only 50 percent of the skin can be glass unless you want to use a high-efficiency glass, which is cost prohibitive. In leasing spaces, you want as much glass as possible for light. By reducing the height of our glass, we were still able to provide floor-to-ceiling glass in many areas of the building. What sustainable features get the best response? People don’t even see a lot of things you put into a building to get LEED certified, but tenants like the sophistication of the building. When you walk in, our 10-foot revolving door reveals artistic accents, including European wood acoustical panels from the Black Forest. They’re made from sustainable wood, but tenants probably notice the beauty. We have a state-of-theart fitness center with locker rooms and all low-flow and auto-flushing plumbing fixtures, but tenants probably notice the showers. And we have an outdoor courtyard landscaped with plants that don’t need excessive water, like natural grasses, but tenants probably notice the wireless Internet. gb&d
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Archway Studios Undercurrent Architects
Built in and around a 19th century rail viaduct archway, Archway Studios is one of the most efficient uses of space we’ve seen in quite a while. Designed by London architecture firm, Undercurrent Architects, the studio is a live/work space that aimed to take a location with limited light and views and turn it into an uplifting environment. Situated on the side of a rail line, the building has an acoustic shell to minimize the sound and vibration from passing trains. This building addresses how society interacts with infrastructure instead of being removed from it, and with more than 10,000 arches running through London neighborhoods, Undercurrent Architects hopes this will be a model for future development. gb&d
Because the site had severely limited access to light, the architects incorporated windows in key and unique places.
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Design to the Letter Thank-you letters from past clients inspire Von Weise Associates in the workplace redux for Stowell & Friedman’s law offices By Tina Vasquez
Von Weise Associates isn’t the architecture firm you reach out to for the best deal. It’s not the firm that will come in and simply make your office, home, or hotel “nice” or “edgy.” Instead, it is the kind of architecture firm you go to for a decidedly more intellectual approach to projects. Such was the case with the workplace design for Stowell & Friedman, a civil rights law firm engaged in workplace discrimination litigation, where Von Weise Associates used specific aspects of the firm’s work to inform elements of the space. “Our designs are inspired by the interplay between the people who will be interacting with the space and the inherent qualities of the materials being used,” says Chip von Weise, who founded the firm in 1999 after he earned a master’s degree in architecture with distinction from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design. “We don’t have an aesthetic we apply to each of our projects. Our design process is informed by the client, and when brainstorming concepts, we exemplify their desires through the design goals. We want to have a genuine exchange and collaboration; it’s not about the client buying a commodity.”
The people who seek out Von Weise Associates’ services are interested in the intellectual content of architecture. They are the clients that tend to embrace change, and it just so happens that those people are also very interested in being responsible stewards of the environment. The core mission of Von Weise Associates is to have integrity. “We’re responsible to the client, to the people who will be in the space each day, and we’re responsible to society,” von Weise says. “We want to minimize the impact on the environment whenever we can.” Many of the firm’s clients don’t go into their projects with the intention of being green, but the suggestions Von Weise Associates makes are ideal for the space and more often than not just so happen to be environmentally friendly. On the Stowell & Friedman project, von Weise wanted to make the most of the building’s natural sunlight and suggested open office areas, but the lawyers at the firm were concerned with privacy and uncomfortable with the idea. Fortunately, this wasn’t the end of the conversation, and, as usual, the committed design team discovered the perfect solution: the offices would be open but still maintain privacy. How? By using glass that was custom film-printed with handwritten letters from former clients expressing their thanks to the firm for taking on their cases. “We’d never done anything like this,” von Weise says, “but we fell in love with the idea after seeing a photograph of the letters on the firm’s old website. When we asked about it, they presented us with a glorified shoebox filled with the letters.
More than one hundred personal letters from past clients were printed on a glazing film to create the Stowell & Friedman office’s privacy screens.
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photos: Michelle Litvin
Eight colors were used in each office space, which tie into the eight different colors used in the Stowell & Friedman logo, on the firm’s business cards, and in the design layout of its website.
We didn’t know how to utilize them at first, so we hung up the photograph of the letters in our design studio for inspiration.” But there was also a much bigger idea at play. Von Weise wanted somehow to include the nature of the law offices’ work, which is trying to balance the rights of individuals against the rights of the larger community. To communicate this push and pull, Von Weise Associates used various techniques, such as layering and carving, to explore the tension between the individual and the collective, or as Von Weise says, “between things that are both one thing and many things at the same time.” gbdmagazine.com
This attention to the client resulted in a space that not only reflects the delicate work taking place, but also one that tells the story of who Stowell & Friedman is. “We didn’t just design a ‘nice’ office,” von Weise says. “We created a space that was interesting and unique that exemplified who they are as a firm. The relationship we were able to build was one of the most rewarding experiences I’ve ever had with a client.” gb&d Von Weise Associates balanced the personal notes on the glass with a collage they designed composed of more than 50 newspaper and magazine articles reporting on cases involving Stowell & Friedman.
