Green Building & Design (gb&d), #21

PLUS

Doug Widener unites the USGBC 54 What to learn from Las Vegas 58 Designing for Air Force officers 66 G r e e n B u i l d i n g & D e s i gN M Ay + j u n e 2 013

CHICAGO’S F I N A L FRONTIER PAGE 86

THE LEADERSHIP ISSUE

CÉSAR PELLI

KohleR

IKEA

Loyola UniversitY

14

38

45

78

GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

In This Issue COVER STORY Nasutsa Mabwa and McCaffery Interests have big plans for the last piece of lakefront property in Chicago, p86

Father Michael Garanzini brings Loyola University back from the brink, p78

the leadership issue

Peter Head left Arup to pursue his own way of urban planning, p20

After success in uniting USGBC-

Illinois, Doug Widener is tapped to

photos: Allen weiss (Hogan); peter hurley (pelli); samantha simmons (garanzini, mabwa, widener)

do the same nationwide, p54

Dan Schimberg tracks trends in student housing, p123

Why Katherine Hogan is the architect to watch, p138

David Kohler, Jr. continues four generations of leadership, p38

gb&d

Our guest editor CĂŠsar Pelli has been thinking sustainably for almost 86 years, p14

may–june 2013

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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

p25

p37

p57

p65

p77

p97

p125

p137

4

may–june 2013

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

12 14 20 22

Editor’s picks The Cycle of Life Guest Editor César Pelli Notebook Alan Oakes Defined Design San Luis National

26 27 29 30 32 33

Stillwater Public Schools Franklin & Marshall College Fields Development Group Transwestern Westin Michigan Avenue Stephens County High School

66

70 73

Center for Character & Leadership Development Media Studios North Brunton Architects Office

78

86

95

Loyola University Chicago

Wildlife Refuge Visitor Center

38 43 45 48 50 54

Kohler Co. Macerich IKEA Ohio State University Vernon Swaback Doug Widener

CITY HALLS

58 Case Study: Las Vegas 63 Spotlight: Vaughan, ON 64 Spotlight: River Falls, WI

98 103

107

108 111 112

126

131

134

District of Columbia Consolidated Forensic Lab, Whiting-Turner Contracting Company Existing Fabric Willow Glen Town Square, Kahn Design Associates Hurricane Zone Jennette’s Pier, North Carolina Aquarium Society Urban Laboratory

Father Michael Garanzini has brought the school to the forefront of urban design and development mccaffery interests

The developer envisions Chicago’s last lakefront property as a global hub of energy innovation

138 Architect to watch Katherine Hogan 140 Groundwork Green Leaf Inn 144 Toolbox Green on Green 146 Show & Tell Stanley Saitowitz

Discussion Board

Which of history’s heroes should leaders look back to?

Learn

Hamline University Anderson Center University of Wisconsin–Madison Biochemical Sciences Complex St. Thomas the Apostle School

Plus From the Publisher Editor’s note Index People & Companies VERBATIM Amy Chisholm VERBATIM Curt Radkin VERBATIM Dan Schimberg Index Advertisers

7 9 10 35 75 123 145

Play

W Hotel San Francisco Camp Prairie Schooner InterContinental Hotel San Francisco

work

115 Health Care REIT Headquarters

live 121 230 Broadway

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may–june 2013

5

ROBERT DERECTOR ASSOCIATES Consulting Engineers

RDA promotes environmentally responsible design practices that consider high energy efficiency and reduces carbon footprints.

We are proud to be an integral part of the design of Wells Fargo’s LEEDŽ Platinum flagship facility at the Duke Energy Center.

Mechanical Systems . Electrical Systems . Fire Protection . Plumbing . Mission Critical . Commissioning Peer Review . Sustainable Design . IT Infrastructure . Audiovisual . Security . Lease Negotiations 19 West 44th Street, New York, NY 10036 | Phone: (212) 764-7272 Fax: (212) 764-7827 | www.derector.com

GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

From the Publisher The Next Five Years

photo: samantha simmons

Mistreating employees and then finding them wearing T-shirts that read, “90 hours a week and loving it,” doesn’t seem to exemplify the best leadership qualities, and many may question that leader’s motivational tactics.

However, many would also argue that Steve Jobs was one of the greatest corporate leaders of all time. As we start to discuss The Leadership Issue, defining what a leader is and discovering what characteristics people look for in a leader seems relevant. More importantly, how do great leaders inspire action?

Five years ago, when I came to gb&d, my discussions with people in the industry included a lot of skepticism and uncertainty about whether or not green building was worth the cost. Since then, my conversations with designers, builders, and the general population have changed tremendously. The greenbuilding market has not only grown but flourished, in part due to the leadership.

With the right people in place, going green can be a long-term driver for economic growth through investments in renewable energy and improving efficiency in the use of energy and materials. Last year, I had the pleasure of working with the Illinois chapter of the USGBC on its annual gala, which is where I met Doug Widener, the USGBC’s new director of community advancement. While working in Illinois, he brought disparate state chapters into one collective unit, and in this issue, we speak to Widener about his leadership in forming USGBC-Illinois and how that prepared him for his current position (p.54). “Everything in [my] plan is focused on how to diversify the movement, how to dive deeper, how to be resilient, and how to get people engaged,” he says. So much progress has been made with still so much more to be had.

As you will also see, many businesses turn to LEED certification as a guide to help them improve their performance and boost their bottom line.

Other third-party certifications are available, but gb&d

LEED continues to be the recognized standard. In this issue, we speak to David Kohler, Jr., president of Kohler Co., and as the voice of the company and its environmental commitment, David believes that sustainability must integrate both business and environmental principles, and he has found it to be quite profitable for the company (p.38). “It’s okay to be a capitalist and an industrialist and an environmentalist at the same time,” he says, memorably.

Many businesses are starting to realize the importance of sustainability on numerous levels, including making long-term economic sense and simply improving their bottom line. Companies are no longer just adopting sustainability strategies in order to comply with government regulations, and the leading corporations, such as Kohler, want to embrace this concept in order to be a part of the conversation surrounding those policies.

So, what makes a good leader? If someone says, “That’s not possible,” a leader responds, “It’s not possible—yet.” And no doubt it will be, as long as leaders like Widener and Kohler continue to advance ideas and explore new boundaries. Leaders are the people moving this industry forward, and in another five years, the green-building landscape could, once again, be drastically different.

Best,

Laura Heidenreich Associate Publisher laura@gbdmagazine.com may–june 2013

7

GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Editor’s Note Notes from Nowhere

portrait: samantha simmons; cover photo: Samantha Simmons

Several philosophers and theologians have argued that to be ‘made in God’s image’ means to have the ability to create. That spark that drives us to make. It could be a painting or a house or a magazine, but whatever it is, the act of creation is an extremely powerful thing. And nowhere is that more evident than at the old U.S. Steel plant in Chicago.

The site is a 600-acre canvas, a prairie of weeds and gravel, untouched since the mill was demolished. (That’s me at the site, to the left.)

This blank slate won’t be barren forever. Already pavement has been poured, forming a black vein on the westernmost portion of the property, the extension of Lake Shore Drive. That road is the future. It is the first step in constructing Lakeside, a new neighborhood in Chicago dubbed “the community of 2050.”

While putting together this issue, I continually found myself down at the Lakeside site. Twice it was to report this issue’s cover story, which I hope you’ll read (p.86), but other times it was simply because I felt drawn to it. The expansive wilderness reminded me of Kansas, where I grew up, but I also loved being caught between the site’s past and future. What for a century was a steel mill would soon be a small city, and yet it was currently neither of those things.

It was nothing, nowhere, a non-place, fenced off and home only to birds and worms and rabbits.

On every occasion, I would marvel at our ability to make—and unmake. We built a steel mill here, and then we tore it down. Next we will build housing, supermarkets, schools, and bars. Will those things fare better? I think so.

The vision for Lakeside, conceptualized by Chicago-based McCaffery Interests and masterplanned by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, is ahead of its time, prioritizing things like green infrastructure, smart meters, high-tech IT capabilities, and a district energy plan. But it also looks to the past, borrowing from famed architect Daniel Burnham gb&d

for its notions of neighborhood connectivity and letting the site’s history (as a giant slag heap, which is wonderfully porous) inform its plan for storm water. This to me is leadership. The ability to view the future through the lens of the past without getting stuck on the present—the nowhere that exists right now.

And with that, I welcome you to The Leadership Issue, a celebration of those individuals who have influenced green building and design. In addition to McCaffery Interests, we have global manufacturers such as IKEA (p.45) and Kohler Co. (p.38), who are using their worldwide footprints to their advantage. We have legends like Vernon Swaback (p.50), who apprenticed with Frank Lloyd Wright, and new leaders like the USGBC’s Doug Widener (p.54), and Tonic Design’s Katherine Hogan (p.138).

We have a great feature on Father Michael Garanzini, president of Loyola University (p.78), and a candid chat with César Pelli, who guest edited the issue (p.14). These and many others in this magazine are the people who see what isn’t there, who stand in the non-places and see what is possible. The good news is that in those places, there’s always room for more.

Cheers,

Timothy A. Schuler Managing Editor tim@gbdmagazine.com ON THE COVER This image of Nasutsa Mabwa and Ed Woodbury, of McCaffery Interests, speaks volumes. Photographed

by Samantha Simmons on the Lakeside site, the weather-stained wall tells a story of defunct industry while their presence signals action and change.

Read the story on p.86.

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UP FRONt GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Index People & Companies

#

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

10

230 Broadway, 121 99% Invisible, 12 Ackerman, Matt, 22 Acoustigreen, 101 Alliance for Environmental Sustainability, 56 Antunovich Associates, 91 Arcoplast, 128 Arup, 20 Ashenbrener, Trevor, 121 Ashford, Gary, 117 Beavers, Nancy, 127 Bedell, Jeff, 43 Bellmont Cabinet Company, 122 Bergey, 136 Berry, Thomas Jr., 67 Bierce, Ambrose, 109 Biochemical Sciences Complex, 103 Black, David, 103 Borgert Products, 101 Bowen & Watson, 34 Boyle, Duane, 67 Bromander, Lowell, 99 Brunton Architects, 73 Brunton, Corey, 73 Building Owners and Managers Association, 35 Burbank Redevelopment Agency, 70 Byer, Alex, 131 Cadet Chapel, 67 Camp Prairie Schooner, 111 Capital Gateway, 30 Catalyst Architecture, 22 Center for Character & Leadership Development, 67 Centerbrook Architects, 116 Chicago Community Loan Fund, 56 Chile Residence, 139 Cisco Systems, 92 City of Chicago, 81 Clean Energy Trust, 92 Colt Group, 129 Community Green Energy, 140 Continental Electric Construction Company, 33 Crossville, 133 Davinsky, Leo, 70 Detropia, 13 District of Columbia Consolidated Forensic Laboratory, 127 Duke Energy Center, 75 Duket Architects Planners, 116 Duket, Michael, 116 Durnbaugh, Aaron, 81 Ecological Urbanism App, 12 Ecovative Biocomposites, 144 El Dorado Inc, 111 Elara Engineering, 83 Elkus Manfredi Architects, 61 Elkus, Howard, 61 Emerald Awards, 56 Fields Development Group, 29 Flad Architects, 103 Fox, Mitchell, 105 Francetic, Amy, 92 Franklin & Marshall College, 27 Frisbie Architects, 64 Frisbie, Matt, 64 Garanzini, Michael, 78 Gehrlicher Solar, 46

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H

I

J K

L

M

N

O

P

Gensler, 42 Gloria Solar, 46 Green Leaf Inn, 140 Greenbuild, 56 Griffin Enright Architects, 107 Grower’s Guild, 82 Habitat for Humanity, 41 Hamline University, 99 Hawkey, Corey, 48 Head, Peter, 20 Health Care REIT, 116 Highland Park Elementary School, 26 Hobbs, Harry, 112 Hogan, Katherine, 138 HOK, 127 Hornberger + Worstell, 109 Hue by Philips, 12 IKEA, 45 IMG Sports Marketing, 48 Inovateus Solar, 46 Institute for Environmental Sustainability, 82 Institute of Civil Engineers, 20 InterContinental Hotel–San Francisco, 112 Isthmus Architecture, 105 Jennette’s Pier, 134 Kahn Design Associates, 131 Kahn, Charles, 132 Kamprad, Ingvar, 45 Kohler Co., 39 Kohler, David Jr., 39 Kreiss, Fritz, 140 Kretz, Patrick, 29 Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg Architects, 63 Lakeside Entitlement Zone, 94 Lakeside, 86 Land Art Generator Initiative, 13 Las Vegas City Hall, 59 Les Enfants du Paradis, 17 Loyola University Chicago, 78 Luminae Souter Associates, 114 M. David Paul Development, 70 Mabwa, Nasutsa, 92 Macerich, 43 Madox, 29 Makani Power, 144 Marchetto Higgins Stieve, 29 Mars, Roman, 12 McCaffery Interests, 87 McCaffery, Dan, 91 McGough, 101 Media Studios North, 70 Monday Morning, 91 Monterey Bay Sustainable Seafood Program, 82 Mowhawk Group, 129 Natoma Architects, 109 Navajo Housing Authority, 53 New College House, 27 North Carolina Aquarium Society, 135 Northwest National Lamps, 114 Ohio State University, 48 Oklahoma State University, 26 Old Course Hotel, 40 Pace, Michael, 109 Pacific Gas and Electric, 114 Paja Investments, 131 Patterson, Devon, 83 Payne, Matthew, 30

Peabody, Laird and Cret, 106 Peerless Building Maintenance Co., 70 Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum, 54 Pelli, César, 14 Perrigo, Tom, 61 Petrarca, Vincent, 138 Plan of Chicago, 91 Precor, 70 Presidio Graduate School, 110 Price Farms Organics, 48 Quinlan School of Business, 80 Radkin, Curt, 75 Ramboll, 92 Real Estate Roundtable, 30 REC Solar, 46 Regional Green Building Case Studies Project, 56 Remige, Mike, 135 Retreat and Ecology Campus, 82 River Falls City Hall, 64 Ross Barney Architects, 26 Roth, Joseph, 45 Ryan, Jim, 26 S Saarinen, Eero, 15 Saint Katharine Drexel Chapel, 17 Saitowitz, Stanley, 146 San Luis National Wildlife Refuge, 22 Santa Monica Place, 43 Sasaki Associates, 91 Sato, Norie, 106 Seattle City Light, 122 Selser Schaefer Architects, 26 Shelton Group, 41 Shepley Bulfinch, 101 Sherwin Williams, 129 Shimberg, Dan, 123 Shorenstein Properties, 70 Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, 91 Skodowski, Al, 30 SmartWay Shipper Award, 45 SoCore Energy, 46 Sodexo, 48 Solomon Cordwell Buenz, 80 Souter, Michael, 114 SRM Development, 121 St Thomas the Apostle School, 107 Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, 32 Stephens County Board of Education, 33 Stephens County School District, 33 Sternberg, 132 Stillwater Public Schools, 26 Stritch School of Medicine, 80 Swaback Partners, 51 Swaback, Vernon, 50 T tenKsolar, 101 The American Club, 40 The Ecological Sequestration Trust, 21 The Passage of Power, 15 Thomas, Bob, 32 TIAA-CREF, 30 Tomlinson, Richard, 92 Tonic Design + Tonic Construction, 138 TrafficCom, 13 Transbay Transit Center, 18 Transwestern, 30 U U.S. Steel, 87 United States Air Force Academy, 67 United States Steel Real Estate, 88 University of Wisconsin–Madison, 103

Q R

V

W

Y Z

Uptown Rental Properties, 123 Urban Open, 56 USGBC, 54 Vanderweil, 127 Vaughan City Hall, 63 View, 110 Voigt, Doug, 91 W Hotel, 109 Warmboard, 144 Waste Management, 48 WaterSense, 40 Westin Hotel on Michigan Avenue, 32 Westside Mechanical, 33 Wetzel, Mike, 27 Whirlpool, 47 Whiten, Sherrie, 33 Whiting-Turner Contracting Company, 127 Widener, Doug, 54 Will Rogers Elementary School, 26 Willow Glen Town Square, 131 Womb Chair, 15 Woodbury, Ed, 88 Worthe Real Estate Group, 70 Wright, Frank Lloyd, 51 Wronski, Reid, 64 WSP Group, 92 Yelp, 17 Zappos.com, 61 Zero Waste International, 48

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List 12

Editor’s picks

14

Guest Editor

20

Notebook

22

Defined Design

gb&d

Projects and podcasts to pay attention to César Pelli shares a few of his favorite things Alan Oakes: Peter Head is a true leader San Luis National Wildlife Refuge Visitor Center

may–june 2013

11

UP FRONt

Editor’s Picks The Cycle of Life

12

99% invisible

hue

ecological urbanism app

Addicted, 270 days and counting. This radio show by Roman Mars is a delightful slice of urban exploration and thoughtful storytelling. A wunderkind who was accepted into college at age 15, Mars is interested in anything related to design, from “queue theory” to how we architecturally segregate our cities. It’s not related to the Occupy movement, except in that it too hopes to draw attention to the 99 percent of our world we tend not to notice. The 20-minute episodes air weekly on KALW San Francisco and are available as free downloads.

One bulb and every color of the rainbow. More specifically, any color on the spectrum. That’s the promise of Hue, by Philips, a wireless LED bulb that can be screwed into a typical socket and controlled from a smart phone or tablet. Forgot to turn off the lights? Do it on your way to work. A three-bulb starter pack runs at $199.95, but that’s three bulbs and the “bridge,” the connector between the bulbs and the app required to operate them. With an expected lifespan of 15 years, we say that’s a good investment.

Our cities are evolving to be more ecologically supportive of the land they increasingly blanket, and case studies from around the globe are a developer’s best friend. Ideas that work across an ocean could save American cities, yet even superheroes can’t be everywhere at once. Unless, of course, they have this app from the Harvard Graduate School of Design, the next logical iteration of its eponymous book series. Download it for free from the iTunes App Store. (And while you’re in the App Store, there’s this magazine called gb&d…)

99percentinvisible.org

meethue.com

ecologicalurbanism.gsd.harvard.edu.

may–june 2013

gbdmagazine.com

photos: Raymond ahner (Roman mars); Philips lighting; Second Story; Land Art generator initiative; Tony Hardmon (Detropia); Trafficcom

Each time we put our mark on the land, we accept the ‘terms and conditions’ of the Earth, which state plainly that what we build will not last forever. This idea is well represented below in the contrast between the nascent design work happening at Freshkills Park and the practically post-apocalyptic slog of Detroit. Wherever they fall on the spectrum, here are six things we guarantee will leave you thinking about the sustainability of our cities.

UP FRONt

Scene-Sensor was the Land Art Generator Initiative’s 2012 competition winner. The giant screens react to weather patterns and human traffic and also generate electricity.

land art at freshkills park

detropia

trafficcom

The Land Art Generator Initiative’s 2012 competition involved a site within Freshkills Park, a 2,200acre former landfill now maintained by New York City’s parks and recreation department. Proposals for art that also generated clean energy came from around the world, visions of giant screens laced with piezoelectric wires (the winner), cornucopia-like wind farms, even 99 red balloons, which unlike those in the song were 50 feet tall and lined with transparent solar cells. Sifting through them is like watching a movie trailer for the future.

“We can experiment here,” says street artist Steve Coy in this documentary film, a rattling investigation into the history and future of Detroit, an American city that for years has seemed to be in the twilight of its existence, fighting extinction.

Directed by Rachel Grady and Heidi Ewing and nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival, Detropia documents a city that will not go quietly into the night and raises questions about the future of the built environments that we consider bulletproof today.

Not a single aspect of city planning goes unaffected by traffic patterns, but fortunately those patterns just got a lot easier to map. Developed by urban planner Aurash Khawarzad and industrial designer Ted Ullrich, TrafficCOM lets anyone with $140 measure the number of cars and bikes on any given street. The counter is small and easy to use, and the data can be uploaded to a computer with a USB cable in minutes. By far the simplest and cheapest counter on the market, city planners should never leave home without it.

landartgenerator.org

detropiathefilm.com

trafficcom.org

Want more? Download the digital gb&d on your iPad for exclusive photos, video, and more.

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may–june 2013

13

Guest Editor CĂŠsar Pelli

UP FRONt

photos: Peter Hurley (Portrait); Random House; Design within reach

César Pelli is a living legend. When he started his education in architecture in the 1940s, his classes centered around palace design and monuments for the monarchs of ancient history. Fortunately, he says, the content of his courses changed to hospitals and bus stations, putting him at the forefront of modern, practical architecture from the beginning.

At 86-years-old, he remains there. Pelli’s long career includes numerous awards from the AIA and some of the world’s tallest skycrapers but also includes a subtle sensitivity to the environment.

As gb&d’s guest editor, César shared his five favorite things at the moment (including the infamous womb chair by his former employer Eero Saarinen), a recent project in New Orleans, and his thoughts on the ephemeral nature of an architect’s work.

womb chair

the passsage of power

prickly pear

Right now I am reading the fourth volume on Lyndon B. Johnson by Robert Caro, The Passage of Power. Caro brings L.B.J. back to life and gives us a better understanding of this incredible individual that we never had when he was alive. It is a pleasure to read.

I love prickly pears. I grew up eating them from the cactus plants and covering my hand with the almost invisible thorns with which the fruit is covered. I remember them as truly delicious.

Recently markets here in New Haven have started carrying them. They have removed their aggressive coating, and they are still delicious.

The Womb Chair designed by Eero Saarinen was designed about 60 years ago, and it is still one of the most delightful, casual pieces of furniture I know. I can sit or curl up in it, and it looks great as an object in a room.

dwr.com

robertcaro.com

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Details Location New Orleans Size 11,000 ft2 Completed 2012 Client Xavier University of Louisiana Architect Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects

The octagonal shape of Saint Katharine Drexel Chapel departs from today’s typical church designs yet is rooted in traditional religious architecture.

UP FRONt

"Throughout most of my professional life, I wondered about the challenge of designing a sacred space.”

César Pelli on the Saint Katharine Drexel Chapel

Saint Katharine Drexel Chapel

photos: Jeff Goldberg (Chapel); Yelp; Criterion collection

I am fortunate in having been able to design buildings for almost every function, but throughout most of my professional life, I wondered about the challenge of designing a sacred space. I finally had the opportunity at Xavier University in New Orleans when my firm was asked to design their university chapel to be named for the university’s founder, Saint Katharine Drexel.

I wanted the chapel to reflect the ideas of Pope John XXIII as developed in Vatican II. This required a centric design where the faithful would look at the altar table and at one another. The traditional, longitudinal, and hierarchical design was to be avoided. Our design was an octagonal plan, which connects the chapel with some of the earliest churches in Christianity, and a high tapering roof. The proportions of the roof and the space it defined were very important in creating the emotional responses I was seeking, and how we brought light into the space was critical for this. Skylights in the perimeter of the roof spread natural light behind a perforated, aluminum screen that diffuses it, and they appear to take away all weight from the roof. A risen Christ, signifying ascension, seems to float in front of the screen and is the visual center of the chapel.

The Stations of the Cross, in stained glass, are most beautiful and are the work of the artist José Bedia. Now when I enter the chapel, I feel moved and sense that I am in a space that is dedicated to something higher than ordinary everyday activities. Here I can forget about my mundane worries and be in peace. Fortunately, I am not the only one to feel this—almost everyone that has visited the chapel feels the same.

The world-famous Argentinian-American architect discusses design signatures, the so-called aesthetic of sustainability, and why in school he preferred bus stations and hospitals to palaces.

yelp MOBILE APP I enjoy the mobile phone app Yelp. I travel a fair amount, and Yelp always gives me good choices of restaurants within walking distance of wherever I am. It has led me to some delicious dinners that I would have otherwise missed. yelp.com

les enfants du paradis I recently saw again, after many years, the movie Les Enfants du Paradis. It is probably the movie that I have most enjoyed seeing. It involves me and carries me through in pure delight. It is magnificently well-acted, though it was filmed in Paris during the German occupation.