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how to light the aia With an original design that was four times the project budget, Gregg Mackell of 186 Lighting Design Group got thrifty for the new AIA Colorado headquarters By Julie Schaeffer
the 2013 AIA National Convention. “We lost some cool lighting elements, like pattern projectors,” Mackell says, “but because we had a lot more pull with manufacturers than we normally would, we were able to maintain the integrity of the design.” Upon entering the building, people are greeted by two large-scale decorative fixtures—one halogen pendant light and one fluorescent pendant light—donated by Visual Interest, Louis Poulsen Lighting and Studio Como, and the ceiling boasts the more functional LED-powered, four-inch square-aperture down lights manufactured by Tech Lighting. In the office spaces, Mackell started by repurposing some of the existing incandescent A-lamp down lights by replacing bulbs with screw-in LED versions donated by GE Lighting. He also added 2’x2’ LED troffers (two-by-twos) manufactured by Finelite for general lighting. Over the conference table, Mackell used Architectural Lighting Works’ linear direct and indirect pendants with halogen-infrared MR16 lamps for task lighting and dimming fluorescent uplights. “The task lighting in the conference rooms gives us an infinite dimmability range, which is important when tenants are using projectors,” Mackell says. Another notable lighting aspect of the project was the Lutron GRAFIK Eye light-
ing controls. In many commercial spaces, you have breakers or switches, but for this project, ESC Thul and CET & Associates donated a substantial amount of time and money in order to integrate iPads with everything in the conference rooms and general spaces. “You just grab an iPad, and you can control the lights in the conference rooms and lobby,” Mackell says. One thing that surprised Mackell about the lighting design was the success of the LED two-by-twos. He had never used LED troffers in an office space and was leaning toward the building standard of fluorescent direct and indirect two-by-twos until Paul Hutton of Hutton Architecture Studio, who was on Lindenau’s team, pushed for two-by-two recessed LED fixtures. “We ended up going with what Paul recommended, and I was pleasantly surprised,” Mackell says. “We got a good volume of light from the LEDs, and the people who work in the office seem happy with their performance.” In the end, Mackell says that the project’s budget constraints actually proved fortuitous because they led to a more energy-efficient office. The lighting team began with 0.9 watts per square foot; by the end, it was down to 0.8 watts. It appears that necessity really is the mother of innovation. gb&d
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Location Denver Size 4,290 ft2 Completed 2012 Program Office space
CERTIFICATION Not applicable Materials Native Coloradan beetle kill pine and other sustainable materials Lighting LED troffers instead of fluorescents Daylighting Extensive glass use in lobby, conference areas, and offices Controls Lutron GRAFIK Eye controls for dimming and efficiency
TEAM LIGHTING DESIGN 186 Lighting Design Group Client AIA Colorado Architect Studio B Architects, Hutton Architecture Studio General Contractor Weitz Construction
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photos: raul j. garcia
Lighting designer Gregg Mackell doesn’t often work for free, but if the right offer comes along, why not? Scott Lindenau of Studio B Architects approached Mackell about doing the lighting design for the 4,290-square-foot AIA Colorado headquarters in Denver, a great opportunity for him to help out architects. “He asked if I could work for very little or no money, but architects are the reason I have business, so I jumped at the chance,” says Mackell, who founded Denver-based 186 Lighting Design Group in 2001. The team sat down with a conceptual design, which involved a tenant finish of an existing high-rise office space. “Scott wanted to make the space substantially different, and his ideas were really cool,” Mackell says. “Studio B has a modern style and incorporated natural daylight with sustainable materials.” Of course, there was one problem. When Lindenau and Mackell got estimates for the cost of the original design, it was roughly four times the budget. “We basically had to value engineer something like 75 percent out of the cost of the project,” Mackell says. To make that happen, Lindenau and Mackell asked for donations and discounts, which were somewhat less challenging to get—though certainly not easy—given that the AIA office is hosting
photos: raul j. garcia
Lit with sunlight and donated fixtures, the new AIA Colorado headquarters used existing building materials, such as the carpet tiles, lighting fixtures, and mechanical systems.
“You just grab an iPad, and you can control the lights in the conference rooms and lobby.� Gregg Mackell, 186 Lighting Design Group
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PUTTING The ‘Mod’ in Modular
The Simpatico prototype’s corrugated-metal siding requires no maintenance. Finished in the factory, the material features durable paint much like an automobile.
A meticulous look at the modern prototype Simpatico Homes will use to raise the bar for prefab Interview by Stephanie Vozza
The prototype’s rooftop deck expands the living space, maximizes the view, and creates usable space from a typically unusable home feature.
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Simpatico’s high-design prefab home uses bamboo wood ceilings above the sunken living room, which also features furniture from Blu Dot and custom carpet from FLOR.
modern architecture that is standardized, and we’re bringing the price down by prefabricating most of it in a factory. We’re doing things differently than the East Coast; there is a different standard of architecture there. In the West Coast, we’re more modern and green.
PROJECT LOCATION Emeryville, CA Size 2,450 ft2 Completed 2012 Program Prefab modular residence Awards 2012 Gold Nugget Awards Merit Award for Prefab or Modular Housing Concept
photos: Russell Abraham; Kate Carboneau; Simpatico Homes (crane)
TEAM DEVELOPER Simpatico Homes Architect Robert Swatt, Swatt Miers Architects General Contractor Simpatico Homes
GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Platinum Materials Porcelain, wood, cork, and bamboo flooring; glass tile; engineered wood Water Rainwater-harvesting system, low-flow plumbing Energy Net-zero energy, passivesolar design, hydronic radiant floor heat, LED lighting, Energy Star appliances and windows
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hat if you could buy a modern and eco-friendly house the same way you might buy a Chevy Volt or Toyota Prius? You could select options like you do leather seats, wheel upgrades, and built-in GPS navigation. Seth Krubiner of Simpatico Homes offers a way to do just that, but without wheels or a GPS. He offers custom-built modern homes that are a notch above most prefabs. Here, he talks about his own prototype and the “dealership” he also calls home.
How does it work? Typically, building a custom home is a major process. You have to make every decision, assemble the team, and manage the work. We offer one-stop shopping. We’ve predetermined the team and the design to take advantage of off-site manufacturing technologies. The number of decisions you have to make is much smaller. It’s similar to buying a car; some things are standard and other things can be customized. For example, in our system the size of the modules are standard because they need to fit on the truck, be transported under bridges, etc. But within the different rooms, you have choices from a finish standpoint, such as flooring materials, cabinets, countertops, and tile. Homes are built to the same codes as site-built homes and arrive in separate modules to your site. Each module is roughly 80 percent complete with the kitchen, plumbing, drywall, windows and doors, recessed lighting, and subfloor installed.
Where did you get the idea to build high-end modular homes? My own background is in mid- and high-rises, lofts, and townhomes, and I’ve done contractor work on the side— buying, selling, and remodeling. I have a close friend who builds modular homes on the East Coast. There is a lot of interest in prefab homes out there. One in ten new homes is built this way, and it’s becoming a significant piece of the industry. I’ve always wanted to take custom modern architecture and find a way to make it more accessible to a wider audience. The modular space seemed like the perfect way to do that. We’re creating
Tell us about the prototype. The Simpatico Prototype Home is a twostory home with a third-level roof deck. It’s designed for a long and narrow urban lot. The home measures 24’x70’ and has three bedrooms, three bathrooms, plus a study, with 2,086 square feet of living space. The design drew inspiration from the modern, architect-designed Eichler Homes, which were built across California in the 50s and 60s. We worked with architect Robert Swatt of the firm Swatt Miers Architects, which is known for its high-end modern homes. We take their knowledge and expertise and apply to it to the prefab movement. Together,
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“Our prototype is different than a typical model home because someone lives in it—me.” Seth Krubiner, Simpatico Homes
Floor-to-ceiling windows add to the open feel of the second-story hallway. Double-paned, low-E, and Energy Starrated, the windows are a major energysaving feature of the home.
we designed some standard details and methodology; they use our kit of parts. What kinds of materials are used? We look at these homes concerned with sustainability. We’ve chosen materials that aren’t harmful or depleting of resources; we’re also concerned with durability and low maintenance. We offer a variety of options, including two types of no-maintenance siding: corrugated-metal and composite-wood siding. On the inside of the home, we chose a lot of green materials, and everything is formaldehyde-free. Our paints are low- or zero-VOC, and we offer an option for hydronic radiant floor heat. We use all LED lighting and low-flow plumbing fixtures. All of the windows are low-E coated, double-paned, and Energy Star-rated. We use bamboo flooring for accents and stairs. The structures are wood framed though most of the wood isn’t standard dimensional lumber; instead it’s engineered wood
This IceStone countertop adds sophistication and sustainability to the Simpatico kitchen, aided by Energy Star-rated Bosch appliances and a Heath Ceramics tile backsplash.
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How is this method of building a home green? Building a home in a factory is much greener. Most of the construction is done closer to the labor, which results in fewer car trips. We have a better way of managing waste, which can be much more challenging on-site. On-site, extra materials often get tossed into a Dumpster; in a factory, extras can be saved. It’s also more efficient from a research and labor standpoint.
This ‘marriage line’ is where the second-story modules were pieced together. Simpatico’s homes are delivered 80% complete to the building site, a green approach that is heightened here by clean, modern design.
What’s next for Simpatico Homes? Our prototype is complete, but it’s different than a typical model home because you can see how it’s livable because someone lives in it—me. We’re considering purchasing land or a small subdivision and building homes on a spec basis. We’d like to be able to help a wider range of people than just those who are looking to build a home on their parcel of land. We’ve seen the need for homes that are available right away, for those who would like the convenience of purchasing something that is move-in ready. gb&d gb&d
photos: Russell Abraham / Kate Carboneau
products that are made from smaller pieces of scrap wood and laminated in a way to make it lighter, stronger, and straighter. Engineered wood doesn’t warp and has a stronger green story.
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Dani Ridge House Carver + Schicketanz
Photos: Robert Canfield
As legendary for its place in the American consciousness as for its natural beauty and spectacular ocean views, Big Sur in California offered the perfect location for a house with so many glass walls that being inside feels like being outside. The 1,900-square-foot Dani Ridge House, by Carver + Schicketanz, is carved into a hillside and looks upon the Pacific through floor-to-ceiling windows that nearly stretch the perimeter of the house, which uses daylighting and shading to control temperatures. Hoping not to obstruct their neighbors’ views, the clients asked the architects to add a native green roof, which from above looks essentially identical to the surrounding greenery. In fact, it blends so well into the landscape that if you drive by, you just might miss it. gb&d
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Housing 44 condominiums, the LEED Platinum Third + Bond is a showcase of sustainability—and a new way of building for the Hudson Companies.
Brownstone
The Hudson Companies’ LEED Platinum take on the Brooklyn townhouse never would’ve happened if not for one woman By Tina Vasquez
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Few may have predicted that a plot of land at the intersection of the Carroll Gardens and Gowanus neighborhoods in Brownstone Brooklyn would become a LEED Platinum modern adaptation of the traditional townhouse, but Third + Bond is the central premise of that exact story, the brainchild of the Hudson Companies Incorporated and, more specifically, Alison Novak. Before Novak came to the Hudson Companies in 2006, the well-established New York development company hadn’t implemented much sustainable design into its residential projects. Novak, an MIT graduate who is now vice president of the company, came from a real-estatedevelopment background where she was taught to look at things holistically, and she says that taking a holistic approach to sustainability seemed within the realm of possibility. Before pitching the idea of green building to Hudson’s partners, Novak discussed the idea with past employees, attempting to get a feel for whether or not the company would embrace sustainability—what she heard was a resounding yes. “Many of our competitors were already going the sustainable route, and gb&d
SPACES
“it definitely wasn’t business as usual. we had so much to rethink. There were some things I didn’t know about at all.” Alison Novak, Hudson Companies Incorporated
PROJECT LOCATION Brooklyn, NY Size 54,000 ft2 Completed 2011 Program Residential condominiums Awards Building Brooklyn Award 2012 for Residential Low-Rise
TEAM DEVELOPER Hudson Companies Incorporated Architect Rogers Marvel Architects Landscape Architect The Organic Gardener General Contractor KSK Construction Group
photos: James Shanks
GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Platinum Site Urban area, land previously used Materials FSC-certified hardwood floors, locally assembled panel system, fly ash in foundation Water Dual-flush toilets, low-flow fixtures Energy Tight building envelope; efficient lighting; double-pane, low-E windows Landscape Organic landscaping with native plants
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I didn’t want us to get left behind,” Novak says, “but I also understood that after doing jobs the same way for 20 years, taking on something new and unfamiliar could seem daunting. Thankfully we received a grant from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) that enabled us to add a consultant to our development budget. That made all the difference. I didn’t want the partners to think we were going to be installing bicycles to power toasters.” June 2007 marked a momentous time for Hudson; it purchased the plot of land in Brooklyn, not far from the company’s former office. The project would become Hudson’s first foray into green building and Novak’s baby, featuring 44 residential condominium apartments in eight four-and-a-half-story townhomes. By the time Third + Bond was completed in January 2011, it was everything Novak and her team could have hoped for, but getting there had its challenges. Not only did city oversight of construction sites become stricter around the time of building, but Hudson began the project during the recession, and selling the units proved to be slow. Not to mention the fact that the entire team, including Novak, was inexperienced when it came to green building. To say it was a learning process would be an understatement. “Everyone did an amazing job, but it definitely wasn’t business as usual,” Novak says. “We had so much to rethink. We’d set a budget for something like insulation based on costs from past projects, just to realize later in the design process that we’d need a far greater budget for far greater insulation. There were some things I didn’t know about at all, and in a lot of ways, we were figuring things out along the way, making sure to leave room for adjustments. Even now that the units are occupied, we are learning about adjustments to make on this and future jobs.”