TABLET & ONLINE EXCLUSIVES! Want to know more about César Pelli? Read an extended Q&A online or download the iPad edition from the iTunes App Store.

gb&d

Dialogue César Pelli

criterion.com

gb&d Some architects are known for shaping the architecture of a certain city, but you’ve designed major landmarks all around the world. How does a global portfolio affect your style and approach to architecture?

César Pelli It doesn’t so much affect the style, but it gives me an expanded understanding from working with different people, with different traditions, and different expectations. It really forces you to open your mind, and that has been very useful for me and everybody in my firm.

How does the individual city shape its respective project?

We try to respond as closely as we can to the nature of each city, to the traditions, to their expectations. I don’t believe that architects should be imposing their style or their plans on every city in the world; it is a bad development at this moment in architecture. Too many architects are just trying to make all of their buildings look like a brand, and that may be good for business, but that is terrible for the cities because they lose character. If I go to Paris, I go to see the beauty of Paris and the coherence of Paris.

Your buildings are so unique from one another that I don’t know if I could look at a building and say, “That’s Cesar Pelli.” Do you have a signature that everyone is just missing or do you like the anonymity of your design aesthetic?

I have avoided what is called a ‘signature.’ Unquestionably, I have preferences about proportions, about colors—which colors go with which colors—that would be different from project to project, but somebody who knows me well could tell that these different projects have the same sensitivities. But that is the only thing.

How do you make every project unique then?

The main thing I do is that I don’t try to repeat myself. I try to respond as closely as I can to the nature of each place. The place is extremely important—the place one builds, the neighboring buildings, the orientation, the climate, the traditions of the place. If you focus on the unique-

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17

UP FRONt

“Sustainable design is one of the best developments of this period. It ... forces us to be responsible, and responsibility to society is an axis of architecture.”

César Pelli

ness of each project, then each project ends up different.

How does sustainability affect those projects?

Sustainable design is one of the best developments of this period. It is something that forces us to be responsible, and responsibility to society is an axis of architecture; it’s one of the things that gives architecture a reason for being and strength.

Sustainability is something architects all over the world today have to take seriously. Every building we build is negative, but we need to make that as little negative as we can. I think this is a responsibility that we cannot avoid, we cannot change, and I’m very glad for it. It is one thing that is tying many architects with varying styles with the same preoccupations.

When did you come around to sustainable design or was it something that was just inherent to you as an architect?

It has always been somehow important to me, but it has become a question of much more importance in the last 15 years because we are being helped with legislation, materials, and enticements. With the LEED rating system, I can tell my clients that if we do these things, you can have a higher rating, which is a nice thing to have for the universities, for alumni, for donors, for investors because it’s a building that appears more responsible, a better building to anybody who’s going to use it.

What about before LEED ratings?

The main thing we were concerned with at that time is what today we would call ‘passive protection.’ I would be concerned with building orientation, with sunshades, trying to keep the sun out of the building as much as I can.

Your firm has so many LEED-certified buildings, but I wouldn’t say that your buildings are obviously sustainable on a physical level.

That is correct. The looks of sustainability don’t interest me much. Sometimes we need to do something because our clients request it. Making the building obviously sustainable is not so important for me. It’s more important for the buildings to be sustainable, you know, to really do the least damage to the environment possible, to contribute to making a better world. That is important to me.

For someone who has such a long and successful career in architecture, where does the passion come from?

I don’t know where passions come from. That sounds like a good thesis for someone. I love architecture, and it is a passion—I cannot give it up, it would be like giving up life. I’ll only leave if they fire me. (laughs) Well, how did you choose to pursue architecture as a degree?

I decided to study architecture not quite knowing what it was when I was 17 years old. In Argentina, you go straight from high school to a career, which is not a good system, but that’s what it was. I knew very little about real life, but what I learned about architecture seemed interesting and seemed to suit my skills, so I figured I’d give it a try, and I fell in love with it.

What were some of those skills that seemed appealing to you?

I’ll tell you a story because that explains this. When I entered into architecture, the school was teaching a very classical system of design. We were designing temples and tombs and palaces for the post-monarchs and analyzing Roman and Greek

buildings. I became very good at it, but I couldn’t make any sense of what good this was to society.

At the end of my first year, some young architects came in, full of modern ideas, and they immediately changed the program. Instead of studying palaces, we were studying bus stations and hospitals and housing for workers. They also made us very interested in modern art and how modern art connects with modern architecture. For me, the sense that I could build something that has social value and at the same time has the possibility of becoming art, I thought, “Wow that’s fantastic, I love it! I could do this all my life.” And I did.

Does your Argentinian heritage play a role in your creative process?

The only thing is that in Latin America we have a much greater use and respect for the public realm than we do in Anglo-Saxon countries. The streets, the plazas are much more important in our daily lives than they are in America. So I always give priority to the public aspects of my projects over the private ones.

What was the first building you ever designed?

The first building was a little, cheap vacation house for my future in-laws.

Is it still there?

I saw it recently, but it has had pieces added to it and adjusted the proportions. It ceased to be the house that I designed; it became something else.

Does that make you sad that it’s changed so much?

No, it happens. I have lost many other very good projects that were built and then torn down. That is part of life in architecture; your buildings get built and torn down. It’s in the life of buildings, it’s a pity, but that’s how it goes.

Anything you have designed that, if you could, you would like to go back and redesign?

Probably, but I don’t think like that. They are designed, they are done, that was a moment in my life, and if I think differently today, that’s just because it’s the nature of life. It’s a mistake to dwell too much on the things that one has done. Life changes, and you have to accept it. gb&d

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The Transbay Transit Center, by Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects, will be a new, green transportation hub in San Francisco serving the West Coast.

may–june 2013

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Preconstruction Construction Management Design / Build Bid / Build LEED / Build By committing to sustainability through environmentally responsible and resourceefficient construction. Turnbull-Wahlert is a member of the United States Green Building Council (USGBC) and has Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) AP staff in-house. We have been on the Design/Construction teams for many LEED certified projects. Committed to sustainability whether for a LEED certified project or not. Call us for your next Green Project.

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UP FRONt

Notebook Getting into Peter’s Head

By Alan Oakes

One need only to look at the marvel of the Roman aqueducts to see that at one point in history, civil engineers had the balls to completely reshape the course of human history. Fast forward a couple millennia, and we have Great Britain’s Peter Head attempting to do the same. For seven years, the civil engineer led the planning and integrated urbanism team at fabled engineering group Arup. With more than 800 employees under Head’s wing, Arup became a world leader in sustainable urban planning and design. The global firm rolled out bold schemes for massive eco-cities such as China’s Dongtan Island project, and Head himself was championed in the media for his leadership in the new sustainable planning movement. In 2008, Time magazine deemed him an eco-hero while a British magazine said he was one of the fifty people in the world who may be able to save our planet.

But when the markets crashed and access to capital dried up, many of the truly revolutionary ideas put forth by Head were dropped or, as he would admit, only pieces of plans were completed.

“They weren’t being implemented,” he says. “The plans were there, but [the clients] were just choosing little bits and not doing a profound integration. It is in the integration of these things that the real benefits come.” The Dongtan project, for one, was marred by corruption, politics, and contractors’ cold feet. Today, with one lone windmill and a handful of unimpressive apartment towers, it quickly has become the poster child for eco-cities gone bust. Which would be a civil engineer’s worst nightmare.

Civil engineers are trained problem solvers. It’s in their DNA. When asked by the Institute of Civil Engineers (ICE) to present how our planet can sustain nine billion people by the year 2050, Head realized the world needed to radically rethink planning models, and we needed to move at a much greater speed of implementation. As Head often

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“I get a lot more reaction from people when I say, ‘Sustainability is all about waste reduction: waste of money, waste of materials, waste of people’s lives and time.’ ...That tends to get people quite motivated.”

Peter Head, Founder of The Ecological Sequestration Trust

Peter Head was the head of civil engineering at Arup for years before choosing to resign and set up The Ecological Sequestration Trust.

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demonstrates in his presentations, for China to continue with its present model of growth, it will require a land area roughly twice the size of France, annually, in order to sustain itself. Head says China’s leaders have finally realized this is simply not possible.

It was at a Climate Exchange conference in China in 2010 when Head was confronting leaders about the need to move forward that an audience participant challenged him: if Head had the resources, what would he do? “And I said I would get the top scientists, top business people, top financiers in the world together and persuade them to show that it is possible to do things differently,” he says. “Because we know it is possible. You just have to go and demonstrate it.”

The audience member responded that if Winston Churchill won the Second World War with less than fifteen key players, why couldn’t Head do what he proposed? Head remembers mulling the challenge. “I went home and talked to my wife,” he says. “I thought I should be able to make a difference or at least try. I’ve got three grandchildren, and I can’t bear the thought of them having to go through a terrible outcome in their lives.”

In an audacious move, Head resigned his leadership role at Arup and founded a charitable trust he named The Ecological Sequestration Trust (TEST) that he hopes just might be the vehicle the world needs to move to a different model of sustainable planning. “It isn’t possible in the private sector, but it also isn’t possible to do it in the public sector,” Head says, “so I’m going to step into the middle with some money to actually help people find that profound change.”

The plan of the trust is to implement closed-loop system planning in three cities in three different regions of the world: Kigali, Rwanda; Surat, India; and Chongming Island, China. Chongming Island is adjacent to Shanghai—Dongtan is on its southern tip. In late August 2012, gb&d

While at Arup, Peter Head master-planned this eco-city in China. When it stalled, Head resigned and set off on his own.

TEST signed a memo of understanding with the Chinese government to consult on the Chongming Island project.

Head is back on the island and has even greater plans for its future. Head’s closed-loop eco-design system is inspired by nature, which allows for resources to be continuously replenished and reused.

As an example, Head shows how carbon dioxide emissions from a coal plant can be converted into biomass with byproducts of the biomass being further broken down to form organic chemicals and fuel products, making carbon dioxide a useful economic resource rather than a deadly byproduct.

Head’s fearless foray into economics on the one hand seems anathema to our compartmentalized way of solving design problems; on the other hand, it makes sense. Why shouldn’t civil engineers be leaders in helping communities build infrastructure systems that will help them allocate their scarce resources? Head has said that never in the history of the world have we been able to monitor how infrastructure and planning impact economic growth and human development—until now.

Using monitoring technology, he wants the three test cities with their layers of closed-loop planning to create an accessible pool of knowledge for others

to use. They are to be examples of how comprehensive closed-loop systems are sustainable and can be the engines for much needed economic growth.

Is this all too Quixotic? Will Head’s plans be discarded on the vast heap of previous failed utopic civic planning?

Head himself realizes he is fighting a messaging war of sorts. “I get a lot more reaction from people when I say, ‘Sustainability is all about waste reduction: waste of money, waste of materials, waste of people’s lives and time,’” he says. “That tends to get people quite motivated.”

One wonders if the revolutionary work in any of his three test cities will come to fruition. Is he being played by savvy governments who recognize the public relations value of having someone of Peter Head’s stature on their team? Or will his efforts actually reshape history?

Here’s to you Peter Head, a true leader in green design. You may be one of the 50 people who do save the planet—that is, if anyone gives a damn. 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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UP FRONt

Defined Design San Luis National Wildlife Refuge Visitor Center Details Location Los Banos, CA Size 17,000 ft2 Completed 2011 Cost $10 million Client US Fish and Wildlife Services Architect Catalyst Architecture Electrical Engineer ES2 Engineering Contractor West Coast Contractors

re For mo is, San Lu ad our lo n w o d p via iPad ap iTunes

Going for net-zero was the natural choice for the headquarters and visitor center at the San Luis National Wildlife Refuge, which consists of nearly 45,000 acres of wetlands, grasslands, and riparian habitats, plus more than 90,000 acres of conservation easements on private lands. The LEED Platinum building, designed by Prescott, Arizona’s Catalyst Architecture, demonstrates an integrated approach to sustainability. Passive solar and high-performance mechanical systems, along with natural and LED lighting, maximize energy efficiency such that the building produces more energy than it consumes. Matt Ackerman, a principal at Catalyst, says the project was one of the most demanding work efforts the firm has ever undertaken, despite having prior experience with LEED and even off-the-grid projects. He considers it the firm’s flagship project. “Our success with visitor centers is how we tell the story of the place through the architecture,” he says, “and that’s what we achieved here, showing what makes the San Luis National Wildlife Refuge a unique place.” gb&d —Julie Schaeffer

Because of its innovative use of SIPs, the visitor center was the winner of the commercial/industrial/ institutional category at the Structural Insulated Panel Association’s 10th Annual Building Excellence Awards and the overall competition winner.

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UP FRONt

interpret / in-‘tər-prət / (verb) To represent by means of art, bring to realization by performance or direction. The rich agricultural heritage of the San Joaquin River Valley, once populated by wooden farm structures, is interpreted through heavy timbers that cross overhead through the lobby of the building. On a quarter of the timbers a weathered steel skin that is both recycled and recyclable complements the wood. Outside, curving site walls and sidewalks tell the story of the river, which is characterized by meandering oxbows.

strategy / strat-i-jē / (noun) A careful plan or method. To achieve net-zero, Catalyst took advantage of a comprehensive passive strategy, using a highly insulated envelope—walls and roofs are made of structural insulated panels—and natural daylight and ventilation. For remaining energy needs, the team installed two photovoltaic arrays, on the roof of the building and on the shade structure over the employee parking area, which together produce more than 55 kilowatts of energy.

protective / prə-‘tek-tiv / (adj) Giving or capable of giving protection. With 30 species of waterfowl on refuge lands, San Luis is a protective place for birds stopping over on the Pacific Flyway migration route. To reflect these animals, the roof of the new building mimics the wings of water birds taking flight. conservation / kän(t)-sər-ˈvā-shən / (noun) Planned management of a natural resource to prevent exploitation, destruction, or neglect.

The building uses low-flow fixtures and waterless urinals, and the landscaping is designed to direct water runoff from the building roofs to planted areas— what Ackerman calls “the low-tech solution to water conservation.”

Photovoltaic panels follow the shape of the roof, reminiscent of a bird’s wings when taking flight.

This design also allows for operable clerestory windows, which provide daylight and ventilation.

The large bronze elk sculpture in front of the main entry represents the large herd of Tule elk, a species native to the region, that populates the central area of the refuge.

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List 26

Stillwater Public Schools

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Franklin & Marshall College

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Fields Development Group

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Transwestern

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Westin Michigan Avenue

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Stephens County High SChool

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Setting a new standard in Oklahoma

The historic school battles storm water Greener city living in Jersey City

The importance of post-certification analysis Dividing space can spell energy savings

Finding efficiency along the way

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Approach

New schools set a green precedent in Oklahoma

It will be nearly impossible for students to tell they are indoors when they enter the Highland Park Elementary School in Stillwater, OK. The building design includes numerous courtyards and the “tree well” shown above.

Sustainable design process educates community, contractors, and students about everything from waste diversion to animal husbandry Stillwater Public Schools (SPS) of Stillwater, Oklahoma, is rebuilding two elementary schools that are targeting LEED Gold and Silver certifications. The two schools, Will Rogers and Highland Park elementary schools, comprise 184,000 aggregate square feet and will be completed in summer 2013, just in time for the new school year. The schools house nearly 1,200 of the SPS’s 6,000-student population, and according to Jim Ryan, assistant superintendent for operations at SPS, “What we’re learning in these new buildings with regard to energy management and sustainability is going to be replicated in all of the buildings in our district.”

Ryan’s push for sustainability comes from his interaction with Oklahoma State University’s department of long-range facility planning when the university helped on a project to

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construct a new football stadium in the public school district. The university had its own sustainability goals, and in 2010, Ryan began to make sustainable concepts a priority in SPS’s plans for replacing and retrofitting its aging school infrastructure.

“We sent out an RFP to 77 firms in Oklahoma, including an emphasis on integrated design and how we wanted a minimum of LEED certified for these new schools,” Ryan says. “We ended up getting responses from all over the country.”

SPS selected the Tulsa, Oklahomabased firm Selser Schaefer Architects, which partnered with Chicago-based Ross Barney Architects, to design the two new schools. “These firms were dedicated to giving us sustainable buildings,” Ryan says. “It has been interesting because the community doesn’t quite

understand what we’re doing, so it’s also been an opportunity to educate our community about the process.”

Will Rogers is a 92,000-square-foot school being built at a cost of $17.2 million. Its educational program is designed to suit approximately 600 pre-kindergarten to fifth-grade students, and the twostory building will preserve 90 percent of the open space on the 12-acre site.

By recycling and diverting construction materials; using daylighting, materials with recycled content, and low-VOC finishes; and maximizing open space, Will Rogers expects to receive a LEED Gold certification.

Highland Park, which is targeting Silver certification, has the same square footage and building cost as Will Rogers, yet it is located on a site twice the size at 24 acres. The school itself is designed with several interior courtyards to blend gbdmagazine.com

APPROACH

Highland Park Elementary is on a 24-acre lot that allowed the design to include a number of interior courtyards. And the green efforts extend to the jobsite; nearly 100% of building materials were recycled during construction.

21st-century ideas for a 200-year-old college already switching to an interconnected indoor and outdoor spaces, and it is and remotely controlled energy manlocated adjacent to the high school’s 20acre agricultural education farm. “We’re agement system. Both Will Rogers and Highland Park are using geothermal connecting the elementary school to the systems, and the other buildings in the high school’s agricultural education prodistrict will soon be eschewing rooftop gram,” Ryan says, “so the students will HVAC equipment for the more functional be able to learn about animal husbandry and aesthetically agreeable geothermal and horticulture by walking just a few systems. hundred yards.”

“The technologies we’re employing for More than 95 percent of construcenergy management and lighting control tion materials on the two new schools in the new buildings are also going to are being recycled. “We’re hardly taking be a model for our other schools,” Ryan anything to the landfills, and we’ve gotsays. “Schools can’t afford to be ineffiten a financial benefit as well as LEED points for this,” Ryan says. “We’re getting cient anymore. The community recognizes this, and we’ve passed $92.5 million in paid for our wood and metal, and this bonds in the past five years to help build is something new to the subcontractors [schools] that the community is proud who are doing it, so everyone is getting of.” gb&d —Benjamin van Loon educated here.”

Both of the schools use colorful exteria message from Selser Schaefer or finishes, glass corridors, and oversized Architects landscape elements such as concrete letDesigning an average school is relatively simple. Designing a ters and numbers at Highland Park. They great one requires more—something deeper. As architects, it also use exposed concrete architecture, open stairwells, and community-oriented means immersing ourselves in your environment. We listen to your thoughts and find solutions that fit your goals, budgets, and design, which is contrary to the schools’ sensibilities. We take everyone’s opinion seriously. Executives to formerly cloistered aesthetics. custodians, teachers to students.

Ryan says that these new schools are setting a precedent Ninety percent of the open space at Will for the entire district, which is Rogers Elementary School will be preserved in the new school design.

gb&d

Storm water drives the design of Franklin & Marshall College’s new housing project Rain gardens and permeable pavement relieve a city’s already overburdened system Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, was established with a gift from Benjamin Franklin in 1787.

More than two hundred years later, the school has committed to achieve LEED Silver certification on all major renovations and new facilities that exceed 5,000 square feet. The first of such new construction projects since the new sustainability plan at the 2,400-student college is New College House.

Given its age and history, Franklin & Marshall wanted even new buildings to evoke a classic, historic look. New College House was built in the tradition of architect Charles Z. Klauder, an American architect who lived in the late 1800s and early 1900s, who was known for Georgian buildings with red brick, stone, painted wood trim, and slate roofs.

The college broke ground on the project in 2009, completed it in May 2011 and received its LEED Silver certification in October 2012. The 188-bed facility offers suites, apartments, and dorm rooms, as well as a multipurpose space, seminar and small group rooms, and offices. The design incorporates energy-recovery units in its HVAC system, local and regional building materials, FSC-certified wood, and materials with a high recycled content.

The most notable aspect of the project is its six rain gardens that manage rainwater on-site. “Because of the placement of this building, we had to deal with storm water,” says Mike Wetzel, may–june 2013

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“The City of Lancaster is at capacity in terms of storm-water management. We had to come up with a [plan] that was friendly to the environment.” Mike Wetzel, Franklin & Marshall College associate vice president of facilities management and campus planning. “The City of Lancaster has an older system, and it’s at capacity in terms of storm-water management.

We had to come up with a way that was friendly to the environment.”

One option was to tap into a nearby township, but officials there were ask-

ing for a $250,000 tapping fee. Instead, Franklin & Marshall’s architects worked with landscape architects to design rain gardens for the project.

“Four huge rain gardens are in front of the building,” Wetzel says. “And two in back are interconnected. They handle all of the storm water that comes off of the building and an adjacent site. We’ve

New College House at Franklin & Marshall College

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Number of on-site rain gardens, which absorb water rather than dumping it into the overloaded city storm-water system

had significant storms since construction was completed, and in 24 hours or less, buildup from the storm infiltrates into the ground.”

A parking lot built nearby was constructed to also handle water flow because in the past, rain would flood off the parking lot and onto nearby streets.

Rain gardens were added to the lot, and permeable pavement was chosen for its porous abilities. “By using porous pavement for parking spaces and impervious paving for the driving areas, we solved the problem,” Wetzel says. “The parking lot has become a model for our city and county because of how well it has performed.”

With its first sustainable initiative in place, Franklin & Marshall College is using New College House and the new parking lot as concrete examples of the college’s commitment to sustainability. gb&d —Stephanie Vozza

ership

in Green Multi-Family Design

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New Jersey project an ‘answer to Manhattan real estate’ Fields Development Group combines smart building systems, salvaged materials, and luxury amenities to reimagine city living The Madox in Jersey City, New Jersey, will be the first residential development in the city to receive LEED Silver cerification. The eight-story building, by Fields Development Group and completed in September 2012, has a number of green features that would add to the certification, including land reuse, energy- and water-efficient systems, and proximity to public transportation. The building also is designed to create a natural connection between residents and the city, which is why Fields strove for a balance between innovation and interconnection.

One of the key green elements for the project, which received a Gold Award for green design in the 2012 Professional Builder Design Awards, was using reclaimed urban land. The site of the 186,500-square-foot building was previously home to a machine-parts manufacturer. Fields conducted an extensive clean-up by pumping ozone and oxygen into the soil before digging out the contamination that was left behind and beginning work on the features that the 131-unit complex would offer.

Patrick Kretz, the project manager for Madox, says using recycled materials does still require a larger budget, but in addition to their green aspects, the materials added cosmetic benefits. “Madox promotes a feeling of old comfort, and using recycled material and reclaimed wood helped the look of it,” he says.

In addition to reusing land and materials, Fields added systems to reduce energy consumption by 14 percent. Its water-use reduction was triple that, estimated at 45 percent, realized through the installation of aerators on fixtures, low-flow toilets, and reduced-flow shower heads, along with a photovoltaic solar array and rooftop vegetation. The company also pledges to source 35 percent of Madox’s electricity from renewable resources and touts a building design gb&d

Patrick Kretz

that overall should save 430,141 kilowatthours of electricity and 37,805 therms of natural gas per year.

Kretz says the project was the result of a team effort and credits partners like architectural planning firm Marchetto Higgins Stieve for its success. “The LEED aspect came from a basis of design that they already practice,” Kretz says. “They were very willing and able to add any other aspects we needed.”

As the people at Fields see it, Madox is a ‘way of life.’ “We wanted [to create] the feel that you’re doing your daily grind, and then you get home, and you’re in this great, green community,” Kretz says.

Although the project is in Jersey City, it is seamlessly connected to city life through nearby transit options. PATH trains and ferry services to New York City are just blocks away, and the building offers electric vehicle-charging stations and other green options. “Madox raises the bar for the entire market in our area,” Kretz says. “We are changing the way people build around here.”