Each Third + Bond unit has been sold, 80 percent of the units include a private outdoor space, and each building was constructed using a prefabricated steel structural system with concrete floors. The units have individually ducted central air-conditioning, energy recovery ventilators for tempering and filtering fresh air, and a panel façade crafted from locally sourced brick and recycled aluminum. Hudson used low-VOC paints, and FSC-certified solid hardwood flooring, dual-flush toilets, super low-flow lavatories, and drought-tolerant landscaping. As a result, Third + Bond, designed by Rogers Marvel Architects and built by KSK Construction Group, was awarded LEED Platinum certification and an Energy Star label. Hudson seemed to be on to the Brooklyn boom before it became the hottest borough. Hudson partnered
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“a grant from [NYSERDA] made all the difference. I didn’t want the partners to think we were going to be installing bicycles to power toasters.” Alison Novak, Hudson Companies Incorporated
with Brooklyn’s own design school, the Pratt Institute, and employed alumni, students, and faculty to furnish two Third + Bond model residences. The Pratt team customized everything in the space by silk-screening pillows, designing wallpaper, and even including chairs featured in the Museum of Modern Art’s collection. “There was so much talent on display, it was almost ridiculous,” Novak
says. “It was like hiring a team of the most talented interior designers, and all of them were committed to sustainability. They put so much heart and soul into this project.” Hudson even started a guest column on Brownstoner.com, one of New York City’s premier real-estate blogs, so outsiders could get an inside look at the development. For “Inside Third + Bond,”
Novak posted behind-the-scenes photos and wrote honestly about the challenges and frustrations that informed each decision made on the project. “This project is a source of pride for Hudson and me,” Novak says. “The response has been great. I even had a tenant tell me that she shows all of her guests her dual-flush toilet. It was sort of unusual, but I loved that she loves it so much.” gb&d
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buildings.With over a hundred years of combined experience in the construction business, KSK Construction
GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List
150 Thompson Residence Weathering the New England winter 153 The Old Church Historic preservation plus energy efficiency
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Budget Build the Ranch House Remix
Who Kaplan Thompson Architects What Thompson Residence Where Portland, ME By Murrye Bernard
Site
When Portland, Maine-based architect Jesse Thompson and his family were ready for a house upgrade, they knew they didn’t want to start from scratch with an empty lot. But they also didn’t want to take on a historic preservation project. “We were looking for the cheapest and worst house in the neighborhood,” Thompson says. Thompson and his wife spent two years searching for ‘the one,’ which turned out to be a typical—if not a little drab—one-story, 1960s-era ranch-style
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home with a detached garage. The house offered several pluses: its location in the Deering Center neighborhood was blocks from the kids’ school and a baseball field and was only a 15-minute bike ride for Thompson to his downtown architecture firm, Kaplan Thompson Architects. But every house has its drawbacks. This one wasn’t quite large enough to comfortably accommodate a family of four, its curb appeal was lacking, and its leaky exterior let Maine’s winter air penetrate the house.
Jesse Thompson’s home in Portland, ME, was a typical 1960s ranch house when he and his family purchased it.
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Jesse Thompson on combatting the cold: “I grew up in old New England farmhouses, so I’m used to being cold, and this house is by far the warmest and most comfortable house I’ve ever lived in. It’s almost embarrassing to admit to people that you’re not cold in the winter because your house stays at 70 degrees.”
Salvage
The revival of this ranch house demonstrates that an older home can be made sustainable on a budget. Thompson, who served not only as architect but also as general contractor for the project, wanted to keep as many of the house’s existing walls as possible and maintain the balance of its roofline while avoiding excavation of any kind. But he needed to gain additional interior space for his family, so the only solution was to build up. He added a second floor with two bedrooms for the kids, and he enclosed the breezeway that connected the garage to serve as a mudroom. These two moves allowed him to expand the interior from 1,000 square feet to 1,900 square feet without enlarging the home’s footprint. Not only did Thompson salvage much of the original home’s structure, but he also salvaged materials from other sources to complete its transformation. Thompson drew inspiration from the clean lines of Scandinavian architecture, particularly the work of Alvar Aalto, to create “a quiet gray exterior with a lively interior.” In many cases, the types and amounts of materials he found informed the design decisions. For the house’s exterior, Thompson reclaimed a mix of hemlock and local Maine cedar siding via Craigslist, the online marketplace. He stained the siding dark gray to match and paired it with a metal standingseam roof. Slate tiles that were salvaged from a 19th century barn came in short supply but were too good a find to pass. “We knew we had 1,000 square feet of tile to work with, so we were able to design to exactly that amount of mategbdmagazine.com
rial,” Thompson says. He used the tiles to create an undulating base that weaves in with the wood siding and wraps the outside of the chimney. A mix of salvaged and new materials enlivens the home’s interior. Thompson’s wife, Betsy, a textile designer and fiber artist, handled most of the interior color and finish selection. She creatively transformed materials such as birch plywood off-cuts left over from the fabrication of a CNC-milled ceiling installation in a recent restaurant project by Kaplan Thompson into coat hooks that she mounted against a striking blue wall in the mudroom. Betsy also selected a canary yellow tile from Johnson Ceramics to line the bathrooms. The high-end kitchen appliances, including a Bosch dishwasher and Frigidaire cooktop, were surprising bargains
discovered at the local Habitat for Humanity ReStore resale outlet. Although the Thompsons appreciated the grain in the home’s original red oak floors, they wanted a darker finish, closer to ebony. They discovered a lost woodworking technique called “liquid nightmare,” an easy and nontoxic process involving the application of vinegar with steel wool followed by a seal of water-based polyurethane. Rounding out the interior palette, simple drywall painted white was the most affordable and moldable surface material for the walls and ceilings. In the living room, the sculptured ceiling billows up to 12 feet in height. Throughout the home, LED and fluorescent fixtures provide a clean wash of light across these surfaces while keeping energy to a minimum.
Thompson only had 1,000 feet of the slate tiles he salvaged from a 19th century barn, so he designed the tile to be seen on the façade and integrate with the wood siding as it continued around the sides.
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TOUGH BUILDS Thompson Residence
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Inches of reclaimed rigid foam insulation around the Thompson Residence’s exterior
Seal
Thompson was one of the first architects in northern New England to become a certified PassivHaus consultant, and renovating his own home gave him the perfect opportunity to test out his knowledge of the stringent German standards. Although the completed renovation doesn’t quite meet Passivhaus heating standards, it does meet the total energy use requirements for heating, electricity, and hot-water use as a bundle. The house is also projected to achieve LEED Platinum certification. To seal against air leaks, Thompson wrapped the house’s existing walls in six inches of reclaimed rigid foam insulation. He faced the challenge of accommodating the depth of the insulation while supporting the heavy slate tiles, and he ultimately devised a solution involving mounting the tiles on a lattice of wood furring strips that transfers the weight to the house’s framing via 10-inch-long SIP screws. This assembly also functions as a rainscreen, draining moisture away from
the walls’ surfaces. Thompson installed triple-glazed windows, which are much more effective against drafts than standard single- or double-pane units. He also beefed up insulation in the existing slab and then poured a new slab on top to further isolate the home from the ground. During the construction process, Thompson conducted three separate blower-door tests to ensure that he’d prevented as many leaks as possible, ultimately increasing the airtightness of the home’s envelope by 90 percent (a heat recovery ventilator keeps fresh air circulating throughout). With the house sealed against leaks, heating the interior requires little energy. A Scandinavian wood stove in the living room is the house’s main source of heat, supplementing the existing gas boiler. Two
cords of wood are all that’s required to keep the home at a consistent 70 degrees throughout the winter. Designing the renovation of his own home allowed Thompson to test out many cost-saving and sustainable design strategies. But Thompson wants to share his knowledge; his home has become an educational tool for others and has been featured on several local green-building tours. “Visitors are shocked that such a transformation is possible with a 1960s house,” Thompson says, “especially the idea that you can heat a house for only $500 a year in Maine.” gb&d
$500
Total cost to heat the Thompson residence last winter, despite Maine’s severe climate
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Energy Retrofit New Systems for an Old Church 49 Location Who Imagine Energy What The Old Church Where Portland, OR
By Julie Schaeffer
Portland, Oregon, is the 29th most populated city in the United States with more than 2.2 million people living in the metropolitan area. Yet it feels like a small town in many ways; it has a low skyline and a lush Pacific Northwest landscape shadowed by the 11,249-foot-tall Mount Hood, the highest point in Oregon and home to 12 glaciers. Not surprisingly, the Portland community has rallied around environmental causes, in part because of its natural beauty. The city’s website specifies that it is committed to clean air and water, livable neighborhoods, shared open spaces, transportation, and sustainable economic development, which has led the Mother Nature Network to dub Portland the greenest city in the United States. Given the city’s focus on sustainability, historic preservation is also very important to Portlandians, who have been committed to preserving The Old Church, a nonprofit event venue located in downtown Portland’s cultural West End. The former church, built in 1882, is a cherished Portland landmark because it is the oldest church that is still standing in the city.
Preservation
In 2011, The Old Church’s board of directors was faced to confront the reality that the building’s decades-old heating system was unsafe and failing, and it lacked air-conditioning systems, so it hired Imagine Energy, a Portland-based energy consultancy, to update and improve its energy systems. “It was getting gbdmagazine.com
Estimated percent reduction in energy use for The Old Church after upgrades
uncomfortably hot during the summer, which was a problem given that The Old Church is an event space,” says Jonathan Cohen, founder of Imagine Energy. “It was preventing a lot of people from holding weddings there.” Imagine Energy evaluated the sustainability of all of the building’s systems while it was working on the air-condi-
tioning. “They were looking for someone to take a holistic look at everything that was going on and come up with a plan of action,” Cohen says, whose 22-person firm works on commercial and residential projects to help their energy use come as close as possible to netzero. “Buildings have complex systems, complex usage patterns, and complex march–april 2013
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“Buildings have complex systems, complex usage patterns, and complex DEFEATING WINTER’S CHILL CHIL DEFEATING WINTER’S controls, and we provide energy solutions and the gas andbill. the gasforbill these complexities.”
DEFEATING WINTER’S CHILL
Jonathan Cohen, Imagine Energy
and the gas bill.
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controls, and we provide energy solutions for these complexities.” For The Old Church, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, preservation was critical. “The board wanted us to find the most sustainable and cost-effective things it could do to improve the building’s energy use and carbon footprint, but it also wanted to preserve the aesthetic of the building,” Cohen says. “We had to make sure anything we were designing didn’t affect the look and feel of the space.”