When Fields set out to develop Madox, it wanted to provide a green community that promoted sustainability as well as offer tenants an affordable way to experience the amenities of luxury city living.

Having succeeded, Kretz says Madox is a model for what Fields hopes to do more of in the future. Plus, he says, it’s the “perfect answer to Manhattan real estate.” gb&d —Kelly Hepner

“Madox raises the bar for the entire market in our area. We are changing the way people build around here.”

Patrick Kretz, Fields Development Group

430,000 kWh Amount of electricity the Madox should save annually

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$1.2m

APPROACH

Amount of tax credits Transwestern received for the energy savings in its Capital Gateway retrofit

Transwestern pays attention after LEED The commercial real estate giant hones in on a building’s post-certification performance Commercial real estate firms are in a position to have an enduring influence on sustainable building operations.

After all, they have the opportunity to implement and monitor the building’s various systems and plan for eco-friendly upgrades as part of renovation efforts.

And preparations made in design and construction phases are ineffective if those systems aren’t achieving the desired results when they’re operational.

Matthew Payne, a property manager with Transwestern, a global provider of commercial real estate services, knows this well. Working in a company that has more than 56 LEED-certified properties in the country, Payne knows that sustainability doesn’t stop with certification.

Transwestern has been at the forefront of sustainability initiatives for more than a decade. “Our initial partnership with Energy Star began in the late 1990s,” says Al Skodowski, who is Transwestern’s senior vice president and director of LEED and sustainability services and chairman-elect for the USGBC. “As a result of California’s energy crisis, our energy program has been solidified, and we have a top-down commitment to managing the most energyefficient properties in the country.”

Because Transwestern is a global company, its wide reach has brought new opportunities in its commitment to reducing the environmental impact of its properties. Pilot programs at a single location can be expanded for significant savings of cost and resources throughout the country. For example, the firm has developed a night audit program in which every property has after-hours walk-throughs to identify unnecessary energy use when electronic

“We have a top-down commitment to managing the most energy-efficient properties in the country.”

Al Skodowski, Transwestern

Case Study Capital Gateway When the TIAA-CREF-owned Capital Gateway building in Bethesda, MD, was built in 1993, sustainability was less of a priority than it is today, but thanks to a major commitment from TIAA-CREF, Transwestern led a renovation effort that resulted in a LEED Platinum certification. With retro-commissioned mechanical systems and upgraded lighting and plumbing systems, Capital Gateway is now one of only three LEED-EB Platinum commercial office buildings in the state. One of the other two also was certified under Transwestern’s management, underscoring the organization’s commitment to sustainability.

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devices aren’t turned off or in energysaving mode.

Clients play a major role in Transwestern’s commitment to sustainability and often drive the process, as was the case with TIAA-CREF, a financial services firm and its Capital Gateway building that earned LEED Platinum under the Existing Buildings: Operations and Maintenance rating system. Owners such as TIAA-CREF and its tenants get major benefits from a sustainable commitment.

Even with a full-service lease, operating expenses influence the rate, and lower operating expenses equal lower rent.

Nonetheless, some clients are hesitant at the initial investment that some features require to eventually reduce resource consumption. “Inexpensive retrofits provide some energy savings,” Skodowski says, “but a building can be made so much more efficient for a small premium.” Payne adds that if you want to go Platinum, you have to make an investment. “You’ll get a huge payback from that, though.”

Collaboration with entities ranging from local vendors to national associations is also essential, Payne says. “You have to make sure that the building staff, contractors, and vendors are all doing what they need to be doing.” he says. “This is an enormous team effort.”

Transwestern partners with groups like the Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA) and Real Estate Roundtable, even with competing firms.

At the same time, Transwestern has developed its own initiatives to be more sustainable, such as the Good, Better, Best Program, which is designed to incorporate sustainability into all of the organization’s functions. The program takes into account that its properties have different sustainable goals in mind; some want to at least start a recycling program while others are seeking LEED certification, so the Transwestern system identifies how a facility is operating now, the level of its managers’ knowledge about sustainability, and how the facility can improve.

Although Transwestern has established itself as a leader in sustainability, opportunities for additional progress remain. Even with Platinum certifications, Payne says there are still credits to go after and ways to improve every day. gb&d —Kelli McElhinny gbdmagazine.com

CONTINENTAL ELECTRICAL CONSTRUCTION COMPANY

A Century of Excellence. A Tradition of Quality.

Continental Electrical Construction Company is uniquely positioned to supply owners and facility managers with a complete array of energy-saving and environmentally minded solutions. Since 1912, Continental has a history and century long track record unequalled in Chicago.

The Westin Project Assembling the right team at the right time is paramount in order to flush out potential obstacles and provide technical solution. During the Westin bid process it was discovered that the project was over previously established budgets. We performed a full investigation and provided mock-ups to compare the energy and cost savings between retrofitting and replacing.

This allowed the customer to be better informed and ultimately gave them the aid they needed to move forward with the project. The goal of the project was to beautify the ballrooms, while reducing energy consumption and we accomplished this goal!! We would like to thank The Westin Hotel and let the Chicagoland area know, we look forward to being of service.

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Chicago Westin Hotel opts to subdivide and conquer

The Michigan Avenue hotel splits its meeting rooms into smaller sizes to save energy and better serve conference planners

The Westin on Michigan Avenue in Chicago is being sustainable in ways other than its meeting spaces. The hotel has a 400-square-foot rooftop garden where herbs are grown for the hotel’s restaurant.

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Chicago has always been a big convention town, home to the sprawling McCormick Place, the largest convention center in North America. The city has been built up with hotels to accommodate the high number of these national and international business gatherings. With so many options, the Westin Hotel on Michigan Avenue, part of Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, set about to differentiate itself from the pack. The hotel chose to reconfigure its meeting spaces in the main ballroom because not everyone needs a 2.6 million-square-foot exhibition hall.

The hotel came up with a plan that would divide its existing space to create right-sized rooms for a number of conferences and make them greener as well. “The ballroom used to divide up into two even halves,” says Bob Thomas, director of engineering for the Westin on Chicago’s Magnificent Mile. “It was a little odd to have smaller groups in such large spaces. It now splits into six cubes, five of them usable for meetings and the sixth a vestibule.”

The changes go beyond simply providing appropriate-sized conference space.

Because the rooms are smaller, they require less energy to heat, cool, and light. Construction on the Westin’s $7 million renovation was done between December 2011 and March 2012, in time for Chicago’s second-hottest-ever July of 2012, yet in that month, the hotel had a 5.5 percent reduction in natural gas.

These kinds of environmental gains are very important to hotels and other hospitality venues in Chicago and worldwide. New environmental standards established by the Convention Industry Council’s Accepted Practices Exchange in partnership with the American Society for Testing and Materials International make it easier for meeting planners to find a green venue. These standards encompass nine areas of hotel and meeting venue operations: accommodations, audio-visual facilities, marketing and communications materials, destinations, exhibits, food service, meeting venues, on-site administrative offices, and transportation. Initiatives are scalable to any size meeting—meaning, even planners for small groups can compare venues based on environmental features.

“By making the changes we’ve made, we’ve increased the marketability of gbdmagazine.com

APPROACH

“It’s actually a very fun thing to be creative in how we reach these goals. … It creates a competitive camaraderie.”

Bob Thomas, Westin Michigan Avenue

Renovated ballroom and boardroom spaces (below)

the space,” Thomas says. “By increasing revenues, it improves the ROI on the renovations.”

Those renovations meant more than changing the moveable pocket doors. Because lighting and air-conditioning constitute the bulk of energy consumption, the systems for those had to be reconfigured. The 50-year-old building’s original HVAC system was well built and worth saving, so they opted to install new coils, dampers, air handlers, valves, and piping with the help of Westside Mechanical in Naperville, Illinois. New lighting fixtures included 5,000 energy-efficient CFL and LED bulbs that were put into the new design by Continental Electric Construction Company in Oak Brook, Illinois.

The Westin is also one of only 13 Chicago hotels recognized by the Green Seal program, which focuses on energy, water, waste, and pollution management.

Green Seal measures how resources are managed in guest accommodations, where they can opt out of housekeeping services during their stay. Low-VOC paints, eco-friendly cleaning products, and multiple-use serving products are used wherever possible.

It is no fluke that this particular hotel is among that group of environmentally recognized Chicago destinations. All Westin hotels—along with its sister brands Le Meridien, Aloft Hotels, Four Points by Sheraton, and W Hotels, and others—participate in the Starwood corporate initiative called the “30/20 by 20” plan. The specific goals are a 30-percent energygb&d

and a 20-percent water-use reduction by the year 2020. Because Starwood owns hotels in so many different climates around the world, the hotel chain left it up to each building engineer to determine how to achieve this plan. “‘30/20 by 20’ respects engineers’ knowledge,” Thomas says. “It’s actually a very fun thing to be creative in how we reach these goals. We share a lot between hotels with a corporate best practices forum. It creates a competitive camaraderie.” Which is probably the reason the Westin Chicago competes successfully for business in a crowded hotel town. gb&d —Russ Klettke

Looking to LEED mid-build means greater savings Georgia’s Stephens County High School identifies greener opportunities by conducting post-design energy models The Stephens County School District, in Toccoa, Georgia, has demonstrated its commitment to energy conservation in the past decade by pursuing the Energy Star label for each of its facilities, and this initiative has produced measurable savings for the district. “Since we started the energy-management plan back in 1999, we have saved close to $6 million,” says Sherrie Whiten, superintendent of the Stephens County Board of Education.

The savings aren’t limited to the amount of energy being used. Staff and students participate in recycling programs and monitor resource consumption, and Whiten confirms that this wide-reaching approach has paid off.

“We’ve been able to decrease our energy consumption while at the same time increasing our square footage,” she says.

The district’s latest construction project, a new high school, goes beyond its already progressive standards. “We

started looking at LEED certification after the building was designed but before we had actually started construction,” Whiten says. First, a consultant conducted energy-modeling studies to identify potential savings opportunities and came up with 13 different models, and then up-front project expenditures were carefully weighed against life-cycle costs.

“We looked at how long it would take for us to recoup that money if we made some of these changes,” Whiten says.

The project was already energy efficient, but the district realized there were additional ways they could save money with the new building. “There were some things we would need to change out in order to realize additional savings,” Whiten says. A number of new design elements have helped to reduce energy consumption including occupancy sensors for the high-efficiency T5 lights, low-flow fixtures throughout the building, additional insulation to minimize energy, and a high-efficiency water-source HVAC system.

The district made sure to use local vendors and regionally sourced materials on the project, and Whiten says it also benefitted from the waste-management program, which minimizes how much material is sent to landfills, at the new facility. “We have a pulper in our cafeteria, and at the end of the day all of the food waste is reduced down to a very small cube,” she explains. When considering the scope—the high school feeds two meals each day to its nearly 1,100 students—a small cube of waste at day’s end is quite an accomplishment.

The cafeteria has three areas: a bistro accented with brick arches, an overlook area, and the main dining room space.

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APPROACH

“We started looking at LEED certification after the building was designed but before we had actually started construction. There were some things we [could] change out in order to realize additional savings.”

Sherrie Whiten, Stephens County Board of Education

The site required the construction of a retaining wall, something Bowen & Watson, the project’s constructionmanagement firm, carefully designed to achieve the best results while keeping costs down. Whiten says the company evaluated the first proposal for the wall and determined it would be too expensive. Their experts then crafted a

new design that met the need at a more acceptable price. The final product is a pressure relief wall instead of the traditional, completely solid concrete wall.

“We had a fantastic relationship with them,” Whiten says of Bowen & Watson, adding, “They value-engineered a lot of things that resulted in significant savings for us.”

In the end, all of these cost savings add up to more than just a healthier bottom line for the district. Whiten says, “Anything we can save we’re able to put back into the classroom.” gb&d —Julie Knudson A message from Bowen & Watson, Inc. Bowen & Watson, Inc. is an award-winning general contractor and construction manager serving the Southeastern US that partners with loyal clients who count on us to deliver quality construction services while cultivating positive relationships with local communities as we have for 56 years. Bowen & Watson, Inc. understands construction is a people business, and the quality of relationships and integrity in a company’s actions is as important as the quality of the buildings constructed.

The new high school in Stephens County, GA, already had efficient features, but the school board saw potential for more savings through occupancy sensors, low-flow fixtures, and energy-efficient lighting.

“D e s i g n i n g w i t h i n t e g r i t y .

B u i l d i n g o n t r u s t.”

Ser vi ng the Midwest

Congratulations to Stephens County School System and our Community.

The new Stephens County High School is 1 of only 10 High Schools in Georgia to achieve LEED for Schools – Certification!

As Construction Manager for this project, we are proud to have been allowed the opportunity to be a Partner with the Stephens County School System. Over the last 40 years, our Partnership has delivered many exceptional projects for the community and children of Stephens County.

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507.386.7996 www.bruntonarchitects.com gbdmagazine.com

VERBATIM

Amy Chisholm on why youngsters need BOMA—and vice versa The economy is turning around for commercial real estate. We had record attendance at [the Buildings Owners and Managers Association (BOMA)] 2012 conference in Seattle. In 2013, we’ll be in San Diego, and we’re expecting those numbers to hold. Our association will be turning 106 years old in 2013, and our conference is held every year in June. It really is a can’t-miss event for anyone involved in the commercial real-estate industry. We have 40 to 50 different education sessions occurring during the three-day conference that are led by top industry experts as well as speakers outside of the industry who have particular expertise in leadership or career management.

The education sessions at the annual conference are broken down into five major tracks. The first is sustainability and energy efficiency, which is about creating and sustaining high-performance buildings. We have an operations track that focuses on ways to reduce costs to improve net operating income; it also includes engineering and maintenance.

Another track is centered on tenant retention and tenant relations. The sessions in that track cover ways to improve your tenant relationships and the importance of retaining tenants. Then we have a track that looks at leadership and career development. It deals with individual career growth and development, and how to lead your company to success and be the best you can be. And our final track focuses on asset management and portfolio performance.

Quite a bit of what we’re focusing on these days is next-generation leadership and how to recruit and retain the best talent out there. There is sort of a generation gap in the commercial real estate industry right now where we aren’t bringing in as many young professionals as we’re going to need to replace people as they retire. So there’s a focus on reaching out to the younger generation of professionals in trying to bring them gbdmagazine.com

into the fold, and how best to communicate with them and manage them. We’re also dealing right now with the changing role of the property manager. Owners and building managers today are looking for people who have accounting skills, because there’s a great deal of financial management that goes on with property management now. Commercial real estate professionals also need to have basic knowledge of how buildings work, along with the different smart technologies that are available.

BOMA’s leadership in energy efficiency and sustainability goes back several years. We’ve been awarded the Energy Star Sustained Excellence Award for the last six years running, and in 2009 we received the Energy Star Climate Protection Award. For years now, we’ve lobbied on Capitol Hill to ensure that voluntary energy-efficiency programs are encouraged and mandated and are not implemented without offsetting initiatives.

We’ve partnered with the Department of Energy to launch the Commercial Real Estate Energy Alliance. Back in 2007, we launched the 7-Point Challenge, which called on the industry to realize a 30 percent savings in energy use by 2012.

In 2006, we launched the BOMA Energy Efficiency Program, which we affectionately refer to as BEEP. It’s a major educational initiative that teaches important low-cost or no-cost operating strategies for all aspects of energy efficiency. And then there’s our Sustainable Operations Series, which is a complimentary webinar series that supports BEEP and teaches the implementation of sustainable practices in commercial properties.

BOMA is working had to facilitate knowledge transfer within our industry.

We have a careers and real estate task force that’s made up of volunteer members, and they put together complementary sessions for our conference each year. We also have a ‘student day’ at the annual event, which we’re expanding into a ‘career day’ for the 2013 confer-

About Amy Chisholm Title Vice President of Education and Meetings Organization Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA) Industry Commercial real estate and property management Education BS Central Michigan University Age 44 First job Alumni relations for a small law school in Concord, NH Mantra “Time waits for no one” Hidden talent Tremendous knowledge of geography Definition of leadership ”Innovation. Being at the forefront and being the creative mind behind solutions.”

ence because in addition to college students, we’re inviting returning veterans who are interested in commercial real estate to attend this year. There’s no registration fee for the career day, and it will include programming about careers in commercial real estate. We’ll also be assigning mentors to all of the participants in this program. The mentors will stick with participants throughout the day, taking them through the tradeshow and to our general sessions. They’ll also attend the luncheons with them and introduce them to people. The event is designed to help people understand what this industry is all about and the many different career paths that are available. gb&d may–june 2013

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List 38

Kohler Co.

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Macerich

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IKEA

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Ohio State University

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Vernon Swaback

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Doug Widener

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The respected brand steps up its green game Turning Santa Monica Place inside out Bold choices from a global retailer Taking aim at net-zero waste

The true story of lifelong sustainability A vision for state chapters of the USGBC

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INTERNATIONAL TITAN. President David Kohler, Jr. is the fourth generation of the Kohler family to hold a leadership position within the global manufacturing company, which was started by John Michael Kohler, an Austrian immigrant, in 1873.

TRENDSETTERS

“It’s okay to be a capitalist and an industrialist and an environmentalist at the same time.”

DAVID KOHLER, Jr. Despite the quantifiable promises of a burgeoning green economy, complaints continue to be made about economic barriers to entering the sustainable business world. What so many major companies are coming to realize, however, is that investing today in environmentally conscious processes and products creates a far less expensive future. Bathroom- and kitchen-fixture giant Kohler Co. is committed to making its company and its products greener and more efficient, and by doing so, it makes the case that big business can be the perfect incubator for sustainable leadership.

By Julie Schaeffer

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TRENDSETTERS Kohler

“The world needs business leaders to stand up and lead by example in terms of sustainability,” says David Kohler, Jr., president of Kohler Co. “It’s okay to be a capitalist and an industrialist and an environmentalist at the same time; you can conduct business in a way that is right for the environment.”

To understand Kohler’s commitment to sustainability, one has to understand its beginning, a beginning of entrepreneurial spirit and perseverance. Founded in 1873 by John Michael Kohler, an Austrian immigrant, the company initially made and sold plows and farm implements. When a client wanted plumbing fixtures, however, John Michael complied, adding four feet to a horse trough to construct a cast iron bathtub. When the tub was a hit, the entrepreneur stuck with it, even though the country was mired in a financial crisis and plumbing was rare in rural areas. But Kohler continued to evolve and now houses an interiors division that manufactures tile and furniture and a global power division that makes engines and generators.

It recently expanded into golf courses and resorts with The American Club in Kohler, Wisconsin, and the Old Course Hotel in St. Andrews, Scotland.

But the family-owned Kohler rejects the notion of privilege, and the company invests more than 90 percent of earnings back in the business. It has survived 18 recessions, in part by maintaining a commitment to operating on the leading edge of design and technology. “We are continuously bringing innovative new products to market,” David says. And that innovation is where Kohler’s sustainability story begins. “The company has always been a good environmental steward,” says David, who recalls that his great uncle, Walter Kohler, looked at the communities of Europe when creating the first 50-year master plan for the Kohler campus in Wisconsin in 1910. “He spoke often of the importance of earth and sunshine and clean air.”

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That interest in nature evolved over the decades, and by 2008, Kohler’s management had decided that the potential for climate change created an imperative to do something more, and the company launched a sustainability program with three main pillars. “That’s when we reset our strategy and created more of a structured plan for sustainability,” David says.

To execute this strategy, Kohler is looking at three areas that the company can directly address: its own environmental footprint, the creation of sustainable products, and an enhanced focus on communication and education.

Kohler went about reducing its carbon footprint by targeting zero net greenhouse gas emissions and zero net waste with offsets by 2035. It’s an ambitious goal, but since 2008, when it implemented the program, Kohler has achieved an average annual reduction in greenhouse gas emissions of three percent. That’s due to more than 1,000 sustainability projects in its facilities, including installing more efficient equipment such as a new dust-collection system that uses significantly less energy, developing alternative energy sources such as solar panels, and implementing recycling systems such as a waste heat-recovery system that uses excess heat from a pottery facility to heat water in a faucet-manufacturing building.

Manufacturing more environmentally favorable products is a huge part of Kohler’s sustainability plan. Kohler considers its projects to be eco-friendly if they exceed code requirements, which is not always an easy task. Specific kinds of ceramics are central to Kohler’s plumbing business, but the processes used to produce those ceramics are big consumers of natural gas. While it tries to find better means of production for those energy-consuming processes, Kohler is making the products greener for the consumer. As of January 2013, 10 percent of sales come from environmentally favorable products—a significant number for

a $5 billion company—and the company offers more than 200 bathroom faucets, 100 toilets, and 50 showerheads and hand showers that carry the EPA’s WaterSense label, which denotes a low-flow or water-efficient fixture. Most significant, water-efficient products are the fastestgrowing segment of Kohler’s plumbing business. The company also offers the only electronic fuel injection propane engine, which consumes 25 percent less fuel than alternatives, in the commercial mowing and industrial markets.

The third aspect of Kohler’s sustainability model is awareness. The company educates internal and external stakeholders about the importance of environmental practices. “It’s certainly an ongoing challenge to get people committed, and there are always skeptics,” David says.

“But most people are very responsive to our efforts.”

To promote awareness internally, the company has appointed 130 sustainability champions to guide its 30,000 associates worldwide. They’ve helped spread the word about Kohler’s commitment to the environment, and sustainability has become a grassroots effort with

WasterSense showerheads Available in 1.75- or 2.0-gallons-per-minute models, these use 35% less water than older models, meaning a family of four can save 7,700 gallons of water per year without sacrificing performance or style. Check out the Forté multifunction showerhead, which provides three relaxing shower experiences with wide, medium, and concentrated sprays.

gbdmagazine.com

TRENDSETTERS

On the Record David Kohler, JR. on...

Knowing his product: “Working at almost every one of our manufacturing areas has given me an appreciation for the hard work that goes into quality craftsmanship.”

Being the face of Kohler Co.: “Working on the front lines, talking to people about what they like and don’t like, has shaped me. You really get to know the customer that way.”

Numi toilet Kohler’s most advanced toilet combines unmatched technology and engineering with a striking modern form. The WaterSense toilet with a dual-flush offering a choice of 0.60 or 1.28 gallons per flush meets strict EPA flushing guidelines, including using at least 20 percent less water than 1.6-gallon toilets.

associates driving its implementation.

“We currently have hundreds of projects seeking to improve a process or a product in regard to sustainability, and the fact that this is happening organically is powerful,” David says. “Our associates have embraced sustainability because they want to be a part of a company that is doing great things and that makes a difference by trying to make the world a better place.”

This is one way in which Kohler stands out—the presence of what feels like a very genuine backing of sustainability. “We’re not driving sustainability because we need to put it in a report so shareholders can be impressed. We do it because we think it’s the right thing to do for the world.”

But the challenge with green products and systems comes down to one thing. “Consumers are interested in understanding what they can do, but they don’t necessarily want to pay more for green products,” David says. That’s why Kohler’s focus has been on carrying the message that responsible choices don’t necessarily involve sacrifice. “You can have your cake and eat it too with products that deliver performance and beauty and value but are also in har-

mony with nature,” David says. To communicate that, Kohler has created global teams to conduct a life-cycle inventory of core materials, which include cast iron, stainless steel, and vitreous. The results of the inventory—which evaluates the environmental impact of a product’s use, from raw material extraction through the time the customer discards it—will be used to educate design associates and customers about the environmental implications of product design choices.

David says Kohler’s strategy, when properly conceived and executed, should not be about compromise or massive trade-offs. “It should be a win for the consumer, a win for the associate, a win for the environment, and a win for the company,” he says.

To promote its vision, the company has partnered with the EPA on the WaterSense program. Kohler was the first company to earn the EPA WaterSense Manufacturer Partner of the Year Award in 2008. It received the Partner of the Year award again in 2009, was lauded with Excellence Awards in 2010 and 2011, and received the Partner of the Year award for the third time in 2012. One of the initiatives noted by the WaterSense program was the Kohler-sponsored “Wasting Water is Weird” public service announcement campaign.

Kohler also partners with a number of industry organizations, including the USGBC, and Kohler has been one of the platinum sponsors of Greenbuild for the past five years. As a part of the third pillar in its sustainability plan, the company also is committed to philanthropy with its Save Water America initiative,

“We’re not driving sustainability because we need to put it in a report so shareholders can be impressed.

We do it because we think it’s the right thing to do for the world.” David Kohler, Jr., Kohler Co. gb&d

Taking chances: “My best business decisions have involved betting on the right people. I remember a young man that started in our organization in his twenties, as a controller of a plant, but from the earliest day, I felt he had what it took, and now he’s a president.”

Transparency: “The clearer you can be about what you want to achieve as an organization, the better your associates will be able to live up to your standards.”

The turning point: “The biggest turning point in my career was in 1996, when I was tapped to become sector vice president of plumbing for North America. That showed a massive vote of confidence in my abilities.”

Being David Kohler: “If I had to describe myself in three words, I’d say I’m visionary, entrepreneurial, and hard-working.”

Leadership: “Your leadership style should reflect your personal convictions.”

Success: “My definition of success is obtaining personal happiness by achieving your dream, whatever it is that you aspire to do.”

Family business: “This is a family business, guided by family principles, but of the company's 30,000 employees, only six are family members. Our real strength is having 30,000 people who buy into our guiding principles.”

through which the company has donated water-efficient plumbing products. The initiative has helped build nearly 2,000 Habitat for Humanity homes in 48 states over a three-year period. Other global stewardship projects connect Kohler associates with their communities by planting trees, building bathing and housing facilities for the disadvantaged, and responding to natural disasters.

“All of these endeavors are facets of a communications strategy that seeks to communicate authentically what can be done,” David says.

Kohler’s awareness efforts include constructing LEED buildings for its facilities and helping other buildings achieve their own LEED certifications. “We’re designing products to work in LEED buildings, but we also have to live by may–june 2013

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TRENDSETTERS Kohler

Building greener at home The Kohler global communications building in Wisconsin is LEED Gold certified. The one-story, 79,000-square-foot building was opened in June 2012 and uses low- or noVOC paints, natural landscaping, and Kohler’s own waterefficient plumbing systems.

Hybrid faucets On the commercial side, Kohler has combined its Touchless Insight faucets with its hybrid energy system, which features a hybrid energy cell that provides maintenance-free power for 30 years. The system is manufactured with eco-friendly materials, and Kohler also replaces the energy cell at the end of the faucet’s life.

example,” David says.

“So in 2008, we decided that everything we built going forward would be designed to LEED standards.”

The company’s first LEED effort was the renovation of the environmental, health, and safety building on its campus in Wisconsin. To achieve Silver under the LEED-EB criteria, Kohler made several enhancements to the building’s exterior and interior. The building achieved a 50 percent reduction in water usage by installing new fixtures in the bathrooms, including Kohler waterless urinals, highefficiency toilet, and touchless faucets.

Natural lighting is used throughout the building, and long-lasting, low-energy compact fluorescent bulbs were installed.

New landscaping included native Wisconsin plant life, and Kohler instated a green cleaning program, so only environmentally friendly cleaning products are used to in the building. All told, the building received all five points in the LEED Innovations category.

Since then, Kohler has continued down the path to LEED certification. In November 2011, just two years after the renovation of the environmental, health, and safety building, Kohler opened its first LEED-NC Gold-certified office building in Zibo, China. Compared to a standard office building of the same size and location, the facility uses significantly less potable water and energy, and 95 percent of its construction waste material was recycled.

The company’s new global communications building in Kohler, Wisconsin, built in 2012 to house its 180 corporate communications departments, is also certified Gold under LEED-NC. The 79,000-square-foot building, designed

by Gensler, features water-conserving Kohler plumbing products, which will save an estimated 330,140 gallons of water per year. Thanks to a white roof, task lighting at each workstation, and low-mercury light fixtures and bulbs, the building uses approximately 18 percent less energy than a comparable building.

More that 20 percent of materials were harvested and manufactured within a 500-mile radius, and 20 percent of materials were recycled.

“It’s my responsibility to ensure that this company continues to evolve and grow to be a proper reflection of our values.”

David Kohler, Jr., Kohler Co.

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Although David acknowledges that the company has achieved a lot in regard to sustainability since 2008, he still believes it has a ways to go, but he is ready to lead it there. “It’s my responsibility to ensure that this company continues to evolve and grow to be a proper reflection of our values, and I’m excited about that challenge,” he says.

If anyone can take Kohler into the next generation of sustainability, it’s David, in whom the company’s guiding principles have been deeply ingrained since birth. He began working at Kohler during summers in 1983. He didn’t return permanently to the company until 1993, after receiving a bachelor’s degree from Duke University, then a master’s degree in business administration from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, and working elsewhere. He joined Kohler as director of fixtures marketing for plumbing and specialty products. “I always knew I’d be back, because it’s an incredible company,” says David, who represents the fourth generation of the Kohler family to hold a leadership role in the business. “When you understand what the company stands for and see that those principles are true throughout the culture, you can’t help but be awed.”

Yet David acknowledges that this journey will not be easy. “Are we going to be perfect day one? No, but we’re on a path to strive for that,” he says. “And honestly, we don’t know exactly how we’ll get there in all of our areas; if we did, we’d do it tomorrow. But we’re holding ourselves accountable for consistent annual reductions, and that is going to lead to incremental improvements.” gb&d gbdmagazine.com

TRENDSETTERS

Shopping al fresco is more pleasant than walking stale, sterile corridors. It’s also greener, which is why Santa Monica Place may be the future of retail.

By Jennifer Nunez

In 2010, Santa Monica Place was transformed from a claustrophobic indoor mall to an open-air shopping destination.

It was a massive and applause-worthy undertaking, yet not even Macerich, the property’s developer could have imagined the success of the metamorphosis.

“We always have a fiduciary responsibility to be cost-effective and sensible in what we do,” says Jeff Bedell, vice president of sustainability at Macerich. “With Santa Monica Place, all those things really came into line, and we achieved the type of development we envisioned.” gb&d

The open-air Santa Monica Place, in the heart of Santa Monica, California, received LEED Gold certification, and all its sustainable elements make it a perfect place to go shopping while spending the day outdoors.

“The efforts started at the design table and early in the conceptual work,” Bedell says. Those efforts paid off because Santa Monica Place received five points in LEED’s Materials and Resources category due to its dedicated reuse of building elements, construction-waste management, and use of certified wood. More than

Santa Monica Place opened in August 2010 and received its LEED Gold certification for Core & Shell in June 2012. By converting the space into an outdoor mall, Macerich offset 3 million kWh of energy.

90 percent of construction waste was diverted from landfills. “It was looked at carefully [regarding] how and what could remain and be reused,” Bedell says. “It would have been quite easy to bulldoze everything and start from scratch.”

The common areas incorporate a mix of concrete applications and aggregate, and most of them were created with recycled content. Macerich reused the existing structure and used recycled may–june 2013

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TRENDSETTERS Macerich

“It would have been quite easy to bulldoze everything and start from scratch, [but] we always have a fiduciary responsibility to be cost-effective and sensible in what we do.”

Jeff Bedell, Macerich

steel for the bones of the project. On those bones, it added low-VOC materials, paint, adhesives, and drywall “to ensure it’s a healthy environment for guests and people who work there long-term,” Bedell says. Macerich also installed an energy-efficient HVAC system, lighting, and controls systems, and the company provided tenant criteria packages, which pushed retailers to strive for greater energy efficiency. “The types of lights selected were not only for aesthetic impacts for design, but also for efficiency,” Bedell says.

Indeed, Macerich used various lighting types on the project, including metal halide, LED, induction, and T5 fluorescents. “It was a matter of selecting the best output and highest efficiency,” says Bedell. “Was it a hallway, a parking structure, ambient light, or an accent light?

We truly have a mix of almost any and all high-efficiency sources you can think of.”

LED bulbs, for instance, are found in various accent and decorative applications such as signage and backlit displays.

The technological backbone and controls in the operating systems allow Macerich to continue monitoring the development’s energy use. Keeping track of what’s running and how it’s running on a day-to-day basis is the only way to ensure the design intents are intact. “It’s easy to design a building and implement systems,” Bedell says, “then several years later, they’re running amok, and you’re not quite sure what they’re doing or how they’re doing as far as efficiency or optimization. We wanted to have that ongoing monitoring capability to be able to set those benchmarks, set those thresholds, and make sure that we not only met design intent and efficiencies the day the mall The three-story, 550,000-square-foot shopping center opened, but we wanted to was designed by renowned architect Frank Gehry. make sure we were meeting During construction, 90 percent of construction waste

those optimal levels of operation 10 years down the road.”

The original structure featured numerous waterfalls, but Macerich tore them down to divert the water for use in irrigation, bathrooms, and cleaning. The company strove to design and implement a system to make sure it doesn’t over-water. “Watering the sidewalk—not a good idea,” Bedell says, referring to that most common result of poor planning. “The systems need to be designed properly to ensure there isn’t waste.” Macerich reduced irrigation needs by 60 percent compared to the previous indoor space, and by installing automatic fixtures, low-flow toilets, and waterless urinals—as well as Dyson Airblade hand dryers—it reduced bathroom water use by 42 percent.

Santa Monica Place’s transformation won a handful of prestigious design awards, but the most coveted was the International Council of Shopping Centers 2012 Design Development Award for Sustainability. gb&d

was diverted from landfills, and the shopping center has water-efficient landscaping and a green roof element.

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gbdmagazine.com

TRENDSETTERS

Sweden’s Greenest Export The well-known global retailer offers a transformative model of sustainable manufacturing

By Michelle Markelz The next time you’re in the market for some GLIMMA unscented tea lights, you may be too fascinated by the most popular Swedish import since ABBA to notice that the shrink-wrap surrounding that 100-count pack, which used to be sold in big plastic bags that wasted space and increased the number of shipments the company had to make, is just one of the ways IKEA is reexamining every aspect of its business to become more sustainable.

“Everything stems from our founder, Ingvar Kamprad,” says director of public affairs Joseph Roth. In the south of Sweden where Kamprad lived, the people lived an agrarian life, but only after wresting the land into working condition. IKEA was born of the entrepreneurial spirit of a boy who started out selling matches, and today it is a global homefurnishings company with stores in 40 countries.

The appreciation for cultivation and the value of a clean and fruitful earth were important to Kamprad’s countrymen and are central to IKEA’s sustainability platform. “Our corporate culture stems from our rural southern Swedish roots, where people control their own destinies,” Roth says. “They show initiative and take responsibility for their actions. We do the same at every step in our production process.”

One of the greatest assets IKEA has in streamlining its initiatives is that it’s a privately held company that owns every aspect of its production chain—from the design drawing board to its iconic gb&d

color-blocked stores. This means IKEA is being responsible in lumber and cotton harvesting, resourceful in its designs, economical in its production and shipping, and minimalist in its packaging.

In 2011, the company improved its cotton acquisition by upping its share of sustainable fiber to 23.8 percent. IKEA hopes to eventually source all its lumber from responsibly managed forests that are independently verified. Not sacrificing style for sustainability, pieces such as the LACK tables are constructed of pounded-together waste wood that is then covered by a solid veneer.

With suppliers in 55 countries, IKEA has been able to mitigate some of the common contributors to global warming despite its worldwide presence. In 2012, IKEA Distribution Services earned a SmartWay Shipper Award from the EPA for top environmental performance and efficiency in moving freight. By increasing its supplier network, cutting out the middleman (itself), and using lowemission vehicles, the retailer is shaving miles off its shipping and passing the savings on to consumers.

The content of those freights is getting leaner as well. IKEA’s unassembled products not only satisfy the tinkerer in us all but also save space; it takes seven furniture trucks to carry the amount of furniture in of one of IKEA’s trucks. The flat-pack method allows objects to fit together in a compact array with minimal packaging—lamps, for example, that don’t require any cardboard because the design itself provides enough security.

And remember the tea lights? Similar to the way they were once sold in plastic

The Recipe for Solar What’s one energy-saving advantage of being a big-box store? That giant rectangular roof and the thousands of square feet of solar-panel space it provides. IKEA has made strides in the United States to outfit 39 of its 44 stores and distribution centers with corporately owned and operated photovoltaic arrays. Through the roughly $767 million IKEA has invested globally in renewable energy, the company is on its way to reaching its goal of total energy independence by 2020.

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TRENDSETTERS IKEA

“Our corporate culture stems from our rural southern Swedish roots, where people control their own destinies. They show initiative and take responsibility for their actions. We do the same at every step in our production process.”

Joseph Roth, IKEA

250,000+

Number of solar panels installed on IKEA buildings across the world.

Currently, the company is 50% energy independent through renewable energy.

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(USA), and Inovateus Solar to advance renewable energy across its US locations.

Rather than leasing out its roofs, the furniture giant owns all of its solar equipment, removing any barriers to using its full potential.

IKEA’s efforts have benefitted more than just its bottom line. At Round Rock, where solar installation was completed in September 2012, the amount of clean energy harvested annually will reduce 1,822 tons of carbon dioxide that would have been produced from nonrenewable resources. That’s the equivalent of eliminating emissions from 324 cars or powering 206 homes for a year. The IKEA store in New Haven generates enough renewable energy to relieve the atmosphere of 836 tons of carbon dioxide annually, which is equivalent to the emissions of 149 cars or 95 homes over the course of one year.

To reach its goal of 100 percent renewable energy use by 2020, Roth says IKEA is exploring options outside solar and wind generation. Already some of the clean power not harvested on-site comes from energy providers that use their own techniques to generate renewable energy.

“In Oregon and Washington, most electricity is generated via hydropower,” Roth says, “so that’s a very renewable and very green energy option for us.”

Beyond electricity, the company has explored geothermal options to replace gas-based heating systems as well.

Although not as pervasive as its solar effort—only 20 sites worldwide and one US location have geothermal capabilities— the initiative is impressive nonetheless, especially considering that it’s nearly impossible to do a geothermal retrofit.

However, at the new stores slated for Miami and Kansas City, Missouri, Roth says geothermal and solar options will be explored before concrete is poured. In the coming years, if complete renewable energy is still out of reach, the company might explore biomass plants as another potential source.

lamp of the Future Meet ONSJÖ, just another typically hardto-pronounce yet distinct and stylish LED chandelier by IKEA. The last bit is the important part: LED is becoming standard on IKEA lamps, and by 2016 stores will sell only LED lighting. ONSJÖ is reminiscent of old atomic models with rings floating around a central sphere. The LEDs in this chromeplated lamp are tiny and irreplaceable, but that’s rather moot when you consider they’ll last about 20 years. Like all LEDs, the bulbs emit less heat—another energy saver—and put out more light than their incandescent equivalents, meaning lower wattage and less electricity use on utility bills.

If shoppers aren’t encouraged by the example IKEA is setting, the retailer is prepared and has already made changes to nudge its customers in the direction of sustainable lifestyles. “Rather than just focus on home furnishings, we want to empower our customers to live more sustainably,” Roth says. IKEA has started by eliminating plastic bags at checkout counters and installing low-flush toilets in its store restrooms.

Its current endeavor is a few years away from fruition, but a changeover to exclusively selling LED lighting products by 2016 is in the works. Already, a host of lamps are incorporating the low-energy, low-heat bulbs and opening a new world for lighting designers. With tiny, embeddable bulbs, lamps are no longer limited by unsightly sockets. As for its own on-site lighting, Roth explains that IKEA is making a separate effort to convert to LED but must act appropriately to absorb the cost. The retailer just completed an across-the-board switch from incandescent to compact fluorescent lamps.

For all its work to produce furnishings in an environmentally responsible manner, IKEA still catches some fire from critics regarding its indirect contribution to consumer waste that ends up in landfills and dumps. IKEA openly discloses the gbdmagazine.com

Photo: Per Liedberg

bags with extra space, many of IKEA’s cloth products such as comforters and pillows are now shrink-wrapped to fit more in each pallet, thus reducing the number of trucks per shipment.

One of IKEA’s most publicized sustainability efforts, however, is a link farther down the production chain. “We recognize that we are at the forefront of companies who are making investments in renewable energy,” Roth says, “and we are proud [that] we are able to make such a commitment and set such an example.”

That commitment is represented by the 39 stores and distribution centers in the United States that IKEA has outfitted with solar panels and the more than 100 wind turbines it owns and operates in six countries in Europe. Locations in the United States harvest 49 gigawatt-hours of clean electricity per year. To date, IKEA generates 50 percent of the electric energy used at its locations. Because they don’t require as much air-conditioning— nor will you find any Swedish meatballs being served a la carte—the stores are running almost entirely with on-site solar power.

The most recent installations are atop stores in Round Rock, Texas, and New Haven, Connecticut, as well as in cities in North Carolina, Florida, and Massachusetts. Distribution centers in Maryland and New Jersey also boast solar arrays.

IKEA has partnered with solar solutions companies such as Gehrlicher Solar, REC Solar, SoCore Energy, Gloria Solar

TRENDSETTERS

It’s like having your own sun.

The ONSJÖ lamp, designed to look like an atom, is just one of many LED options for IKEA consumers.

A Message from minimalist designs of its furniture that GSAC incorporate honeycomb cores and waste GSAC is the United States wood composite legs. When compared subsidiary of the international to a solid wood coffee table, a piece like photovoltaic system integrator, the LACK table is not likely to match Gehrlicher Solar AG. The in lifespan or durability, but Roth says US-based business began IKEA’s products are no more likely than operations in late 2010 and is anyone else’s to end up in a landfill. He headquartered in Springfield, adds that the products’ high recycled New Jersey. GSAC specialcontent makes them easier to recycle, izes in the full life-cycle of and the lengths to which the retailer has commercial solar projects, improved its production efficiency make including design, construction the pieces more sustainable over their management, and financing. lifespan than products crafted without To date, GSAC has more than IKEA’s guiding standards.

20 MW of commercial projects As an international retailer selling in development across the US, as well as a recently launched bulk quantities of housewares and appliwholesale business offering ances, IKEA is in a unique position to set an industry example and leverage its suc- solar modules, inverters, and proprietary components from cess to promote sustainable innovation our GehrTec product portfolio. among its partners. Fortunately, all signs For further information, please point to a company that understands visit www.gehrlicher.us. this. Whirlpool, for example, crafts cooktops for IKEA’s kitchen collection and has been an integral partner in making energy-saving induction technology affordable and accessible to IKEA shoppers, customers who traditionally may not have been able to afford such environmentally conscious systems. Such is the way of IKEA, circumventing conventional wisdom for a path all l its own. gb&d

IKEA + the EV Project

gb&d

h East Palo Alto, CA j Emeryville, CA k Portland, OR l Renton, WA

www.gehrlicher.us

• Power Plants • Roof Top Systems • Components & Systems Gehrlicher Solar America Corp. • 21 Fadem Road • Springfield, NJ 07081 Tel. +1 908 219 4379 • Fax +1 908 219 4375 • Toll Free +1 877 844 9174 usa@gehrlicher.com

It’s Game Day.

k

When your team takes the field, we take the time to prepare food just for you and serve on recyclable materials.

By partnering with ECOtality, IKEA has been able to participate in the EV Project, a pilot program funded by the Department of Energy to host electric vehicle-charging stations in partners’ parking lots. The nine locations below j are where the program is in place. h Expansion of the project will depend on funding and the success of the pilot. a Tempe, AZ s San Diego, CA d Covina, CA f Costa Mesa, CA g Carson, CA

You also can turn the sun into your own personal source of energy and revenue:

When your quarterback takes the snap, we snap into action to ensure our stadiums produce zero waste.

And when your team scores the winning touchdown, we help our community score, by partnering with local organizations and supporting our community food banks.

Because when it comes to sustainability, we refuse to lose. gd f s

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TRENDSETTERS

Keeping AN Eye on Zero Ohio State University sustainability coordinator Corey Hawkey details the university’s plan to reach zero waste by 2030

When Ohio State University committed to a zero-waste initiative in 2011, sustainability coordinator Corey Hawkey knew it would be a challenge. Today, however, the university has a 30.8 percent wastediversion rate and hopes to up that to 40 percent in about a year. Below, Hawkey tells gb&d how that’s going to happen.

Interview by Julie Schaeffer What was the impetus for beginning the zero-waste initiative at Ohio Stadium?

Corey Hawkey: The idea had been floating around for a while, since 2008 or 2009 as part of Ohio State’s sustainability initiatives, but like any new initiative, it took time and effort to get it off the ground. In 2011, Ohio State’s Office of Energy Services and Sustainability put together a proposal to get a grant from the university’s President and Provost’s Council on Sustainability. They gave us seed funding to get the program off the ground.

How did you come up with your goal of 90 percent waste diversion?

Ninety percent is the number Zero Waste International, a nonprofit group, uses to define zero waste. Colorado University at Boulder and University of California at Davis also use that methodology. We also had some other objectives of our own, including 75 percent waste diversion from our stadium by the end of 2011, which we accomplished.

How did you get started?

The number one thing we needed to do was establish a team of the major stake-

2014 and Beyond

holders. They included facilities operations and development, which is where I serve as sustainability coordinator for the office of energy services and sustainability; department of athletics; our food vendor, Sodexo; our sports marketing group, IMG Sports Marketing; our recycler and hauler [at the time], Waste Management; and our compost facility, Price Farms Organics. We brought them all to the table from the beginning and made sure we were all on the same page.

Was it hard getting them on board?

Initially, yes. But once we had the

“We’re not talking about trash and recycling. We’re talking about sustainable materials management, which involves minimizing waste at the source.”

Corey Hawkey, Ohio State University

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Ohio State University hopes to be at 40 percent waste diversion by the end of fiscal year 2014, and 90 percent by the end of 2030. “As we move beyond the stadium to the university at large, we need to make sure that our infrastructure is adequate,” Corey Hawkey says. “And we need to address our recycling of organics—food scraps, landscape debris, and animal bedding—to ensure that we’re capturing all of those materials.”

support from the very top of the university and a clear plan, everyone rallied behind it.

Why the stadium first?

It was ambitious because it holds an average of 103,000 fans per game, but we wanted to be one of the country’s first stadiums to achieve zero waste. It was a controlled environment; we can limit what goes in and what comes out.

And, it allowed us to demonstrate that zero waste was possible on campus. Ohio Stadium is a gateway to the campus, and gbdmagazine.com

TRENDSETTERS

“We hope our stadium effort will be the foundation for our other efforts across campus.”

Corey Hawkey, Ohio State University

Ohio State worked on making its stadium sustainable by starting a recycling program, using low-flow fixtures, and adding a composting pile.

we said, “If we can do this here, we can do it anywhere.”

Were there any challenges to establishing the stadium program?

We use at least 800 garbage-can liners a game. That’s a lot of liners, but switching to compostable versions wasn’t a possibility. They were too weak, they didn’t

30.8

Percent of waste currently diverted from Ohio State University.

Sustainability coordinator Corey Hawkey is in charge of tripling that number by 2030. gb&d

2010

2011

98.2%

77.9

70

highest diversion rate (up from 82.4% in 2011)

58.0

44.3

40

59.8

60 50

Trash Recycling Trash Diversion

19.4

12.3

10

23.2

30 20

16.6% reduction in trash (compared to 2011 season)

2012

80

51.7

Do you do anything with your organic compost?

When we recycle organics, some of it is composted, like the materials at the stadium, but some is disposed of in an anaerobic digester. At the digester, materials are converted to electricity, clean natural gas, and soil amendment. That’s part of our strategy to reach 90 percent.

We’re not talking about trash and recycling. We’re talking about sustainable materials management, which involves minimizing waste at the source, organics recycling, and regular recycling.