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After the board hired Imagine Energy and raised the funds to do the systems overhaul, Cohen and his team developed an energy model of the building to determine where energy was being lost. “We asked what was the source of the energy, how sustainable that source was, and what we could do to make a difference,” Cohen says. The team discovered that although the existing mechanical equipment was outdated, inefficient, and unsafe, the 1940s-era ductwork was well-built and large enough to handle cooling the building, which was a major sustainability plus. Cohen’s team also changed the systems used for the main floor from gas forced air to heat pumps. “That lowered our carbon footprint and gave the cooling we were looking for at the lowest energy use and operating cost,” Cohen says. Imagine Energy initially looked at mini-splits from Mitsubishi, but the firm ended up selecting Bryant equipment provided by Airefco for the majority of The Old Church. Mitsubishi mini splits, provided by Gensco, were used for the building’s office, which had no ductwork. “It was the natural choice,” says Cohen, whose company also hired Knez Building Systems to install insulation in the building’s attic. It’s been less than a year since Imagine Energy finished the project, which cost just less than $100,000, so hard data isn’t available about energy use, but Cohen’s models point to a 49 percent reduction in energy use and 26 percent reduction in energy costs. Although the measurable data isn't in yet, the anecdotal results are available. The Old Church was in use for summer 2012, and Cohen says he has evidence that the church is “dramatically more comfortable.” gb&d gb&d
GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN
Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List 156
TOOLBOX
Sustainable lighting for any application
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Material World
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Designer to Watch
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The rise of building-integrated PVs The enigmatic, erudite Derek Porter Groundwork
Part I of a series on an ambitious, new hotel
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Show & Tell
From a paper lantern to a place of prayer
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Toolbox Tomorrow’s Lighting
From lunar inspirations to light chains, we gathered four fascinating and energy-efficient lighting fixtures that might just be perfect for your next project
England-born designer Jake Dyson marries minimalist design with major function in his CSYS lamp, which comes in Tall or Task styles. The LED light is completely dimmable, but at full power and full height (approximately 4.5 feet for the floor lamp), it creates an 8-foot diameter of warm white light. The real beauty is that this is one of few lamps that addresses the heat created by LEDs (which reduces output and lifespan) by using heat pipe technology to conduct heat away from the light source. jakedyson.com
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Platek Moon
Foscarini Solar Lamp
GE LED Accent
Coming to a city near you: the LED Platek Moon. Designed specifically as a bollard for lighting public spaces, the elegant fixture comes in four different heights and can be based in the ground or mounted onto a wall, and the aluminum body is corrosion-resistant. Also, the LEDs are smartly housed within the body to reduce vandalism.
The Foscarini Solar is not solar-powered, but it does invoke the image of the sun in the way it casts an illuminating glow no matter how it is employed. It can be used indoors or out and positioned with the flat part as the base, or it can be angled by using the convex light as the base. Endless options for an imaginative product.
When traditional lighting doesn’t quite reach a specific area, the GE LED Accent light is an energyefficient option. The chain of lights can be strung just about anywhere, and they can be cut to any length and always provide uniform light distribution.
platek.eu
foscarini.com
gelightingsolutions.com
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Photos: Courtesy of Platek, Foscarini, GE Lighting Solutions, Jake Dyson Products
Jake Dyson CSYS
PUNCH LIST
Material World Invisible Solar with Endless Possibilities The colored-glass skylight in the Bejar Market in Spain uses Onyx Solar’s embedded photovoltaics to generate renewable energy.
Pros
Solar panels are a badge of green honor today, but future construction will incorporate photovoltaic cells directly into building materials. That future is now. Onyx Solar CEO Alvaro Beltran explains the material’s infinite possibilities. By Russ Klettke
This rapid transit station in Union City, CA, uses 800 Onyx PVs in its canopy to generate 174,000 kWh per year.
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When we see solar collectors on buildings, we feel good. We think happy thoughts about renewable energy and sustainability and a greener future. But the designers and engineers at Onyx Solar know this reaction may wane as smart-energy buildings proliferate. So the company custom-manufactures buildingintegrated photovoltaics (BIPV), which allow architects to incorporate solar into almost any flat surface. “We believe there are no limits,” says Alvaro Beltran, chief executive officer of Onyx, a global company with offices in New York, Spain, and Colombia. The company manufactures its PVs to be part of the surfaces that are being used for a project by adapting to both its functional and aesthetic needs. “An Onyx Solar-patented PV floor can be applied on terraces, rooftops, pedestrian walkways, open spaces, commercial building [façades], and sidewalks,” Beltran says. “It has been tested to even support light vehicle transit.” Onyx Solar uses a flexible, handcrafted method of high-tech manufacturing that can easily respond to the specifications of an architect’s design or fit into any project. In fact, the company promises that it can meet any client requirements
In situ power generation via PV installations is possible on traditional as well as unorthodox surfaces of the building, walkways, and even parking areas. Building orientation, including window placement, is driven by factors other than sun exposure. Aesthetic goals of the building design can take higher priority since the architect won’t be burdened with the need to position rooftop-only PVs toward the sun.
Cons The cost. This is specialty manufacturing. BIPVs—including stick-on laminates, solar shingles, PV glazing of window glass, solar tiles—can overheat, which causes technical problems. Onyx Solar uses ventilation to attempt to avoid this.
and integrate its PVs into any type of building. “We can achieve with one high-tech and reliable product all the energy and aesthetic requirements for every one of our projects,” Beltran says. One of those recent projects is Pfizer’s GENyO building in Grenada, Spain. In the project, Onyx Solar’s BIPV solutions were incorporated into a ventilated façade, reducing energy demands by 25 to 40 percent and preventing overheating in the building. Onyx has multiple successful installations around the world, including in a canopy over BART rapid transit stations in San Francisco and in multicolored and semi-translucent skylights in markets throughout Spain. gb&d march–april 2013
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Designer to Watch Derek Porter
With a unique perspective that looks at light in a philosophical, collaborative, and detailed way, Derek Porter is the founder of an award-winning, eponymous lighting-design studio and a faculty member at Parsons The New School for Design. Here, he discusses toggling between academia and practice, provocative new products, and why his favorite project was a storage facility. Interview by Stephanie Vozza
How did you get started designing lighting? I didn’t actually study lighting design; I kind of happened into it. I earned a degree in fine arts from the Kansas City Art Institute where I became interested in human perception and spatial relationships. The subtle qualities of space and human response intrigued me. I enjoyed architecture and eventually started working with an architectural lighting designer where I discovered the significant impact light can make. Seven years later, I started my firm with the intent of expanding my interest and experimentation with light into new domains. You study light and space through photography and sculpture. How does this show up in your designs? It’s a very different framework for investigating light than typically found in design practice where a consultant’s primary focus is to address project needs. My artistic pursuit allows freedom from such practical constraints and an increased slowness to explore spatial relationships and subtle nuances of light in the built and natural world. This results in a very different vantage point and a soft voice that subconsciously is felt—its essence is what comes across. What is the goal of lighting? On a base practical level, lighting allows us to perform tasks, but its application should be considered beyond sole practical issues. I’m involved in academia,
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“My ambition has to do with developing instruments that engage interior space or landscape environments in a way that’s unusual, fresh, and provocative.” Derek Porter, Founder, Derek Porter Studio
Porter took this photograph of Lake Michigan (right) to capture atmospheric qualities of light, using a long exposure to abstract any recognizable details. These artistic explorations heavily influence his approach to lighting in practice.