OSU Materials Management Season Comparison

TONS

What strategies did you use to reduce your waste?

The first thing we did was work with Sodexo to look at the materials used throughout the stadium. They had to be compostable or recyclable. Then we determined that we were going to say food and fiber will be compost, and everything else will be recycled. With 103,000 people you can’t make a lot of exceptions. Along the way, we also had to change the infrastructure in the stadium, change how we cleaned up, and establish an education and outreach plan.

come in the right size, and they cost too much. We decided to use the same liners we had been using, but we added the recycling logo to the bags we were using for recyclable items so we could identify what bags to divert. It might not sound like a big deal, but it was a make-or-break moment for us. We also had a challenge with contamination from materials we hadn’t switched over yet—things like coffee cup lids. We had to make sure they didn’t get in the compost.

Was it important for you to get students on board?

Believe it or not, they consume less material than other areas [of the stadium].

We’re still working on engaging them, though. We asked the marching band to make a recycling symbol once last year, and there’s a recycling video that’s shown on the screen of our mascot recy-

72.3% increase in diversion rate (compared to 2011 season)

cling with the cheerleaders. We also have a team of six volunteers on the day of the game that manages the program and makes sure it’s running smoothly.

What are your plans for the next year?

We hope our stadium effort will be the foundation for our other efforts across campus. We’re taking bold steps, looking for ways to avert products in the first place—make sure they don’t even come to campus—but if and when they do, make sure we can either reuse them or recycle them. We’re already starting to see the effect. We have a zero-waste event service that anyone on campus can request. We’ve expanded our collection of organic materials, such as food scraps, to five of our major eateries, and we’ve achieved an estimated 85 percent waste diversion in our four-star hotel. gb&d may–june 2013

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TRENDSETTERS

The Life and Legacy of Vernon Swaback

When he was just 17, he caught the eye of Frank Lloyd Wright and became the youngest apprentice the icon ever took on, eventually leading the Wright Foundation as its director of planning. He has a deep and elusive sense of what sustainability means, and an examination of his work only points back to the genius of Wright and our own confused notions of necessity.

By Ashley T. Kjos

Vernon Swaback is sitting in a small, sunlit studio, his mother on his right and his father on his left. A door opens and Frank Lloyd Wright walks in. He asks the 17-year-old Swaback why he wants to leave the University of Illinois.

“They are beginning to teach preconceived ideas,” Swaback tells him. There is a beat. Then Wright looks at Swaback’s mother, then at his father, and eventually says, “Where does he get it? From you? Or from you?” gb&d

The conversation continued, but Swaback knew then that the interview was over and that his life was about to be changed forever. He became a member of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin Fellowship, the youngest person ever to be invited in.

His answer had impressed Wright.

What enabled the young man to give such an audacious response? When asked about it, Swaback defers to Wright’s own power. “When you’re in the presence of a man like that, you’re inspired not to give

an ‘aw-shucks-I-don’t-know-type’ answer.”

After meeting Swaback, however, it’s clear that’s not the whole truth. Something in Vernon Swaback enabled him to reply the way he did. It was the difference between intimidation and inspiration.

The indefinable ability to form a fresh perspective is what has set Swaback apart throughout his accomplished career as an architect and planner. His firm, Swaback Partners, is responsible for some of the most significant planning projects in Arizona’s history, including the award-winning Arizona Biltmore Estates. He is a registered architect in 15 states and has been inducted into the College of Fellows by both the American Institute of Architects and the American Institute of Certified Planners. A life, however, isn’t defined by a list of accomplishments, and Vern Swaback responds to questions about his life and legacy with his most candid response—bewilderment.

Before the young Swaback found himself in that Wisconsin studio with his parents, he had met a few of Wright’s may–june 2013

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TRENDSETTERS Vernon Swaback

“Some people would think of it as a hardship, but ...

I’d walk out under the dark and the stars and sleep with the fresh air blowing over me.”

VERNON Swaback, swaback partners

apprentices at the Sheraton Hotel in Chicago on October 17, 1956, which Mayor Richard J. Daley proclaimed to be Frank Lloyd Wright Day. That night, during a dinner in his honor, Wright proposed his famous Mile High Building. The Illinois, if built, would have been four times the height of the Empire State Building. At the dinner, Wright’s apprentices told Swaback if he wanted to meet the great architect that he should send him a letter. Swaback was a student at the University of Illinois at the time, and he sent the letter. Eventually arrangements were made for an interview at Taliesin, the summer home of Wright and his fellowship.

Convincing his religious parents to drive him up to meet the man—whom some perceived to be flamboyant—at the site of an infamous murder wasn’t easy, Swaback recalls, but he was ultimately successful. After being invited to apprentice with Wright, Swaback left the university and became immersed in a creative

world he’d become interested in as a boy, long before he knew the word ‘architecture’ or the name Frank Lloyd Wright.

Swaback’s holistic views on sustainability were formed during that time spent with the Taliesin Fellows, migrating from Wisconsin in the summer to Arizona and Taliesin West in the winter. “I won’t live as sustainably as that ever again,” Swaback says. “We didn’t have low-E glass or solar panels or any of the other bells and whistles,” explaining that instead he and the others experienced an unmatched feeling of connection to nature and the elements while sleeping in tents and working outside. When they worked on the building of Taliesin West they used stone available on the site and made concrete from sand where they slept. “Some people would think of it as a hardship, sleeping in a tent, but I could work until midnight and not have to commute anywhere,” Swaback says. “I’d walk out under the dark and the stars and sleep with the fresh air blowing over me.”

The communities at Taliesin and Taliesin West had such a feeling of community and intellectual connectivity that Swaback expressed feelings of anxiety driving through towns and cities in the Midwest while they traveled during the change of the seasons. “I thought ‘What if I got stuck in this town?’” he recalls. “It was a feeling that I would be cut off from life, which was odd because where I was going was a place in the middle of the desert, a place much more remote. But it was a hotbed of international knowledge and awareness.”

Swaback certainly believes that the technology we employ today is incredible and useful but maintains his thesis that sustainability is much more dependent on human behavior than anything technology can produce. “Technology is an amplifier rather than a solution,” he says. “It allows us to do whatever our natural tendencies are, but at a greater scale, whether those tendencies are good or bad.”

Vernon Swaback on Leadership An obvious influence on your work is your time with Frank Lloyd Wright. How would you define his leadership style? Wright would say that he was not a teacher and Taliesin was not a school.

We were there to help him. If we got something out of it, all the better. He would speak formally Sunday mornings about politics, and poetry, anything.

working together and being committed to the endless pursuit of ideas. There are times when someone will make an appointment to see me, and we just talk. I have at times taken individuals to jobsites or to design-related events. I’ve written nine books, but each individual has to find their own way. No one can do that for another.

How did he shape you? Wright was balked at by educators who said he was just creating a bunch of little Frank Lloyd Wrights. With a characteristic twinkle in his eye, he would deny the allegation, then add, “Besides, there’s no such thing as a ‘little Frank Lloyd Wright’” [laughs]. That’s not what he was about. You couldn’t be around Wright without becoming a better version of yourself.

Seeing the legacy that was left by notable architects you’ve worked with, do you ever think of your own legacy? I’ve received many wonderful accolades, but most of all, I remember Wright saying, “When they call you a genius, don’t believe them.” The reality is that I’m not sure I have any idea how to assess who I am or what I’ve done other than living with the uneasy feeling of always feeling like an outsider. I just don’t think of myself as anyone other than someone outside the mainstream who has had extraordinary opportunities. I still

How do you mentor another person? There’s no formal way. It’s a natural phenomenon of

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have a sense of being lost, reaching toward something.

What is it that you’re reaching for? A little over two years ago we created the public charity 501(c)3 Two Worlds Community Foundation.

It occurred to me that those who are most involved in adding to the built environment are more concerned with codes, ordinances, financing sales, and marketing of their own projects than what everything is adding up to becoming. At the other extreme are the highlevel institutes that are more at home in the clear atmosphere of policy than what is happening on the ground where they live, work, learn, shop, and play. These are two very different worlds.

My foundation has been designed to attract and give these two worlds incentives and permission to interact, starting with those who have not yet settled in to the challenges and comfort of either of the two worlds.

gbdmagazine.com

TRENDSETTERS

Skyfire, Swaback’s own residence, honors the desert in form and materiality with walls that are 12 inches thick and made of volcanic ash.

INSIDE Skyfire At Home with Vernon Swaback

Swaback had been an apprentice of Frank Lloyd Wright for just more than two years when Wright died on April 9, 1959. Swaback chose to stay on at the Wright Foundation. He stayed for 21 years. He eventually became its director of planning and oversaw some of the foundation’s most significant architectural projects.

For Swaback, the question whether or not to stay was an easy one. “There was never any struggle over staying or going,” he says. “I didn’t even think about it until 20 years had passed. Then the real struggle was leaving. By then it had become my schooling, my work, my home, and my life.” Swaback left the foundation when he was 38 years old. “I didn’t own a car. I didn’t have a key chain because I didn’t have anything to lock. There’s almost a luxurious freedom about that.”

In his own mind he hadn’t done enough to deserve a reputation as a proficient architect. “When I left Taliesin, I had no money and was working as a one man shop,” Swaback says. “I had to ask, ‘What’s in me? What do I have when all the trappings of genius are gone?’” What Swaback had was that same unknown quality that caught Wright’s eye and has never been extinguished. He established Vernon Swaback Associates in 1978, which became Swaback Partners in 1999.

The firm has since been a prominent source of forward-thinking and holistic design philosophies.

Swaback Partners recently collaborated with the Navajo Housing Authority, on a project “unprecedented in its magnitude,” Swaback says. Working with representatives of the Navajo Nation, which spans 27,000 square miles or roughly the size of West Virginia, the project involves the planning of five Navajo agencies, gb&d

which are equivalent to American states; 24 regions, equivalent to counties; and 110 chapters, equivalent to cities and towns. To facilitate involvement, Swaback and his team have held individual meetings in more than 30 places all over the Navajo Nation.

“We go to each individual location and cover the walls of the meeting rooms with a profusion of drawings and plans, not to further our own ideas or direction, but rather to stimulate and inspire responsive dialogue,” Swaback says. “[In this way,] they’ve been able identify basic considerations for how to plan, design, and live, including building systems and materials, orientation and shading, water harvesting, and that which the built environment can do to have a positive influence in the direction of cooperative behavior.”

Another notable and highly successful project is the family-centric Martis Camp in Truckee, California. Designed

by Swaback’s long-term partner, John Sather, Martis Camp is a luxury community—luxury in a sense that Swaback and Wright understand different than most people. “Wright would say, ‘I learned early in life that I could get along without the necessities if only I could have the luxuries,’” Swaback says. “This would always get a good laugh. Wright’s idea of luxury wasn’t anything that money alone could buy. It was to live with beauty and culture and to be able to associate with intelligent people and the bounty of nature.” Martis Camp has many amenities, but of the 2,127 acres, well more than half of its total land area will remain true to its natural environment with the native vegetation intact.

Swaback’s life was forever changed when he gave that unexpected response

“A guiding principle in the design of my family’s residence is that I wanted to feel somewhat exposed and vulnerable to the elements. We named it ‘Skyfire’ to be a celebration of the atmospheric effects of the desert. We built the house out of scoria, which is a volcanic ash. We have 12-inchthick walls and concrete floors; we have this great thermal mass. Both the gardens and the interiors include sculpture and murals from our line of Skyfire artifacts, which are offered as custom features of the houses and buildings we design for others.

It is somewhat of a successor to my tent at Taliesin. There are a lot of fabric canopies.

When it rains I hear the same drum-like sounds the way I did at Taliesin West. It’s my evolution of the tent.”

to one of history’s greatest architects. “I think I’m always formulating responses; I’m thinking all the time about what this notion of design and architecture has the power to achieve,” Swaback says.

And the questions still exist. For Swaback, his fascination with Wright’s influence hasn’t been satiated. “What was it about him and his work that is forever an inspiration?” he says. “Considering the high praise and publicity accorded the many star architects who continue to build with increasing grandeur all over the world, how is it that this lone architect who was born just two years after the Civil War and lived most of his life in remote, hard-to-reach places remains the singular iconic name? It implies that his life and work represents something that we might want to be more interested in exploring.”

Just as Swaback still wonders about Wright, Wright once wondered about Swaback. Where does he get it? The truth is that we don’t know where that elusive greatness comes from, in either architect, and if we did, perhaps it would cease to be so exceptional. gb&d may–june 2013

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TRENDSETTERS

Doug Widener’s Three-Year Plan The new director of community advancement at the USGBC is in the perfect position to help the green-building industry mature

By Benjamin van Loon

D

oug Widener is excited. As an industry, what’s become known as green building is still young, and for leaders such as Widener, who became the USGBC’s newest director of community advancement in August 2012, the industry’s youth means that it has infinite opportunity. “We’ve only scratched the surface,” Widener says. “As we diversify and get more involved in projects that are moving green building forward for all communities, we’re really going to start hitting that tipping point.”

I met up with Widener while he was in Chicago for a few days before going back to Washington, DC, then Orlando, Florida, and Columbus, Ohio, for his work with the USGBC. He lives in Chicago and picked to meet at a place he knows very well: the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum, where he worked for 10 years before going to the USGBC. At the nature museum we were surrounded by flowers and prairie grasses, and at first glance, his pinstriped, twobutton suit and banded tie suggested a businessman out of his element. But after we shook hands and started talking, Widener looked very much at home at his old place of work. In the years he was there, he started as an educator, then became director of education, and finally worked as the vice president of education for the nature museum for four years before going on to be the first staff member for the then nascent Chicago chapter of the USGBC. Although softspoken, he is articulate and intelligent

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with the cool, contemplative demeanor of a dedicated professional.

Widener is most passionate when talking about how the successes, advancements, and programmatic shifts of the green-building industry have been—and continue to be—possible only through working with others. “There are 77 national USGBC chapters, and being in this new role with the USGBC helps me—and all of us—realize that we’re all on the same page,” Widener says. “I’ve been through a lot of ups and downs, and I want to take that experience to now help other chapters.”

The USGBC was originally formed in 1993, but it wasn’t until the green building industry boom in the early 2000s when myriad volunteer-run state chapters started to sprout up. That boom was partly fueled by a thriving building industry though the interest in green building came from the local grassroots support generated by the growing state chapters.

When Widener became the executive director of what was then USGBC-Chicago in 2006, he was the organization’s first staff member, but instead of coming from the building profession, he was joining via the nonprofit industry—a conceptual shift indicative of the USGBC’s

RIGHT Doug Widener, director of community advancement for the USGBC, is working to bring separate chapters within one state together to form a single entity, as he did in Illinois.

“I’ve been through a lot of ups and downs, and I want to take that experience to now help other chapters.”

Doug Widener, USGBC

photo: samantha simmons

DOUG WIDENER

TRENDSETTERS Doug Widener

“There are so many great ideas out in the chapter network, and our role will be to both identify great programs and help other chapters replicate them.”

Doug Widener, USGBC

dynamic role as a transforming agent in and beyond the green building industry.

Two years into his stint with USGBCChicago, Widener and the rest of the United States had to face the economic downturn. Aside from the obvious difficulties presented by the industry collapse, Widener and his board saw the challenge as an incentive to begin consolidating the separate Chicago and Central Illinois chapters to form USGBC-Illinois in 2009. Now that he is at the national level, Widener continues to promote consolidation of chapters in other states.

“Florida has seven chapters, California has eight, Ohio has four,” Widener says.

“We’re working on helping our chapters collaborate more closely so that if they don’t consolidate, they can at least work more closely together. We grew when the economy was great, but now we have to shrink a little bit to be more effective.”

In addition to his consolidation efforts, Widener also oversaw some major precedent-setting programs while with USGBC-Illinois, including the Regional Green Building Case Studies Project, a two-year, post-occupancy study concluded in 2010. The project was executed

by USGBC-Illinois in partnership with the EPA and the City of Chicago analyz-

ing the performance, costs, and benefits of 51 LEED projects in Illinois. Since the study was completed, it’s been replicated by other state chapters.

Widener’s leadership also led to Greenbuild being hosted twice in Chicago while he was head of USGBCIllinois, during which time he also made recommendations under House Joint Resolution 45 for greening Illinois schools, created the Urban Open garden project, and formed a unique partnership with the Chicago Community Loan Fund and the Alliance for Environmental Sustainability to train affordable-housing providers in the area on green-building techniques. He also helped launch the Emerald Awards, which started in 2012 by honoring projects and leaders in the Illinois green-building industry.

“Illinois is currently the largest USGBC chapter by membership and in the top five for budget and staff, so Illinois is seen as a leader,” Widener says. And while he is still a chapter member, it was his leadership that now puts him on the national circuit, where he is currently overseeing a three-year national USGBC plan that was launched at the end of 2012 and encourages diversity and cohesion between national and state chapters.

“Everything in this three-year plan is focused on how to diversify the movement, how to dive deeper, how to be resilient, and how to get people engaged,” Widener says. “There are so many great ideas out in the chapter network, and our role will be to both identify great programs and help other chapters replicate them.”

Although the economy continues to test the strength of the industry, Widener believes every challenge presents an opportunity. As the green-building industry is now looking just as critically at existing buildings as it is at new projects, an aspect of Widener’s efforts detail the evaluation of extant assets for new possibilities.

“I think there’s a lot of untapped potential for further collaboration between the USGBC and its chapters,” Widener says. “We do a lot already, but we can do more.” gb&d

Doug Widener on Leadership

What were some highlights of your leadership at USGBC-Illinois? I was the first staff member with USGBC-Illinois, and I had never been at the executive level working so closely with the board. It was a great opportunity, but because it

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was so new to everyone, we all had to work on growing together as we transitioned to being a professional organization. The best way to achieve anything is through partnerships.

What were some challenges—especially with the constant changes of green building—during your leadership? The economy was probably the biggest challenge, but there are opportunities in every challenge. Also, successfully merging the Chicago and Central Illinois chapters was a challenge, but we saw the potential in unifying as a statewide nonprofit.

What are some strategies you are going to carry over into your national role, and what will change? I’m a big-picture thinker, but to get to that picture, you need to implement. We did that really well locally, and that’s something that I’m bringing to my team now as we launch this three-year plan. My leadership style is less to tell people what I think and more to listen to what others want to contribute, which allows you to capitalize on ideas from everyone.

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photo: samantha simmons

As a leader, who inspires you? Growing up, I had a lot of people—family and friends—who cared about the world and cared about other people, and I think that kind of compassion is a really important aspect of leadership. Also, environmental leaders—people like Rachel Carson [author of Silent Spring] who wrote a book that changed the world, or Theo Colborn who did the same thing 20 years later.

GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List

CITY HALLS

58 case study: Las vegaS, NV

Sin City anchors its new downtown

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Spotlight: vaughan, ON

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spotlight: river falls, WI

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Setting the tone for a city on the make When building benefits a waterway

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GREEN TYPOLOGIES city halls

The Heart of the City Now that green building has gained traction with elected officials, policy is a major player in shaping our cities, and the city hall has become a vital organ, pumping dollars, ideas, and leadership into the neglected areas of its constituency. Three case studies showcase the ways in which new city halls can be built sustainably and inspire renewed commitment to the environment.

By Russ Klettke and Benjamin van Loon

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GREEN TYPOLOGIES

Las Vegas City Hall captures the eye with the proficiency of a world-class casino, yet it is also oriented east-west for optimized energy performance, and extensive floor-to-ceiling glazing on the north and south façades provides daylighting and reduces energy consumption.

Case Study

Las Vegas City Hall A desert-inspired office tower anchors a new downtown development

photos: brad feinknopf

Roof and site runoff are caught in gravel beds like this one for site irrigation.

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Most people share a singular impression of Las Vegas. It is exuberant, flashy, and frenetic—a place where fun is on tap 24/7. Few among its 39 million visitors per year come for an ecotourism experience, yet green ideas are one of Las Vegas’ best kept secrets. Tourists overlook the resource-saving mentality of the city because all the lights, limos, and latenight attractions seem incongruous with environmental sensitivity. But much of the “real” Vegas for residents is away from The Strip, which is technically outside the city limits, and people’s impressions are beginning to change thanks to a number of energy conservation efforts at casinos and a push for LEED-certified buildings, such as the new Las Vegas City Hall.

The new city hall is the nexus of the “real” downtown, an area undergoing substantial development. Nevada already has more square feet of LEEDcertified buildings per capita than any other state, and Las Vegas is hoping to add one more building to the list by applying for LEED Gold certification for the city hall.

The relationship of the city hall to its surroundings is no accident. “A lot of emphasis over the past ten years by the mayor [Oscar Goodman, whose term may–june 2013

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The LED-powered luminaires in the façade are expected to reduce annual energy costs by more than $400,000 and cut greenhouse gas emissions by 2,400 metric tons.

Rooftop solar arrays and these 33 iconic photovoltaic “trees” produce approximately 290,000 kWh of power annually.

city halls GREEN TYPOLOGIES

The city hall building uses natural shading, materials with high albedo values, and vegetated roof surfaces to mitigate heat island effect.

photos: brad feinknopf

The building’s urban location is close to public transit, and limited surface parking, bike parking, and charging stations for electric vehicles promote sustainable forms of transportation.

limit expired in 2011] has been on the downtown,” says Tom Perrigo, the city’s chief sustainability officer. “Public buildings set the tone, particularly in a city hall where there are all kinds of activities around it.”

Through a series of city council resolutions that emphasize climate protection, green building, energy, and urban forestry, Las Vegas has incorporated environmentalism into its very DNA, particularly in the downtown elements.

New police headquarters, a center for performing arts, a transit center, the Mob Museum (a showcase of organized crime and law enforcement), and two corporate buildings are all LEED-certified and within a few blocks of the city hall. About $7 million was spent on pedestrian-friendly streetscaping, and the city also invested $65 million in water and energy, including a gradual switch to LED street lighting. A retail market made of discarded shipping containers, Container Park, was approved by the city council in October 2012.

This concentration of employers and attractions is drawing other entrepreneurial ventures, in part prompted by Zappos.com, which purchased the old city hall. The successful online retailer is retrofitting the building to ultimately accommodate 2,000 employees by October 2013, and new restaurants, taverns, and other retail businesses are already opening in the area.

In appropriately spectacular fashion, the building’s exterior captures the eye with the proficiency of a world-class casino. Designed by Elkus Manfredi Architects of Boston, the 309,000-squarefoot contemporary glass, metal, and masonry building, impressive in its own right, is momentarily upstaged at first glance by a stand of 33 “solar trees” on the south façade of the building. These cast shade on the entry plaza, where the average temperature highs in July and August are in the triple digits, and together with a photovoltaic array on the gb&d

The horizontal bands on the building’s north and west faces allude to the stratified walls of the Black Canyon around the Hoover Dam.

rooftop of the building, they also collect 290,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity each year.

The boomerang footprint of the sevenstory office tower is oriented to control solar exposure and optimize energy performance while low-E and fritted windows, natural shading, vegetation, and high-albedo roofing materials reduce solar heat gain.

Howard Elkus, principal at Bostonbased Elkus Manfredi Architects, wanted the building design to make a statement about the past and the future of the city itself. Hoover Dam, the source of electricity that enabled Las Vegas to grow, is strongly referenced with exterior LED luminaries that cascade an evening lightshow along window fins that represent water powering the turbines. The may–june 2013

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GREEN TYPOLOGIES city halls

Project LOCATION Las Vegas Size 309,000 ft2 Completion 2012 Program City hall, meeting rooms, offices

Team ARCHITECT Elkus Manfredi Architects Architect of Record JMA Architecture Studios Client City of Las Vegas Developer Forest City Enterprises General Contractor Whiting-Turner MEP Engineer JBA Consulting Engineers Structural Engineer DeSimone Consulting Engineers Civil Engineer Poggemeyer Design Group Landscape Architect SWA Group Lighting Designer Lighting Design Alliance Energy & Daylighting The Weidt Group Curtainwall Design CDC Curtainwall Design Consulting

out Check .com ne zi a g a gbdm tos re pho for mo Vegas s a L of ll!

City Ha

The prefunction space is primarily lit with daylight, reducing the need for articifial lighting in one of the largest spaces in the building.

Green

horizontal bands on the building’s north and west faces allude to the stratified walls of the Black Canyon around the Hoover Dam. Las Vegas’s history as a desert spring is also referenced in several places, and downward-diagonal beams of glass representing the sun radiate from the upperright corner on the east wing façade, a visual acknowledgment of the building’s future energy source. Overall, Elkus says the project was designed so that “the rawness and gutsiness of the desert run into the building.”

A huge part of the building’s sustainability measures include a drought-resistant landscape program. Precipitation (a scant 4.5 inches per year) is captured onsite and reused to water the landscaping;

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concurrently, no- and low-flow fixtures and efficient mechanical systems reduce water-use in the building. Underground and surface parking is complemented by electric vehicle charging stations, public transportation, and bike parking, while the downtown location wins points in community connectivity, with a respectable Walk Score rating of 82.

This mentality, the city hall’s emphasis on sustainable design, and the increasing presence of non-gaming companies such as Zappos might not be what visitors to Las Vegas expect, but those are just a few of many surprises in the greener, futureforward city. gb&d —Russ Klettke

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photos: brad feinknopf

CERTIFICATION LEED Gold (expected) Site Urban infill Exterior Glass, steel, masonry, PVs Water Storm-water capture, low-flow fixtures Landscape Drought-resistant plants Light Natural daylighting in the offices, LED lights

GREEN TYPOLOGIES

The city hall’s clock tower is one of its few vertical features. It references Italian bell towers, given the city’s Italian Canadian heritage.

SPOTLIGHT

Vaughan, ON A stunning centerpiece for a city on the make

photo: maris mezulis

In 1960, Vaughan, Ontario, was home to just 16,000 people. In the decade between 1996 and 2006, however, the town became the fastest growing municipality in Canada and now has more than 288,000 residents. Due to its growth, in 2012 the city completed the first of three phases for its new civic center: the $108 million, 350,000-square-foot city hall, designed by Canada’s Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg Architects. The building reflects the city’s agrarian roots while setting it against its new urban context by laying out the campus in eastwest bands, reminiscent of the linear patterns of farming. It was certified LEED Gold last year, thanks to efficient landscaping, interconnected atria with clerestory glazing, operable windows in the upper floors, and an underground parking garage. As Vaughan continues to grow, the city hall and greater civic center will stand as a practical, sustainable centerpiece for the city. gb&d —Benjamin van Loon

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GREEN TYPOLOGIES city halls

SPOTLIGHT

River Falls, WI

Stone, aluminum, and glass give this city hall a contemporary look while its permeable pavement filters runoff into the nearby river.

One city’s reflection of a vibrant ecosystem

Wisconsin’s first LEED Silver-certified city hall in River Falls, completed in 2010, was built with three constituencies in mind. First were its 15,000 citizens, who remain drawn to the bustling downtown and who paid for the $5 million structure. Second was the business community immediately surrounding the administrative center. And the third, well, it isn’t exactly a group; it’s an entire ecosystem, that of the Kinnickinnic River, which flows through the town and alongside the new building and offers a habitat for wild trout and innumerable other species of wildlife.

The new city hall’s 67,000-squarefeet of hard surfaces is comparable to the existing amount before the site was redeveloped, but the building uses waterefficient elements such as bioswales and pervious pavement to absorb 75 percent of storm-water runoff and feed cleaner, cooler water into the river. Similar watermanagement measures are abundant throughout the city, which exhibits an astonishingly green-conscious culture.

Residents are cognizant of the connections between natural habitat and human quality of life, and this awareness is evident everywhere.

“Local residents are tuned into the environment,” says Reid Wronski, the director of public works and the city engineer. Built on the budget of a smaller city, the post-modern building is futuristic without being exotic. It doesn’t have a geothermal system, solar cells, or a

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green roof, but Matt Frisbie, principal of Frisbie Architects, which designed the structure, says the team did only what made sense. Low-cost features that still met LEED criteria included the reuse of 91 percent of demolition waste in the new building. Quality insulation, a high-efficiency HVAC system, and building automation made the building 34 percent more efficient than energy-code requirements. Low-flow faucets and toilets were installed to reduce water-use, which ended up being 20 percent below code, saving 10,000 gallons per year.

Further raising the bar for city halls of this size, 35 percent of energy comes from renewable sources, and 75 percent of wood came from sustainable forests.

Anticipating that solar collectors will one

day be feasible, conduits are already installed, and even with a plethora of green features, the project was completed at $168 per square foot, low enough that the city didn’t have to raise property taxes.

Maintaining a downtown location was a sustainability decision as well. As the administrative center of a bedroom community (River Falls is 30 minutes east of Minnesota’s Twin Cities), the city hall maintains connectivity and has spurred further building projects. A local grocer just completed a $6 million modernization of its existing store nearby, and a new downtown hotel was constructed in the same time frame as the city hall project. All of which spells good living for River Falls residents—and the trout passing through. gb&d —Russ Klettke

The interior of the new city hall prioritized both natural light to create a welcoming space for visitors and low-VOC materials to maintain a healthful environment.

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List 66

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Center for Character and Leadership Development

The Air Force Academy gets a new landmark Media Studios North

A LEED Gold production campus

Brunton Architects office

The Minnesota firm reclaims and restores

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The CCLD will be the second contemprary icon on the Air Force Academy campus. The first is the Walter Netsch-designed Cadet Chapel, a popular tourist attraction.

d

To ensure this tower aligned with the North Star, an important guiding point for Air Force pilots, SOM collaborated with an astronomer to ensure astronomical alignment.

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INNER WORKINGS

Center for Character and Leadership Development With a glowing glass tower pointing to Polaris, the Air Force Academy’s largest and most important mission finally has a place to call home

In the middle of Colorado, an institution is hidden in the mountains like a gem in a limestone quarry. The United States Air Force Academy campus is as architecturally important as it is stunning, with scenic views of the Rocky Mountains. Since 1955, the academy has been tasked with providing the Air Force with leaders of character and is one of only four institutions that require leadership and character training for every student for all four years of enrollment. No matter what degree a cadet chooses, each receives training from the Center for Character and Leadership Development (CCLD). It is the academy’s largest program, yet until now it was a program without a home. Its classes were scattered throughout the campus and at times even housed in nearby Colorado Springs. “All of the other academic departments had homes,” says academy architect Duane Boyle. “Our biggest program needed a space of its own.”

And the new building will be striking not only in design but also in purpose.

By Ashley T. Kjos

Creating Leaders

Public Access

Moral Architecture

With a staff of 30, the CCLD is the physical home for all program classes, the Cadet Honor Committee, and the Wing Character Officer. The Honor Committee’s mission includes maintaining and enforcing the cadet honor code. “Members of the Air Force don’t lie, cheat, or steal, nor do we tolerate others who do,” says Thomas Berry Jr., deputy director of the center, adding that the role of the center extends beyond the Air Force, or even the military. “All of our cadets become Air Force officers upon graduation. But they are also citizens, and we are producing leaders for life.” The committee is also involved with the outreach and service programs within the community and coordinates with other colleges and universities around the country.

The CCLD will be situated at the west end of the academic area, close to both Arnold Hall, a cadet student center, and the famous Cadet Chapel (No.1). This location makes the building easily accessible to both the cadet population and the visiting public, creating a relatively unique opportunity—there are few places where cadet and public traffic cross. The Air Force Academy, however, is one of Colorado’s largest tourist destinations, and the new CCLD showcases the academy’s mission.

Continuity in design exists throughout the campus, and this consistency is important. It perpetuates a moral message. “Everything at the academy is very orthogonal and based upon right angles,” Boyle says (No.2). Berry, who graduated from the Air Force Academy in 1971, brings the tangible design philosophy into ideological terms. “It’s about bringing the themes of the architecture into life,” Berry says. “Freshmen at the academy have to walk everywhere in straight lines

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and take turns at right angles.

It reminds us to do the right thing and also that there is a correct way to do things. It brings home those ideas of right and wrong.”

Glass Tower The most dynamic feature of the structure is a 105-foot-tall glass tower, skewed to the north to align with the North Star (No.3). The symbolic importance of the North Star is twofold: aviators have used the North Star, or Polaris, to navigate for centuries, and it also indicates the guidance that the academy hopes to impress upon its cadets.

“Aviators need the magnetic compass to navigate terrain, but you also need a moral compass as an officer,” Berry says. Visually, the tower will be a butt-glass system with a smooth glass skin covering an intricate steel plate structure, resembling a spiderweb.

From this angle, the glass tower in the background is meant to look like the tail of an aircraft.

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INNER WORKINGS Center for Character and Leadership Development

“Aviators need the magnetic compass to navigate terrain, but you also need a moral compass as an officer.”

Thomas Berry Jr., Center for Character and Leadership Development

g

Natural Design

f

The Forum is a dynamic space fit for various gatherings located in the center of the CCLD.

GREEN

LOCATION Colorado Springs, CO Size 46,000 ft2 Completed 2013 (expected) Program Classrooms, office space, meeting rooms

CERTIFICATION LEED Silver (expected) Materials Sourced from within 500 miles Energy Convection cooling trough on glass tower, photovoltaic panels Lighting Natural light, occupancy sensors Landscape Interior courtyard

CLIENT US Air Force Academy Architect Skidmore, Owings & Merrill Landscape Architect THK Associates General Contractor ECC, GH Phipps

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Integrative Landscape

PROJECT

TEAM

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The glass tower will be used to convey a large amount of heat out of the building through vents located at the top of the tower. There is also a frit pattern on the exterior surface of the glass to cut down on the heat gain (No.4). Natural light was one of the top priorities for the design of the structure, and all functional areas have access to direct daylight.

“Light and fresh air were two very important things,” Berry says. “Everyone gets to see the outside, and every office has a mountain view. We wanted to bring the outside in.”

The team added occupancy sensors to the interior, and photovoltaic panels, which are now incorporated in all campus projects, were added to the outside of the building.

A Message from ECC

Founded in 1985, ECC is an employee-owned company that delivers design-build and bid-build construction services, environmental remediation, and energy solutions to complex challenges facing our military clients worldwide. www.ecc.net A message from GH Phipps GH Phipps Construction Companies is one of the largest construction companies along the Colorado front-range with 60 years of experience constructing high-profile landmark buildings. www.ghphipps.com

One of the more complicated elements of the center is the surrounding area and the ways in which the center is integrated into the rest of the academy. Most critical was the landscape. The base of the glass tower actually rests on an island and projects into an exterior courtyard, one of many courtyards in the landscape design, which also includes a reflecting pool (No.5). On the cadet level, the building is connected to the main terrazzo. Above is a large public plaza called the Honor Court, which is connected to the CCLD via a ceremonial staircase. gb&d gbdmagazine.com

MILESTONE CONSTRUCTION COMPANY, LLC

General Contractor

| Design/Build

|

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

Developing Leaders of Character

As a trusted partner to the Air Force, ECC and GH Phipps showcase the pride of military services through the construction of the US Air Force Academy Center for Character and Leadership Development Building.

The iconic building serves as a focal point for more than 4,000 cadets per year, who will receive honor, ethics, and leadership training.

Iconic, Sustainable, and Historic Landmark $35.7 Million, 46,000 Square Feet Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Silver

www.ecc.net gb&d

www.ghphipps.com

Integrating award-winning design by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP (original USAFA designers) with state-of-the art technology, the team focuses on sustainable construction and alternative energy solutions, critical to meeting the Air Force’s commitment to the environment.

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INNER WORKINGS

Media Studios North The Burbank office campus known for leasing space to entertainment giants like Technicolor maintains 100 percent occupancy through eco-friendly efforts

Media Studios North in Burbank, California, is home to some big names in media and entertainment—Yahoo!, Technicolor, and Insomniac Games among them—but the office campus itself is quite the showstopper too, at least in terms of sustainability. The award-winning property includes five office buildings, a health club, cafés, screening rooms, on-site covered parking, courts for basketball and sand volleyball, and even a game of chess with life-size pieces. Developed in phases from 1996 to 2006 by M. David Paul Development, it is currently co-owned with Shorenstein Properties. To find out what’s happening to green the office spaces, gb&d took a closer look.

By Stephanie Vozza

Media Studios North has plenty of outdoor spaces for tenants, including seating areas, sculptures, and walking paths.

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Building Acquisition

Furniture to Fitness

Media Studios North originally comprised a single existing building—a converted Lockheed Martin “Skunkworks” site—and the remaining four office properties were developed in phases from 1996 to 2006, following the acquisition of land from the Burbank Redevelopment Agency. Today, energy-efficiency initiatives are important to the property’s continued prestige. “We feel that sustainability is critical to the ownership, tenants, and community,” says Leo Davinsky of Worthe Real Estate Group, property manager for the LEED Gold site. “We’re 100 percent leased and believe our sustainable practices have made this an attractive home for a lot of companies.”

The campus, which has an Energy Star average rating of 93, has promoted the ecofriendly disposal of technology and supplies through e-waste drives, and Precor fitness equipment is used in the health club. Precor, Davinsky explains, manufactures its equipment in the United States, and the company’s process is among the best in terms of a zero-waste target.

Management also adopted sustainable purchasing plans for items such as lightbulbs, paper and office goods, furniture, and electronics.

Greener Air After the building phases were completed at Media Studios North, the project team had air quality and ventilation measured to ensure it met the standards, and the property management continues to work with its maintenance service provider, Peerless Building Maintenance Co., to maximize its green cleaning program by using environmentally friendly products, methods, and equipment. The buildings’ pest control vendor was also able to achieve alternative methods for pest control, minimizing the amount of chemicals used. Outdoors, organic fertilizers are used throughout the campus, as well as low-emission landscape equipment.

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INNER WORKINGS

“We’re 100 percent leased and believe our sustainable practices have made this an attractive home for a lot of companies.”

Leo Davinsky, Worthe Real Estate Group Although the campus was built in 2006, it received its LEED Gold certification for Existing Buildings in July 2012.

Water and Waste All existing plumbing was retrofitted with low-flow fixtures, achieving a 24 percent reduction in indoor water use. The property also developed a cooling tower watertreatment plant and reuses as much water as possible. All food waste from the campus cafés is composted, reducing the contamination rate.

And outside, the grounds are maintained with 100 percent nonpotable reclaimed water.

Studio Lighting An audit was completed for all of the campus’s energy use, and numerous low- or nocost measures were installed.

Fluorescent lightbulbs were replaced with 28-watt, lowmercury, long-life bulbs, and the team reduced the wattage on its CFL bulbs. Exterior and garage lighting schedules were examined and replaced with energy-efficient timing, and halogen lamps were replaced with LED lighting.

Changing Transit Media Studios North worked with tenants to implement a traffic management plan, with a goal of reducing trip counts. Because tenants are carpooling, walking, biking, telecommuting, and using public transportation, Davinsky says they have documented a reduction in single-use vehicle traffic of 27 percent more than comparable baseline. gb&d gb&d

The lights in the offices are 28-watt long-life bulbs or CFLs. Shorenstein Realty is committed to reducing energy use by 20% in its properties by 2020 as a corporate partner in the Better Buildings Challenge.

PROJECT

TEAM

LOCATION Burbank, CA Size 932,190 ft2 (buildings), 19 acres (site) Program Five office buildings, state-of-the-art health club, two commissary facilities, screening room, on-site covered parking Awards TOBY Award for office building of the year in the suburban low-rise office park category; “Clean Air Award” issued by the National Air Filtration Association

OWNER Shorenstein Properties, M. David Paul Development Property Management Worthe Real Estate Group Architect The Landau Partnership (Phase I), Dave Thomsen Enterprises (Phases II-V) General Contractor Krismar Construction Company

GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Gold Cleaning Earth-friendly cleaning and pest control products used Materials Energy Star products, sustainable and US-made materials Water Low-flow fixtures, coolingtower water-treatment plant Energy Low-mercury, long-life, and LED bulbs, low-wattage CFL lightbulbs, energy-efficient outdoor and garage lighting schedule Landscape Reclaimed water for irrigation, organic fertilizers, lowemission landscape equipment

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a cohesive partnership with our clients in which we consistently meet or exceed their expectations. We are committed to being environmentally responsible while providing high quality service in all divisions. We

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WESTERN ALLIED CORPORATION Over 50 Years of Excellence

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INNER WORKINGS

Brunton Architects Offices Armed with lights it salvaged from a strip-mall remodel and plenty more secondhand materials, the Minnesota firm gifts itself a green but inexpensive workspace

Brunton Architects built its offices in North Mankato, Minnesota, with environmental care through energy-saving initiatives and what it calls “light green” building technologies.

The project, completed in early 2012, involved ground-floor offices and second-floor apartments and was a new build on a lot that had been empty since 1982 when a fire claimed an old community drug store.

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By Jennifer Nunez

Reuse, Recycle

Material Camouflage

Brunton Architects adopted a mantra of “reuse and recycle,” and reclaimed barn wood was used throughout the interior.

“It has imperfections in it and dark spots and some old nail holes,” says principal Corey Brunton. The vinyl plank flooring and carpeting throughout the building have a high percentage of recycled content, and the recycling continues into the lobby, where reclaimed granite was used for the reception desk (No.1). The most impressive reuse in the project was the refurbished light fixtures from a past strip mall remodel project (No.2). “When we went into an interior remodel of one of our strip mall projects, we salvaged the fixtures, knowing that some day there would be an opportunity to use them rather than throw them in a landfill,” Brunton says. This saved around $14,000 in fixtures and made use of an old product.

The architectural- and interior-design team at Brunton chose to camouflage the new space so it would blend in with its neighboring buildings, paying attention to details as small as the type of interior brick, which resembles the brick inside the adjacent buildings (No.3).

“It’s a historically significant infill project,” Brunton says, “where the buildings on both sides, as well as the historical character of Belgrade Avenue, were respected, and the architectural elements were included with rhythm, repetition, scale, and form.”

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Brunton Architects used this recycled barn wood throughout its office redesign, to reduce material use but also for its look.

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INNER WORKINGS Brunton Architects Offices

“On the weekends our meter rolls backwards.

We are dumping power back to the grid.”

Corey Brunton, Principal

The dynamic, cascading table in the conference room is custom-made with a concrete topping.

PROJECT Location North Mankato, MN Size 5,000 ft2 Completed 2012 Program Meeting spaces, offices, apartments Awards City Center Partnership City Design Award of Excellence for New Construction under $2 million

TEAM Architect Brunton Architects Client Brunton Architects

GREEN Certification Not applicable Materials Recycled-content flooring, refurbished light fixtures, reclaimed granite and barn wood, local limestone, brick, and quartz Water Low-flow faucets and toilets Energy LED lighting, 14 kW photovoltaic array, natural daylighting, skylights

Slashing Wattage

Light Green

Brunton took the 50-watt halogen incandescent bulbs out of the refurbished fixtures and re-lamped them with 6-watt LED lamps. “Not only did we reduce the wattage of each lamp by 44 watts, we significantly reduced the amount of cooling required for the office relative to that,” Brunton says. “We saved 1,716 watts of power.” Large skylights and oversized windows were installed in the secondfloor apartments so that artificial lighting isn’t needed anywhere in the residences except the restrooms (No.4). By far the biggest energy-saver is the 14-kilowatt photovoltaic array, which produces more than half the power needed for the office (No.5). “Probably approaching close to three quarters,” Brunton adds. “On the weekends our meter rolls backwards. We are dumping power back to the grid.”

The architects have adopted what they like to call “light green” building technologies, “items that don’t have to cost an awful lot of money to incorporate,” Brunton explains. The building has on-site recycling, and Brunton’s team looked at environmental design issues, such as making sure there’s proper solar orientation, shelter from the northwest winds, a high-quality window system, ample insulation in the building, and low-VOC paints. “It doesn’t have to be expensive to get done,” he says. “It is our responsibility to our children to assure them they have the ability to use the Earth they deserve.” gb&d

To offset its energy use (and put power back into the grid), Brunton Architects installed a solar panel array on the roof of its offices.

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VERBATIM

Curt Radkin on the impact of the Duke Energy Center

The green roof of Duke Energy Center has native and adaptive plants and is accessible from the tenth floor of the building.

As told to Julie Schaeffer

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The Duke Energy Center—owned and operated by Wells Fargo—achieved a number of notable firsts. When completed in 2010, it was the largest and second-tallest building in Charlotte, North Carolina, at 1.5 million square feet and 48 occupied stories. It’s still the only project in North Carolina to have Platinum certification for [LEED] Core & Shell Version 2.0, and it was the first office tower in the world to receive Platinum certification in that rating.

We made the decision early on to pursue LEED certification. We never said we wanted to be Platinum; we just wanted

to construct a resource-efficient building that promoted the health, well-being, and productivity of the people who were going to be working in the building. We didn’t know much about LEED though, so we started the journey without a specific target in mind in terms of what level of certification. Somewhere during the second quarter of 2006, a construction manager with our general contractor, Batson-Cook Construction, approached us and asked for some targets, so we went back to the drawing board and developed them. We aimed at our “triple bottom line” of people, planet, may–june 2013

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VERBATIM Curt Radkin

The Duke Energy Center was developed on an old brownfield site where 75,000 cubic yards of soil were removed and remediated to cleanse and revitalize the land.

About Curt Radkin Title Sustainability Strategist Company Wells Fargo, Corporate Properties Group First Job Bagging groceries Inspiration “I like working on things that have scale and make an impact.”

In Three Words “Optimistic, determined, and curious” Hidden Talent Building. “I volunteer for Habitat for Humanity and find that kind of work rewarding.”

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and profit by making educated guesses about productivity; energy, water, and waste efficiencies; and return on investment. That really enabled the design and construction team.

There was a challenge almost every step of the way. We had a 23-acre, belowgrade parking deck, and it took us a year to just dig the hole. The upside of the duration for this effort was that it gave us the luxury of time to analyze and test strategies and drive decisions based on facts. For example, we had lot of consternation around waterless urinals because we did a pilot test in another building, and the urinals weren’t installed correctly, leading to anecdotal data about how they just don’t work. Since we had time, we did another two pilots and made sure we addressed the installation errors.

They were successful, and the waterless urinal conversation became a nonissue.

We had huge success with water efficiency, way beyond our targets.

Downtown Charlotte has an abundance of contaminated groundwater. Normally you’d treat that enough to dump it into the storm-water system, but Tempest Environmental installed a water-treatment system that takes 90 percent of our contaminated groundwater and cleans it enough to drink. We use that water for cooling towers, and that alone drives 10 to 15 million gallons of water savings per year. It’s a big part of our total water effi-

ciency. We save approximately 30 million gallons of water per year through a combination of rainwater and condensation collection, groundwater purification, and a 46 percent reduction of domestic water used in bathrooms.

The Duke Energy Center is also 22 percent more energy efficient than a traditionally built tower of comparable size. We save approximately 5 million kilowatt-hours per year, equivalent to the annual energy use of about 450 homes or more than 3,500 metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions each year. We do it through the use of blinds that direct light into the building, lighting controls that respond to the amount of daylight, high-performance glazing on the exterior walls, and highly efficient HVAC systems and controls. All of these things reduce demands on the center’s lighting and cooling systems.

We also require all tenants to pursue LEED for Commercial Interiors certification. We may be the only development in the country to require that. Our fee developer, Childress Klein Properties, was concerned that we would have difficulty leasing the building with that requirement. However, we stayed the course, and today, we’re 98 percent leased. We also sub-meter every floor, and tenants pay for their utilities directly, so they’re incentivized to drive efficiency within their spaces. gb&d gbdmagazine.com

green building & design

Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List

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loyola university chicago Father Michael Garanzini says sustainability is the future not just of education but of all urban populations

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Discussion Board

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The Chicago-based developer envisions the city’s last lakefront property as a global hub of energy innovation Which of history’s heroes should leaders look back to?