photos: mike sinclair (self-storage facility); Michael Spillers (stair); derek porter (lake michigan)
Self-storage facilities typically aren’t answers to urban blight, but this one in Topeka, KS, lit by Porter, evokes a gently playful presence that functions as a beacon of hope for an economically depressed area.
where I pursue design-based research and larger intellectual interest in lighting design—how it contributes to the world and how it affects life. I toggle between academia and my practice as a means to question, test, and I use my practice to push against traditional ideas and challenge hypotheses. When I enter a project, I bring to the table this cache of study and intrigue that adds value. We solve problems and work with real constraints, but I believe that our company is different because we apply solutions through a broader lens of what light is, how it defines space, and an awareness of the world we occupy. How did you get started teaching at Parsons The New School for Design? Like a lot of people who teach, I had an interest in sharing and exploring ideas in the classroom through reformatting one’s own ideas and interests. It’s an inspiration to be in the presence of young, creative, hungry minds, to witness their growth and contribute to their and the industry’s future. Having a broader contribution to the lighting-design industry, expanding its intellectual capacity, and influencing its future is what ultimately motivates me to teach. What are some of the most important lessons that you teach at Parsons? I’m interested in showing students that gbdmagazine.com
lighting is one piece of a multiple-part, holistic approach to designing the built world. It involves design-based research, evaluation of precedent case studies, and practical problem solving, and through this process, the evolution of each individual’s unique voice. Tell us about a favorite project. A project that comes to mind that I believe epitomizes the work we do is a self-storage facility in a blighted urban area in Topeka, Kansas. The developer was interested in the social value of this project as a financial anchor for community improvement. We were careful to look at the surrounding industrial context so that a perception of change would be recognized. The project needed a welcoming beacon-like quality of hope and future prosperity. We needed it to be luminous without harsh qualities of glare that was common to the area. On a practical level, we had strict limitations to meet
a tight budget with low-tech solutions, but we used these limitations to drive the design. The end design used basic fluorescent strip lights in three variations with one type of light bulb throughout. Rather than the lighting being a pattern on the ceiling, it was folded into the architecture to create a billowy lanternlike quality, which required a great deal of collaboration with the architect and engineer. Social and aesthetic aspirations aligned with all the logistical constraints and yielded a project of value to the community. What’s next for Derek Porter Studio? I tend not to be a planner. I don’t have any grand plan or scheme; more often I work through opportunistic endeavors that present themselves through my constantly evolving journey. One venture that I’m excited about is working with manufacturers to develop lighting products. My ambition has to do with developing instruments that engage interior space or landscape environments in a way that’s unusual, fresh, and provocative. I’m interested in raising new questions for the lighting industry to grapple with and explore, rather than simply reinforcing what is familiar. I’d like to stay in academia, and this continued partnering between professional and academic interests is where I imagine my future. gb&d march–april 2013
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Groundwork Inn-ovation in Wisconsin Wisconsin’s Green Leaf Inn is striving to be the first completely net-zero hotel in the United States. In Part I of our Groundwork series, which will follow this home-turned-hotel from start to finish, owners Fritz Kreiss and Catherine McQueen take us inside the eco-concept. After learning that their vacation property near Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, was targeted for a four-lane highway as part of a commercial corridor, Fritz Kreiss and his wife Catherine McQueen made a life change to save their land. McQueen had always wanted to open a bed and breakfast, and Kreiss was an energy aggregator; he had made a career of assisting various entities finance renewable energy and sustainable construction. The marriage of those interests produced the idea behind the Green Leaf Inn. The project, a 19-suite hotel complex with a retrofit of the existing home along with a new building, is on target to be net zero energy, making it the first hotel in the country to achieve that status, Kreiss says. Working with Anderson Ashton Design/Build, Kreiss plans to incorporate a comprehensive collection of features that will wipe out the complex’s reliance on nonrenewable energy. The property will use photovoltaics, a wind turbine, three different solar-thermal systems, a microCHP, and a geothermal heat pump. “For me,” Kreiss says, “it’s kind of like a kid playing in a toolbox.” By showcasing these environmentally conscious technologies, the Green Leaf Inn will inform a wide variety of audiences, from guests to local government officials, on possible strategies for reducing energy consumption. Additionally, outcomes will be monitored to ensure that the systems are functioning as expected. “The whole concept is going to be educational,” says Brian Fisher, the business development manager for Anderson Ashton. “They want it to be a learning facility in addition to being net zero.” As Fisher points out, Kreiss will recoup an up-front expenditure on a metal roof,
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Details Location Delavan, WI Completed Fall 2013 (expected) Size 16,000 ft2 Client Green Leaf Inn Architect Anderson Ashton Design/Build General Contractor Anderson Ashton-Design/Build MEP Engineer The Matrix Group Engineers
which is more durable than one made of asphalt shingles. The same is true for the power-generating features. “The fact that you’re not going to have utility bills is a huge savings,” Fisher says, adding that Anderson Ashton always tries to emphasize that aspect of environmentally friendly products and strategies. “[Clients] love the idea of going green but aren’t as enthusiastic if it means spending a lot of money.” Anderson Ashton’s orientation has also been an asset to the Green Leaf Inn. “This project really showcases the flexibility of the design/build approach,” Fisher says. “We’ve changed designs on a dime several times.” Kreiss anticipates that the Green Leaf Inn will evolve over time, adding new systems and features as they become available. Of course, the Green Leaf Inn is first and foremost a hotel and is expected to draw many of its guests from the Chicagoland area who come to Lake Geneva for a convenient getaway.