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FEATURES

Loyola University’s place at the forefront of sustainable development and design is owed to the pivotal leadership of Father Michael Garanzini

A Man of Heaven and Earth

By Benjamin van Loon Photographs by Samantha Simmons and James Steinkamp 78

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photo: samantha simmons

For Father Michael Garanzini, education is about more than information. He says for urban areas to flourish, we must work together to find sustainable solutions.

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FEATURES Loyola University Chicago

t the north end of Sheridan Road in Chicago, heading into the city’s northernmost neighborhood, past endless blocks of high-rise apartments and condos, past ground-level bodegas and early 20th century homes, and after the street takes a sharp westward bend, the sidewalk veers away from the street, opening into a garden planted with annuals and evergreens. A fountain gently bubbles at the center of the garden, which is crosshatched with gravel paths and birdsong.

This is Loyola University Chicago.

To the left is the assertive, Art Decostyle Mundelein Center building, and opposite that, the white Vermont marble of Piper Hall, a 1909 mansion whose green shingles blend with the nearby trees, suggesting Loyola’s other true green roofs.

Most stunning is the LEED Silver Klarchek Information Commons, a transparent, four-story glass building designed by Solomon Cordwell Buenz (SCB) and Transsolar in 2007. It is connected to the historic Madonna della Strada chapel, and the portico connecting the two buildings creates a visible dialogue between the historical and the modern, which is further articulated by the open green space of the East Quad—the campus center. Lake Michigan refracts through the glass of the Klarchek building. The air is abuzz as students and faculty bustle between classes.

This is a space where ideas converge.

It also is where the university’s 143-year-old legacy of sustainable, academic, and community leadership continues in a dynamic conversation that extends far beyond Chicago’s north side neighborhoods. Loyola’s planning expands beyond being just a model for other educational institutions. Because the school is tied into the fabric of Chicago, it increasingly can be seen as an example for planners, developers, architects, and all city dwellers of what it means to be a good citizen—and a good steward.

This ethic has been instilled in the very DNA of the institution by university president Father Michael Garanzini. “Loyola

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has always been very connected with the city,” Garanzini says. “Part of our agenda of sustainability—our mission—is not to simply use material resources wisely, but educate others on how to do the same.

This is how you make a difference.”

A crumbling institution Garanzini, a member of the Jesuit order since 1971, assumed the office of president at Loyola University Chicago (LUC) in June 2001. After undergoing Jesuit training around the United States and Rome for several years, Garanzini enrolled at the University of California–Berkeley where he received a doctorate in psychology and religion in 1986. He worked at Fordham University, Saint Louis University, and Georgetown University before finally relocating to Chicago and Loyola, which was then facing a serious budget crisis and teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. “When I got to Loyola, the first thing to do was right the ship,” Garanzini says. “I was used to dealing with normal academic issues, but at Loyola, I had to look at the infrastructure—everything from software to plant infrastructure.”

Although Loyola is a private university, it is robust in student and staff size as it relates to academic spectrum. With around 9,000 undergraduate and 6,000 postgraduate students, Loyola offers a number of degree programs, most notably the Quinlan School of Business, which has a part-time MBA program ranked in the top 20 in the nation by Bloomberg Business-

week, and the Stritch School of Medicine, which used to be Loyola’s primary revenue source before Garanzini took office.

“The university was relying on around $20 million of hospital income per year, but they decided that the hospital should separate from the university in 1996, and from 1997 to 2001, the university was showing increasing deficits,” Garanzini says. “The infrastructure was damaged, and I began working closely with the facilities director to learn about retrofitting a campus that would be capable of handling its environmental situation.”

Although other men of his stature often match their credentials with hubris, Garanzini is humble, curious, and kind: a Jesuit in the purest sense. He has an intelligent way of speaking that suggests an authentic passion for the work he does, which, as a Jesuit, is not just a job for him, but a vocation. The clerical collar complements, rather than detracts from, his authority and excitement about how Loyola has changed in the past decade and what sustainability promises for the future of the institution.

“Sustainability is the future,” Garanzini says. “The theme is attractive and exciting, and if we can latch onto this theme as an institution, we can start asking ourselves new questions, like what it means to have sustainable cities, or public health, or decent services for the poor. We can go around the school and ask each department what it can do to answer these questions.” gbdmagazine.com

FEATURES

The Klarchek Commons stands as a symbol of Loyola University’s commitment to the environment. The view from inside (below) illustrates the power of the nearly transparent building.

photos: James Steinkamp, Steinkamp Photography

“When I talk about … sustainability, I’m talking about what it means to sustain ourselves in urban populations. That means leaving nobody behind.”

When Garanzini first came to Loyola, sustainability wasn’t even a word connected with institutional policy, but as the campus has evolved, so too has its polity. As is usually the case, most universities are divided into disparate departments—some of which necessarily function at odds with one another. But sustainability has proven to be a healing agent for LUC’s physical infrastructure, and it has the potential to mend fissures between its conflicting institutional ideas and frameworks.

Getting the facts At the beginning of 2012, Loyola hired its first full-time director of sustainability, Aaron Durnbaugh. Durnbaugh came to Loyola after 10 years of working for the City of Chicago, during which time he gb&d

was involved with an energy audit funded by Chicago in 2001 that enabled LUC to assess energy usage at its main ‘Lake Shore campus’ in Rogers Park, with 3.2 million built square feet, and the ‘Water Tower campus’ near the downtown Loop area, with just less than 900,000 built square feet. This was the same time Garanzini was starting at Loyola, and the numbers produced from the audit were able to set the stage for helping Garanzini’s efforts to begin establishing the university’s guidelines for its then-nascent sustainability efforts. “When I talk about sustainability,” Durnbaugh says, “I look for projects that overlap and can be in the academic curriculum, the campus infrastructure, and in the institutional community. This is always something that’s developing at Loyola.”

Father Michael Garanzini, President, Loyola University Chicago

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FEATURES Loyola University Chicago

SOUND BITES

“On Leadership” “Leadership is almost always about being a patient listener who is willing to be creative . . . and who is willing to take some risks. You need to know yourself enough so you can know when to listen.

Leadership starts with self-knowledge.”

Father Michael Garanzini President, Loyola University Chicago

“Leadership means having a vision of the future and trying to develop something—from an architectural standpoint—that is better than what was there in the past. It means being good stewards with your partners and their resources.”

Devon Patterson Principal, Solomon Cordwell Buenz

“Leadership is the ability to blend competing priorities to make a decision that reflects the needs of a large group of stakeholders. Sustainability leadership makes sure that the economic, environmental, and social impacts of that decision are considered for this and future generations.”

Aaron Durnbaugh Director of Sustainability, Loyola University Chicago

With data provided by the audit and efforts prompted by the Student Environmental Alliance and the 2005 formation of the Center for Urban Environmental Research and Policy (CUERP)—which will be amalgamated by the new 250,000-squarefoot Institute for Environmental Sustainability when it opens this fall—the analysts on the Lake Shore campus were able to determine that the university’s energy use intensity (EUI) in 2001 measured 120 kBtu per square foot, a high, if not also standard rate for a mid-sized academic institution. Through initiatives driven by student groups, CUERP, the Department of Environmental Sciences, and the Office of Sustainability, the university lowered its EUI to 49 kBtu per square foot in 2012.

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This reduction was after Loyola added a total 561,500 square feet to four buildings on the Lake Shore campus from 2004 to 2012.

However, the EUI reduction is just one byproduct of Loyola’s cohesive campus efforts toward sustainability, which also involve intense programs for water conservation, green roof installation, recycling and waste reduction, and community interactivity. “As we have gone about improving the campus through the construction of new buildings utilizing new technologies, it has also inspired students to come forward and start pushing us to think about other sustainable ideas,” Garanzini says. “Sustainability is the first thing I’ve seen that is hope-filled for young people. Faculty and students are starting to recognize that they have a necessary common project.”

Repairing a long-term relationship Water conservation at LUC—prompted in part by the university’s immediate proximity to Lake Michigan—provides metaphorical and infrastructural connections between the city, the university, and the environment itself. Put lightly, Chicago’s historical relationship with Lake Michigan is strained, and the roots of this tenuous relationship stretch all the way back to the city’s industrial years at the tail end of the 19th century. Sewage and pollutants were often shunted directly into the regional rivers and lakefront areas, prompting the infamous reversal of the Chicago River in 1900 and numerous other reactive urban engineering projects.

For Garanzini, the need for addressing the conflict between the city and its waterways literally came to his front door. “When I first started at Loyola, I was living in a ground-floor apartment of a student dorm, and it flooded twice, because the sewers habitually overloaded from the summer rains,” Garanzini says. “It became clear to me that we had to look at really basic things for the in-

frastructure, like how we were handling water.” After investing $8 million in the university heating systems to begin the years-long master plan for retrofitting the entire campus, Loyola began to redress how it handles storm water, incorporating cisterns on campus and on all new construction projects—an integral step in bridging the connection between the university and the surrounding urban infrastructure.

In addition to the storm-water retainers, the Lake Shore campus is lined with permeable pavers all over campus. Native and drought-tolerant landscaping adds a practical flourish to the open spaces, and just out of site, 52,795 square feet of green roofs are split between the university’s Lake Shore, Water Tower, and Maywood campuses. Since these systems were implemented in 2004, more than 70 million gallons of storm water have been diverted from the Lake Shore campus, with a goal of 13 million gallons annually by the end of 2013 and 19 million gallons annually by 2015. “The Office of Sustainability doesn’t just think of these programs,” Durnbaugh says. “It helps track them, to see if we are making progress. And we are definitely making progress.”

Eliminating bottled water and going tray-free on campus also serve to bolster the school’s waste reduction and recycling rates. Presently, Loyola recycles 60,000 pounds of waste per month—an amount that has increased more than 350 percent from 17,000 pounds per month in 2009.

More than 80 percent of campus construction debris is recycled, and more than 26 percent of total campus waste was recycled at the Lake Shore and Water Tower campuses in 2012. This is more than double the amount of waste being recycled in 2008, and Durnbaugh expects this number to continue increasing as Loyola turns toward innovative programs, such as its relationship with the Monterey Bay Sustainable Seafood Program, local farmers markets, the student-run Grower’s Guild and organic farm at Loyola’s Retreat and gbdmagazine.com

FEATURES

“[we] look for projects that overlap and can be in the academic curriculum, the campus infrastructure, and in the institutional community. this is always something that’s developing at Loyola.”

Aaron Durnbaugh, Director of Sustainability, Loyola University Chicago

Ecology Campus in nearby Woodstock, Illinois, and the campus-sourced biodiesel program, which ‘upcycles’ fryer oil into biofuels for campus shuttle buses. The university has produced more than 5,000 gallons of biodiesel since 2008, with production having increased nearly tenfold in the past five years.

Although these are university-centric programs, they are the threads that connect Loyola to the greater urban fabric, and what makes these myriad programs and initiatives unique is their motivation.

“Loyola has always been a university that is of and about the city,” Garanzini says.

“When I talk about a broader vision about sustainability, I’m talking about what it means to sustain ourselves in urban populations. That means leaving nobody behind, because that’s the only way we can advance as a society.”

The future in a single building As Loyola continues to advance its diverse sustainability efforts, the Institute for Environmental Sustainability (IES), a mixed-use project on the south end of the Lake Shore campus known informally as the ‘Institute,’ will provide expanded residence, classroom, and greenhouse programs while also centralizing and officiating an expanded sustainability-oriented academic track, which will simultaneously symbolize the integrated trajectory of the university as a whole.

Designed by long-time university partner firm SCB and targeting completion in fall 2013, the IES provides a focal point for the continuation of Loyola’s dynamic institutional and urban change. Targeting LEED Gold certification, the IES is part adaptive reuse, part greenhouse, part laboratory, and all green. Programmatically, it’s a three-part building spanning the entire block of Kenmore Avenue on the south side of the campus. At its north end is the Wright Hall building, previously owned by the Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Built in

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1959, Wright Hall is an 11-story brick and concrete apartment structure that formerly had 70 apartment units, the bulk of which—beyond the third floor—are being converted to classrooms and offices.

The lower three floors will be dedicated to multiuse student space adjoined to the three-story greenhouse which connects Wright Hall and the new, six-story San Francisco Residence Hall on the south side of the Institute.

SCB is the project’s architect of record, and Devon Patterson, AIA, principal at SCB and designer of the Institute, says the greenhouse is the center for the design because it gives the university an outward expression of the environmental focus inside. “It provides something for the community to gather around,” Patterson says.

Much like the Klarcheck Information Commons building, the IES features two distinct ‘ends’ connected by a central glass framework that functions practically and architecturally. Most notably, it’s a greenhouse space with interior and exterior vegetated elements to produce edible agriculture and decrease stormwater runoff. The curved shape of the greenhouse has a dual function to facilitate rainwater harvesting and promote natural ventilation using a low-velocity displacement system. Solar thermal collectors throughout the Institute recharge the on-site geothermal system, which will be the largest geothermal system in the city of Chicago.

“The greenhouse forms a bridge between the academic and residential functions of the school,” Patterson says. “This is partly inspired by the bucolic vision of Thomas Jefferson’s plans for the University of Virginia, where gardens were planted next to all of the residential living centers and allowed the students to participate in their natural environment as part of their education.”

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This existing dormitory will be preserved but converted into academic offices and classrooms.

The roof of the greenhouse is sloped to direct rainwater toward a capture system that will irrigate the plants inside.

Below the new building is a geothermal system that will be recharged by solar thermal collectors on top of the new residence hall.

THE City in Microcosm

The new Institute for Environmental Sustainability will be a new kind of residence hall that will allow students to monitor their electricity, heat, and water use and grow food in the greenhouse while learning informally about ecology.

Inspired by Thomas Jefferson's inclusion of gardens around every residence hall at the University of Virginia, the greenhouse serves as a bridge between the new residential space at the south end and the academic hall on the north.

The Institute for Environmental Sustainability not only is an example of the university in miniature, but it’s also a metaphor for Chicago. The north end of the building houses laboratory and office spaces converted from a former 11-story apartment built in 1959, akin to a contemporary commercial district. The San Francisco Residence Hall, at the opposite end of the complex, forms the residential neighborhood while the community spaces resemble cafÊs.

The two distinct ends of the building are joined by a multistory greenhouse the length of a city block. This is both a park and an agricultural site, suited to regulate airflow, control storm water, and grow food that can go straight from the tree to the table.

FEATURES

Elara Engineering on mechanical engineering to implement and experiment with new technologies and concepts to create a unified space. As this concept trickles down to both the building users and surrounding urban fabric, it simultaneously functions as a practical realization of Garanzini’s sustainable vision for the future of the university as it relates to itself and the city.

“Garanzini has a vision for the campus,” Patterson says. “He wants buildings that are transparent so that people outside can see what’s going on, but also [so] that people in the buildings can see what is happening in this beautiful environment that is being made outside.” As Loyola nears its 150th anniversary, the completion of the Institute marks a new chapter in its evolution. “The Institute will help us think about different areas that are impacted by the whole sustainability movement—political science, sociology, history, philosophy, theology, and social justice, where we try to think about the common good,” Garanzini says.

“That’s our theme.”

renderings: solomon cordwell buenz

Continuing leadership At the beginning of 2013, LUC launched a new strategic master plan for the school, incorporating the future of sustainability at the university. The plan details continued measures—integrated urban agriculture initiatives, beekeeping programs, energy and water reduction competitions, community outreach programs—that not only give students license to continue generating their own ideas of sustainability, but also gives the entire institutional community a way to bolster its academic and professional programs with practical ways to bring high ideas into simple practice.

This is what Garanzini considers to be the meaning of education: that it is not merely a system of information transmission, but that it gives people the ability to solve real problems in practical ways. “The university first ought to be an example to its own students and faculty,” Garanzini says. gb&d

“Sustainability is the first thing I’ve seen that is hopefilled for young people. Faculty and students are starting to recognize that they have a necessary common project.”

Father Michael Garanzini, President, Loyola University Chicago

“Whether it’s the way we dispose of our trash, or the way we treat our storm water, we should be always be an institution that is open to incorporating these new ideas as quickly as possible.”

Garanzini visualizes Loyola as setting an example for itself; he is reticent to hypothesize how the university might establish a broader influence in the Chicago community—or if it indeed has that capability. In a philosophical sense, this humility is the mark of true leadership; that it does not perceive its leadership as such. Garanzini says he is always learning from those he works with, recognizing the responsibility the school has for its students, and the role a historic university such as Loyola has in relationship to its urban context.

As the university president, Garanzini is answering to the institution, but as a Jesuit disciple, Garanzini’s has been a life of service that answers to higher principles, reflected most clearly in the direction in which he has led one of the largest Jesuit institutions in North America. As the Jesuit Saint John Berchmans once said, “Our true worth does not consist in what human beings think of us. What we really are consists in what God knows us to be.”

For the Jesuit order, God is blind to pride.

This makes for honest leaders, and honest institutions.

Although sustainability has proven to be a practical benefit for Loyola—bringing the institution out of debt, equipping it to weather the economic downturn, and allowing it to continue developing innovative and environmentally conscious programs and operations—it is fundamentally an ethic for Garanzini. “I’m excited to see whether other institutions will accept sustainability as their driving theme,” he says. “I’m seeing the possibility of uniting very disparate professions and schools into a common effort, which makes Loyola a more exciting place to be. Beyond simply making a salary, everyone wants to work for something meaningful.” gb&d may–june 2013

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McCAFFERY LAK

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FEATURES

KESIDE FEATURE

In 1997, U.S. Steel’s South Works, once the largest producer of structural steel in the world, was demolished, leaving 600 acres of Chicago lakefront barren.

Today, a team of architects, planners, and developers are hoping to transform the site into ‘the community of 2050.’ Obstacles abound, including the absence of even basic infrastructure, but McCaffery Interests doesn’t get discouraged easily.

Chicago’s Final Frontier

By Timothy A. Schuler

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FEATURES McCaffery Interests

In 2050

few Chicagoans remember the steel plant at SeventyNinth Street. Residents of Lakeside, the city’s newest neighborhood built on the site of the old mill, ignore the placards in their apartment buildings, which state that for almost a century U.S. Steel’s South Works plant produced the steel that became the backbone of their city—the skeletal frame of the Willis (once Sears) Tower, the ribs of the John Hancock Center.

The only visible remnant of the massive industrial operations conducted here between 1901 and 1992 is the gargantuan ore wall plunging westward from the lakefront like some giant, fossilized sea creature. It casts its quarter-mile-long shadow over Lakeside, a community that, since the first high-rises were built in 2018, has garnered international attention as a living laboratory for everything from green infrastructure to the latest forms of technology, education, and health care.

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gan, Lakeside Energy Innovation Institution, and everywhere, green space—from rain gardens and native grass-lined pedestrian pathways to the neighborhood’s now iconic linear parks, which connect the community to Lake Michigan and the 20-mile Chicago Lakefront Trail.

Those whose families are from the Great Lakes states hear over and over that no one expected Chicago to become a global hub of clean energy development or Lakeside to become the economic driver the area lost when the steel mill was razed in the 1990s. They have trouble imagining why. To them, it is a given that the world’s innovators migrate to Lake-

side, to this peninsula bulging out into Lake Michigan, to the city built on last century’s industrial waste.

The Tune-Up Phase The future portrayed above is highly uncertain, shimmering in the distance like a mirage, or, more aptly, as a single potential reality, just one of millions. But every day, that version of reality becomes more likely thanks to McCaffery Interests, the Chicago-based real-estate development firm that is inspiring a group of planners, architects, scientists, and city officials to remain focused on the idea of Lakeside and the practical steps required to achieve that goal. “We’re really trying to accept that challenge head-on—how do we create the community of 2050?” says Ed Woodbury, president of McCaffery Interests, who is developing Lakeside in a joint venture with United States Steel Real Estate (U.S. Steel).

It’s as pragmatic a question as it is a bold one. Bordered by Seventy-Ninth Street, Green Bay Avenue, Ninety-Second Street, and Lake Michigan, the parcel in question contains 600 acres—the largest plot of land ever to be rezoned by the City of Chicago. A site of its size would already require a timeline of decades rather than years, but Lakeside lacks even basic infrastructure: roads, sewage systems, street lights. At the moment it is an astonishgbdmagazine.com

renderings: skidmore, owings, and merrill

At Lakeside, hyper-efficient buildings keep residents’ monthly utility costs in the single digits. Coal has fallen dramatically down the list of Illinois’s primary fuel sources; what energy is required to operate the buildings comes from a mix of wind, solar, natural gas, biofuels, and other forms of energy, which continue to come on line thanks to the team of scientists working at Lakeside. Every rooftop is either planted and open to the public or blanketed with high-performance microsolar panels. High-rises use photovoltaic glass skins to generate power from every square foot of the exterior. From their windows, residents can see Lake Michi-

BOOM TOWN The planned Lakeside community will be built on the last undeveloped lakefront property within city limits. Almost the size of Chicago’s Loop, it is the largest rezoning the city has ever handled.

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STARTING FROM SLAG Only two remnants of steel-making exist at Lakeside. One is the gigantic ore wall that stretches the width of the property, seen below. The other is the property itself, which is not soil but slag, a rock-like byproduct of making steel.

FEATURES

“I don’t think we can get too far ahead of ourselves and think about how many green roofs we’re gonna have.”

Ed Woodbury, McCaffery Interests

photos: samantha simmons; skidmore, owings, and merrill (aerial)

ingly empty thing, animated only by the wild grasses and cottonwoods that have spontaneously claimed the empty land.

Progress is being made, however. Since the architecture and planning powerhouse Skidmore, Owings and Merrill (SOM) drew up the master plan in 2007, in cooperation with Sasaki Associates and Antunovich Associates, a slew of pre-development details have been sorted out, including the rerouting of Lake Shore Drive. Officially known as US Route 41, the highway used to terminate in Jackson Park, near the University of Chicago, but it has been extended south through Lakeside, forming a continuous two-mile conduit that connects people and resources to the previously inaccessible site.

That site is prime real estate. It is the city’s last undeveloped lakefront property and a completely blank slate, a rarity in Chicago, a city of nearly 3 million people.

Thanks to trends toward urban environments, density is increasingly attractive to city dwellers, and when CEO Dan McCaffery brought McCaffery Interests to the project, the group won approvals to increase the number of residential units in the project proposal from 4,500 to 13,575.

What had been in danger of becoming a

U.S. Steel South Works as it appeared in 1964. At its peak, the plant employed 20,000 people. It’s been closed for more than 20 years.

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suburb within the city became an urban planning model for the 21st century.

“When we’ve tried to develop new cities and new towns, I’m not sure the planning community has gotten it right very often,” Woodbury says. Lakeside is an attempt to remedy that, which is why the scale architecture model in Lakeside’s Marketing Center—housed in the only building not razed during the demolition of the mill—has raised some eyebrows. The buildings in the model, however, are just placeholders. They haven’t been designed, and when asked about details, Woodbury has one answer: “Who the hell knows? It’s important to understand that none of us have the answers . . . Right now is like the tune-up phase, where all the instruments are a little bit out of tune, and they’re trying to find the right key of C.” What’s important today, other than continuing to rally support for the project, is an infrastructure framework that analyzes sustainability in every area and at every level: land use, street design, wastewater treatment, site remediation, and power delivery, just to name a few.

“I don’t think we can get too far ahead of ourselves and think about how many green roofs we’re gonna have,” Wood-

bury says. “There’s lots of buildings we can develop, and those are fun, but when you get a chance to make a difference in a neighborhood, a city, it’s a whole different endeavor, and that’s what Lakeside is.

It’s a chance to make a difference for the South Side of Chicago and for the city of Chicago.”