When completed, the Green Leaf Inn’s five-acre campus will include a library, pottery studio, gardens, dining, and 19 guest suites. It will use a wind turbine, green roof, and solar panels to achieve net zero energy.
Although the emphasis is on sustainability, luxury isn’t sacrificed in the process. For example, every room has a hot tub, which doesn’t seem like the most environmentally friendly option, but the water and energy from them is reused. As the water drains, the heat is recaptured through a heat exchanger to preheat domestic water, and the water is then fed into the on-site aerobic wastewater-treatment system, which is also integrated into the geothermal heat-pump system. The inn will also provide ample marketing for Kreiss’ company, highlighting the possibilities of renewable energy resources. “It’s a sales demonstration,” Kreiss says. “We want it to be a catalog.” The Green Leaf Inn will illustrate how these projects can be cost-effective in the long-term. “It’s not only good for the environment, it’s good for business.” gb&d —Kelli McElhinny gb&d
green building & design
Index Advertisers
A ADD Inc., 135 AECOM, 6 Allston + Bird, 114 Ameresco, 38 Anders & Falltrick Architects, 50 Atomatic Mechanical Services, 35 B Bank of America, 50 Bryant, 154 C City Lighting Products Company, 42 Consultant Engineering Service, 38 Cree, 2 D Delta Diversified Enterprises, 111 E EBE Consulting Engineers, 135 Edison Price Lighting, 99 E.W. Howell, 114 G Green California Summit and Exposition, 41 H Hannon Electric, 38 Hawkins Partners, 86 K KSK Construction Group, 148 L Leading Edge, 38
LIGHTFAIR International, 164 M Milestone Construction Company, 128 MKK Consulting Engineers, 32 MLB Construction Services, 30 MSi, 78 P Paragon Architecture, 78 Philips Color Kinetics, 88, 99 R Reaveley Engineers + Associates, 32 Rolyn, 56 S Schüco, 114 Solsource Greenbuild, 154 Studio Gee Architecture, 128 SVPA Architects, 86 Synergy Consultants, 128 U Urban Ventures, 30 V Visa Lighting, 99 W Wasco Products, 88 Waste Industries, 50 WD Schorsch LLC, 35 Winona Lighting, 163
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PUNCH LIST
Show & Tell A Lantern Writ Large
Isamu Noguchi’s Akari Light Sculptures (akari meaning “light as illumination”) were first created by the artist in the 1950s after visiting the town of Gifu, Japan, which is known for its lanterns.
Father and son architects Jack DeBartolo Jr. and Jack DeBartolo III describe the glowing inspiration for their Prayer Pavilion of Light
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See more lumino of the us P Pavilio rayer n on p.60
DeBartolo Architects used the idea of weightlessness and the aesthetics of Noguchi’s lanterns to inform its design for the Prayer Pavilion of Light.
oxide concrete walls extend out into the courtyards and elevate the volume in a similar spirit to how Noguchi floats his brilliant sculptures of light. It is the utter simplicity of Noguchi’s work that makes it timeless and transformative; we have attempted to design a chapel with similar sensitivity. gb&d —Jack DeBartolo III
photo: the noguchi museum (akari light sculpture)
The Prayer Pavilion of Light was conceived from a simple statement made by the pastor of the regional church. He stated that he always dreamed of a building, dedicated to prayer, sited against the desert preserve, as a ‘light on a hill.’ As architects, we both really admire art, and we have long been influenced and moved by the transformative work of Isamu Noguchi and specifically, his Akari Light Sculptures. Akari Light Sculptures are considered icons of 1950s modern design. They were originally designed by Noguchi in 1951 and have been handmade for more than 60 years by the original manufacturer in Gifu, Japan. These paper lanterns are a harmonious blend of Japanese handcraft and modernist form. The lamps are created from handmade washi paper and bamboo ribbing, supported by a simple metal frame. The distinctive paper lanterns have always been in our studio and houses as sculptures of both function and timeless beauty. Looking carefully at the construction of the light sculptures, you see how the washi paper is easily held in place by the bamboo ribbing. In a similar spirit, we used minimal means to support the exterior glass of the building, thus maximizing light and keeping the delicate balance between structure and glass. A custom-designed, laminated frit-glass from Viracon was carefully detailed to ‘hold’ light and shade the inner skin of the chapel. The square glass volume of the chapel is carefully lifted from the ground, allowing the building to have a delicate connection to its surroundings. Four black-
About the jack DEBARTOLOS Jack DeBartolo Jr. and his son, Jack III, founded DeBartolo Architects together in 1996. Their design work, often centered on the well-being of people, has earned numerous awards from the AIA and other entities. The firm works around the world on projects of all types.
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2013 THE FUTURE. ILLUMINATED.
We see the future clearly. And so will you.
Philadelphia, PA USA Pennsylvania Convention Center 4.21.13 – 4.25.13
www.lightfair.com
In collaboration with The Illuminating Engineering Society
In collaboration with The International Association of Lighting Designers
Produced & Managed by AMC, Inc.
PHOTO CREDITS (1) BANNER MD ANDERSON CANCER CENTER LANTERN OF HOPE, GILBERT, AZ USA | LIGHTING DESIGN BY CANNON DESIGN | © BILL TIMMERMAN / © MARK SKALNY (2) UNITED STATES INSTITUTE OF PEACE, WASHINGTON, DC USA | LIGHTING DESIGN BY LAM PARTNERS | © GLENN HEINMILLER, IALD, LAM PARTNERS, © BILL FITZ-PATRICK, UNITED STATES INSTITUTE OF PEACE (3) CHANDLER CITY HALL EXTERIOR LIGHTING, CHANDLER, AZ USA | LIGHTING DESIGN BY SMITHGROUP JJR | © TIMMERMAN PHOTOGRAPHY