Drawing on the Past Strolling the streets of Chicago in the early 1900s couldn’t have been terribly pleasant, with the smog of the smelters disfiguring the skyscrapers and horse manure dropped at regular intervals along the boulevards, yet it was in 1909 that the plan to make Chicago one of the most walkable cities in the country was penned.

Daniel Burnham and Edward Bennett’s Plan of Chicago, known prejudicially as the Burnham Plan, made several foundational recommendations to city officials, including the systematic arrangement of streets and improvement of the lakefront, and not only influenced the nascent field of urban planning but also has remained relevant to Chicago a century later.

Lakeside embraces the Burnham Plan and actually marks the completion of one of Burnham’s best ideas. Of Lakeside’s 600 acres, 130 have been given back to the public, completing Burnham’s vision to have uninterrupted access to the lakefront, all the way from downtown Chicago to Indiana. “That in itself is an amazing feat,” says Doug Voigt, SOM’s director of urban design and planning and one of the architects of Lakeside’s LEED-ND certified master plan, which received in 2012 the Sustainia Community Award, a global green initiative spearheaded by former California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Scandinavian think tank Monday Morning.

SOM’s strategic grafting of the area’s street grid is another move Burnham would’ve applauded, and it was praised by architecture critics, who noted the master plan’s emphasis on maintaining connectivity to the west and the choice to may–june 2013

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“People have been wondering what was going to happen at the site. They’ve been watching closely for more than 20 years.”

Nasutsa Mabwa, McCaffery Interests

Global Influences It would be easy to get overwhelmed if you were Ed Woodbury. A veteran developer who also trained as an architect, he understands the challenge of what’s being undertaken. But a wise man surrounds himself with wiser friends, and the leadership team at McCaffery Interests has enlisted partners around the globe to help it put together the puzzle of Lakeside. Early on, Woodbury, who spent time at SOM, sat down to lunch with Richard Tomlinson, a managing partner at the firm, and said, “Richard, how do we do this?”

Woodbury asked SOM for its global expertise. “Nothing can replace the lo-

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cal civil engineers, architects, and consultants that we have on the team,” he says, “but at the same time we wanted to expand that and get the best of the best from around the world.” The developer gathered engineers from WSP Group for transportation planning and Ramboll for ideas in sustainable infrastructure, as well as some unusual players, such as technology experts from Cisco Systems, who is providing leadership regarding the role of information technology in a neighborhood built from scratch.

McCaffery Interests also combed the international community for innovative ideas that could be replicated at Lakeside.

In Copenhagen, it found a city reliant almost entirely on district heating, a far more efficient strategy in which the heat for a cluster of buildings is generated centrally. In Toronto, the team found a cooling strategy in which already cold water is taken from Lake Erie and used to cool 30 million square feet of downtown Toronto. “If you can eliminate cooling towers on all the commercial development,” Voigt says, “not only have you reduced the demand for potable water, you’ve reduced the power load.” Storm water will also be returned to Lake Michigan through the use of things like permeable pavement instead of flowing into the Mississippi.

Amy Francetic, executive director and cofounder of the Chicago-based Clean Energy Trust, a nonprofit technology accelerator that works to create new clean energy businesses in the Midwest, has been instrumental in facilitating the sustainability framework for Lakeside. She says studying foreign cities proved that green was the way to go. “All the communities we’ve looked at for examples are beautiful—brick roads and beautiful green space, and that is part of what is delivering those drainage properties,” she says. “It’s when you pave everything over that [you] overload the system.”

Francetic’s group is also examining options for smart meters and adding infrastructure for electric vehicles, which

is sorely lacking in existing multifamily developments. What really excites Francetic, though, is the ability for Lakeside to serve as a living laboratory. “Making all this tangible and visible is really critical to helping people get comfortable with new forms of energy and changing their behavior,” Francetic says. “You have to be able to point to things [and say,] ‘This is that technology in action,’ and ‘This is that policy in action.’”

Looking West For all the rosy optimism, Lakeside is not without its potential pitfalls. The most obvious are the economic conditions in the surrounding communities and the project’s short- and long-term impacts on the Southeast Side of Chicago, an urban area distressed by the loss of blue-collar jobs from mill closures and de-industrialization. Understanding the neighborhood’s identity and its needs—and wants—will be key in building community support to ensure that Lakeside is not a patch of upper-class values stitched onto a quilt of working-class communities.

Woodbury, however, is not blind to the challenge before him or to the families the development will affect. “We’ve tested these [new ideas] out there,” he says, “and the way we test things is go and talk to people.”

Nasutsa Mabwa, project manager of development at McCaffery Interests, is on the site nearly every day. She interacts with community members regularly, whether during site tours on the trolley rented from the local chamber of commerce or at open houses in Lakeside’s marketing center, which was created from the old Foreign Inspector’s Office and recently renovated and LEED certified. Every communication channel is used in order to connect with residents. “We do weekly posts on Facebook to help people be engaged,” says Mabwa, who holds a master’s degree in urban planning from the University of Illinois–Chicago and an MBA from Roosevelt University. “We work gbdmagazine.com

photo: samantha simmons

make the extension of Lake Shore Drive a pedestrian-friendly boulevard rather than a freeway.

The history of the site has equally influenced what might be built at Lakeside and how it might be greener. The site is landfill that used to be Lake Michigan, which means the water is still there, 40 feet below ground level, providing an opportunity for vertical chilled-water systems that use the natural temperature of the lake for energy-efficient cooling. The site is also not soil but slag, a rock-like byproduct of steel manufacturing, making it naturally porous. Slag’s large voids allow water to seep into the ground quickly and return directly to the lake. This porosity is especially meaningful in Chicago, where two billion gallons of water a day are sent through the city’s storm-water system, over to the Mississippi River, and down to the Gulf of Mexico. A “19th-century idea,” Woodbury calls it. “You don’t have to be a member of the Sierra Club to understand that that’s not right.”

Without existing infrastructure, McCaffery Interests and SOM aren’t tied to those 19th-century ideas, and they can skip over 20th-century notions as well to plan a city fit for the 21st. But what would such a project look like? Had anyone else tried planning such a thing? The answers were scattered around the world.

WHAT LEADERS LOOK LIKE Nasutsa Mabwa (left) is the project manager of Lakeside and handles the daily tasks of the development. She and McCaffery Interests president Ed Woodbury have proven committed to a new paradigm of development.

“Truthfully, for all the technologies and all the ideas, we have mountains to climb yet. We have big challenges in front of us.�

Ed Woodbury, McCaffery Interests

FEATURES McCaffery Interests

“We are beyond conscious of the neighborhoods to the west. Yet at the same time, we’re not here to save the world.”

ED WOODBURY, McCaffery Interests

PROMISING CHOICES One example of environmental leadership is the Mud to Parks program, in which mud from Peoria Lake, which has excess sediment, is floated up the Illinois River to Lakeside, where it will help build parkland.

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ect with the Chicago Department of Transportation, rebuilding existing road infrastructure to prevent the flooding that’s plagued the area. But perhaps one of the most promising ideas is the Lakeside Entitlement Zone, which, if McCaffery Interests has its way, will include a portion of the existing neighborhoods and give the area special rules regarding the procurement of building permits, entitlements, and business licenses. Applications for such documents will be fast-tracked, shortening time frames from months or years to weeks or even days. Such a simple idea could accelerate investment and hopefully encourage additional positive, community-led development. The City of Chicago reportedly is on board. “We have an administration that is very open to the idea,” Woodbury says.

It will be years before we know what the impacts of Lakeside will be, but McCaffery Interests and its leadership team are optimistic that by asking smart questions today, it can avoid the usual build-nowevaluate-later mentality that has cursed developments of this size in the past. Yet Woodbury is careful to remain realistic and business-focused, even as he balances the responsibility of creating something

positive at Lakeside. “We are beyond conscious of the neighborhoods to the west and at times as focused on them as we are on Lakeside,” Woodbury says. “Yet at the same time, we’re not here to save the world. We like to understate it and say that we’re simply trying to develop a little 600-acre site.”

Mountains to Climb It is the nature of our world that when one thing ends, another begins, and such is the nature of Lakeside. As the extension of Lake Shore Drive nears completion, plans begin for the construction of Phase 1, a mixed-use development on 70 acres in the northwest corner of the property. Yet even after the first phase is built and the commercial space is leased, Lakeside will be no more than a toddler in the grand scheme of its life cycle, and like a toddler, Lakeside’s identity can and will continue to change and evolve as it grows. Woodbury and the rest of his team rely on their mantra: Who knows what the future will look like? It is evident, however, that McCaffery Interests is asking the right questions and really pushing the boundaries of sustainable planning, which is all that can be done until the project gets a little bit older.

“The framework and the ideas behind the buildings are the strength of what we’re trying to advocate at Lakeside,” Woodbury says. “That’s everything from how we approach the site and enter the site physically to what we plan to do in the ground itself that no one will ever see. . . .

Truthfully, for all the technologies and all the ideas, we have mountains to climb yet and lots of obstacles—financial obstacles, regulatory obstacles, market obstacles. We have big challenges in front of us.”

Challenges or not, the sheer imagination required to master-plan Lakeside may well be worth every hour and dollar spent on the endeavor for the way it has inspired Chicago to recall not only the Burnham Plan but also Burnham’s infamous quote: “Make no little plans.” gb&d gbdmagazine.com

photo: mccaffery interests

with residents, local community groups, and the aldermen when we do open houses; we do paper flyers [because] not everyone uses the Internet, surprisingly, even though it’s 2013.”

South Chicago, the neighborhood immediately adjacent to the site, lost a huge economic force when U.S. Steel closed South Works, which employed nearly 20,000 workers at its peak. Lakeside is an opportunity to restore jobs and hope, and Mabwa says the residents are incredibly enthusiastic. “[After South Works closed] people were out of work and the community began to change,” she says. “People have been wondering what was going to happen at the site. They’ve been watching closely for more than 20 years.”

Yet Lakeside promises a healthier community not just through economic development but through intentionally blurred boundaries. Any new infrastructure employed at Lakeside will extend into the existing neighborhoods. “We are physically trying to draw a line around Lakeside and include part of the neighborhood in our thinking,” Woodbury says.

Already, the Lakeside team was instrumental in getting a $6.5 million grant from the State of Illinois to do a pilot proj-

FEATURES

discussion board which of history’s heroes should leaders look back to?

“Theodore Roosevelt. A charismatic leader who understood that the natural capital of our country helped make us great.

He did a great deal to preserve wilderness. It’s not just about making a quick buck today. Innovation should be focused on making the world a better place for future generations.”

Rob Zimmerman, Kohler Co., p38

“With the goal of achieving global sustainability, R. Buckminster Fuller was an early proponent of renewable energy sources, conservation through the efficient use of materials, and doing more with less. I firmly believe in his principle that an individual can make a positive difference in the way the world works.”

Mike Remige, Jennette’s Pier, p134

"The vision for Chicago Lakeside follows in the tradition of the influential urban planner Daniel Burnham. His theme of ‘make no little plans’ embodies Lakeside, and can be found in every facet of our development work there.”

Ed Woodbury, McCaffery Interests, p86

“As an educator, Rachel Carson earns my vote as an inspirational leader for students of all ages. Through her seminal 1962 book, A Silent Spring, she alerted us to the negative impact man can have on his environment. This book set in motion the entire environmental movement. Sustainable building practices are derived from her ideas of reducing our impact on the world in which we live.”

Jim Ryan, Stillwater Public Schools, p26

“Added to the well-deserved accolades of being ‘the world's greatest architect,’ scholars are now calling Frank Lloyd Wright ‘our first green architect.’ By doing his work, he planted the seeds for designers of all kinds to become cocreating partners with the holistic systems of nature.”

Vernon Swaback, Swaback Partners, p50

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Santa Monica Place earnS PreStigiouS environMental award: LEED GOLD CERTIFICATION Macerich believes the most sustainable building is one that already exists. With the re-use and re-design of Santa Monica Place, Macerich recycled an existing structure into a sustainable new retail environment.

2008

2009

2010

2011†

energy (kwh) % Reduction

938,093,169

860,039,545 8.3%

786,580,743 8.5%

734,937,471 6.6%

water* (total spend) % Reduction

$11,736,772

$11,186,501 5%

$10,774,281 4%

$10,915,786 -1%

recycled waste (tons) % Increase

10,391

11,008 5.9%

12,690 15.3%

13,879 9.4%

594,287 5.3%

543,527 8.5%

506,780 6.8%

est. carbon Footprint†† % Reduction

* Due to variances in billing units, total spend is tracked at this point. † Waiting on final Waste numbers (still estimated) but Energy and Water are based on final year end billing data. †† Footprint based on Scope 2 emissions from purchased utilities including master metered use.

SantaMonicaPlace.com

Macerich is committed to creating a sustainable, healthy environment for our employees, tenants, guests, communites and for future generations.

GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List

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Learn

A vibrant space for community

Hamline university anderson center

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University of Wisconsin– Madison biochemical sciences complex

Putting together a state-of-the-art puzzle

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St. Thomas the Apostle School

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Architectural flourishes despite constraints

W hotel San Francisco

An aesthetic and energy overhaul Camp Prairie Schooner

Design meets minimalist camping

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InterContinental Hotel– San Francisco

A case study in next-gen lighting

work

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Duket Architects Planners

A LEED Platinum office in a classical shell

live

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SRM Development

230 Broadway is a new kind of Seattle living

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space S l e a r n

Great Room Hamline University’s new student center features site-harvested wood, proprietary wall technology, and multiuse spaces that reflect a changing college culture

By Michelle Markelz

At Hamline University in Minnesota, the new Anderson Center features a façade of high-performance glass that wraps around an inviting place to gather.

These permeable pavers, which reduce runoff, are just one landscape strategy at the new building.

Plantings here and across campus require little upkeep because they make use of native perennials and grasses.

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PROJECT LOCATION Saint Paul, MN Size 76,957 ft2 Completed 2012

Team Client Hamline University Architect Shepley Bulfinch Contractor McGough Solar Panels tenKsolar Permeable Pavers Borgert Products Green Roof Bachman’s Inc. Acoustic Tiles Acoustigreen

Green CERTIFICATION Not applicable Landscape 1,800-square-foot green roof, perennials, native grasses Lighting Daylight harvested in twostory solarium space, skylights Energy Photovoltaics generate 2.5% of required energy Water Permeable pavers, rainwater cistern

PHOTOS: CORY + TAMRAH RYAN

LEFT The Anderson Center gives students and faculty a place for good food, meeting rooms, meditative spaces, and state-of-theart technology to support large and small gatherings.

ABOVE Inside, the vibrant forum has large and flexible event and meeting spaces as well as study areas for students.

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W

hen expecting a hungry football team for dinner, an unfinished kitchen spells bad news. That was one of the many challenges that came up in the construction of Hamline University’s Carol Young Anderson and Dennis L. Anderson University Center, which broke ground in March 2011. It took $36 million, 16 months, and a handpicked team to deliver on the project, but on August 10, 2012, the center opened its doors—just in time to welcome its Pipers football team after the first practice of the season.

Although not officially certified, the building is LEED Silver equivalent, and its conception began more than five years ago. When the board of trustees met in 2007 to lay out a five-year strategic plan for the Saint Paul, Minnesota, campus, it became apparent that its 1960s-era student center was over capacity for the 5,000 students and more than 600 faculty and staff members. It was at that same meeting that the university’s ethic of sustainability was first put in writing and a task force was assembled to see it through. This was the perfect opportunity to transform Minnesota’s first institution of higher education into one of the greenest.

When the university was ready to assemble its A-team, it carried out an intense integrated planning process, says Hamline associate vice president for facilities services Lowell Bromander, a member of both the Sustainability and the University Center task forces. Experts were drafted from various industries, from masonry to energy, to create a stacked, Minnesota-heavy crew. Bromander’s role on the two task forces allowed may–june 2013

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SPACES LEARN PLAY WORK LIVE

“Hamline has this culture of being very humble.

We need to push that aside as much as we’re comfortable and start telling those stories.”

Lowell Bromander, Hamline University

him to function as a natural liaison and maintain the sustainability vision while always considering the integrity of the center.

However, before the foundation could be poured, the crew had to clear more than three-dozen trees from the site.

Making the most of the loss, the team opted to move 30 of the trees to new locations on campus, and the others were harvested for furniture, signage, and artwork within the Anderson Center. What couldn’t be used in those capacities was taken to District Energy in Saint Paul to be used as fuel.

In the new building, Hamline has a front door to both the Saint Paul and Hamline communities. “There are no back doors,” Bromander says. “Our three goals for the facility were to foster community, connections, and collaboration.”

Functioning as the campus living room, the Anderson Center was conceived as a meeting place where students, faculty, and staff could gather and relax, study, and dine. And through the multifunctionality of the center’s spaces, the new technologies it has incorporated, and the

The Anderson Center has an open dining area for students who choose to get food at the center or bring their lunch.

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accommodations the building provides, the building itself reflects that campus personality well.

On the second floor, which is dedicated entirely to food service, Bromander and his team wanted the ability to seat at least 500 people in the 25,000-square-foot space shared with the kitchen. Sensors throughout the building take readings and automatically adjust to changing temperatures and airflow so that no energy is wasted on over-conditioning the space. Thirty-two miles of network cable and two computer bars with seven machines also help Hamline respond to the community’s technology needs. The twostory solarium doubles as a living room space and event center, and the 56,000 square feet of underground parking serves 105 vehicles at a time—plus three electric car-charging stations—without sacrificing any green space.

The Anderson Center is Hamline’s first official green building; however, before it was built, unsung efforts were going on across campus that contributed to the green movement and decreased the university’s environmental impact.

For more than 20 years, locally raised pigs have been eating the discarded double cheeseburgers of Hamline students through a food-waste management program. And, when the new Klas Field replaced the Pipers’ gridiron in 2004, material from the old concrete football stadium was pulverized and recycled.

“We have lots of great stories about Hamline’s sustainability efforts,” Bromander says, “but Hamline has this culture of being very humble. We need to push that aside as much as we’re comfortable and start telling those stories.”

Some of the green aspects of the new university center are impossible to overlook. The roof and side of the building have 118 solar panels that provide 2.5 percent of the building’s energy needs.

Sharing the roof with the panels is a garden of vegetation designed to harvest rainwater and help manage runoff, and though Saint Paul is more known for its winters than its summers, the green roof helps to alleviate strain on the cooling system as well.

During construction, Bromander’s team replaced two less-efficient boilers, which were operating below full capacity, and installed one high-efficiency pressure steam-boiler. Even with the additional heating needs of the Anderson Center, Hamline has actually improved its heating efficiency. Bromander says the additional demand for steam brought the new boiler up to its operating potential and allowed the university to maximize its output.

In routing the steam to the center, a section of the campus sidewalks had to be removed, the space repaved, and street lamps reinstalled. This was yet another opportunity to execute the sustainability plan. The team decided to use LED lamps, which save energy and have lower maintenance costs. They also installed a sidewalk of permeable pavers that both relieve the storm-water system and decrease the hardscape of the space.

As the campus and its fixtures age, these gbdmagazine.com

Hamline University Anderson Center SPACES

Above the third floor is a lush, 1,800-square-foot green roof that helps mitigate urban heat island effect and provides additional insulation for energy savings and sound control.

PHOTOS: CORY + TAMRAH RYAN

Behind the Build

technologies will continue to replace traditional sidewalks and lamps.

Special attention was paid to the lighting and materials used in the Anderson Center as well. More than three quarters of the center is daylit by skylights and towering windows such as those making up the center’s sleek, curved front façade, and an automated system compensates with electric lights when light levels are too low. The university used low-VOC paints and glues throughout the building, and the ceiling tiles were sourced from Delano, Minnesota-based Acoustigreen, whose products are all made from 100 percent locally sourced, recycled wood.

Yet the most revolutionary aspect of the building is around every corner—literally—but impossible to see without a sledgehammer. The high-performance walls conceptualized by architects at Shepley Bulfinch and constructed by McGough are an energy-saving achievement that proved their results even before the building was complete. The walls consist of an exterior rain screen and rock-wall insulation, which is separated by air space, then followed by a permeable vapor barrier, sheeting, and spray gb&d

insulation. Bromander had expected to run three heat sources to get the crew through the winter of 2011, but thanks to the wonder walls, he only needed one.

“It’s the first wall type like this I know of in the Twin Cities,” Bromander says.

Hamline was able to further reduce its environmental impact in construction through making a comprehensive commitment to local sourcing. Aside from Acoustigreen, contributing Minnesota companies include Bloomingtonbased tenKsolar, which provided the solar panels; Borgert Products in St. Joseph, which supplied the permeable pavers; and the Twin Cities’ Bachman’s, a local LiveRoof grower, which planted the green roof.

Just within a year of operation, the Anderson Center has already become a hive of activity on the Hamline campus.

“I don’t know where the students were hanging out before,” Bromander says, “because I’ve never seen it like this.” He jokes that the appeal of the building has even lured the law students out of the law school.

Hamline is certainly not as large as the University of Minnesota, but the Anderson Center and the architectural

Almost every project faces obstacles, but Lowell Bromander credits McGough, the general contractor for Hamline’s Anderson University Center, for the relatively smooth build-out. “McGough was incredible,” he says. “They asked the right questions, identified problems early, and avoided a lot of mistakes we couldn’t afford to make.” As a go-to contractor for the university, McGough brought experience and innovation to the project from the outset. Shepley Bulfinch’s own proprietary technology—the highperformance walls—were an on-thespot successful prototype built by McGough that allowed Bromander and his team to run two fewer heating units during construction through the Saint Paul winter.

precedent it has set are putting this smaller institution in the company of the Minnesota’s larger schools. “I meet fairly regularly with facilities managers from other schools in the state,” Bromander says, “and we get excited about each other’s work. We’ve done some things here that haven’t been done in other buildings, and people want to know how we did it.” gb&d may–june 2013

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LEARN PLAY WORK LIVE SPACES

biochemical Infill Flad Architects carefully navigates a 170-year-old tree and an 80-year-old mural to complete the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s new academic complex

By Murrye Bernard

An empty site is the ideal location for a new scientific research and academic facility, but it’s rare to find a large enough piece of undeveloped land on a college campus. While reestablishing tabula rasa was one option explored by the project team behind the latest addition to the Biochemical Sciences Complex for the University of Wisconsin–Madison, it was quickly ruled out since two existing science buildings inhabit the

Henry Mall District, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Flad Architects, however, found that it could design an addition and two infill projects that incorporate the existing buildings in order to create one cohesive complex that connects the historic and the modern.

David Black, AIA, Flad’s principal in charge of design for the project, likens the design process to assembling a

complex puzzle. The new facilities unite the different departments within the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences and the School of Medicine and Public Health through a mutlilayered project that consolidates several disparate yet historically significant buildings from the 20th century, forming three distinct yet interconnected volumes.

The original 1912 biochemistry building, located on the southwest corner

An American elm that is nearly two centuries old stands in the courtyard of the complex. Great care was taken during construction to ensure the tree was not damaged.

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On the southwest corner of the new building, a glass-enclosed column with aluminum sunshades surrounds lounge areas on each floor. In the center of the stairwell, a sculpture by Seattle artist Norie Sato uses metal mesh and polished metal spheres to evoke the molecules and helical DNA strands central to the biochemical research happening nearby.

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University of Wisconsin-Madison Biochemical Sciences Complex SPACES

“it’s not just about the labs and classrooms.

Campuses are places for people.”

Mitchell Fox, Flad Architects

PROJECT LOCATION Madison, WI Size 250,000 ft2 Completed 2012 Program Laboratories, teaching auditoriums, classrooms, instructional labs, administrative space, offices

TEAM ARCHITECT Flad Architects Client/Owner State of Wisconsin, University of Wisconsin Historic Preservation Architect Isthmus Architecture Civil Engineer/Landscape Architect SmithGroupJJR Structural Engineer Flad Structural Mechanical/Electrical/Security Engineer Affiliated Engineers Supporting Electrical Engineer Zoe Engineering Plumbing/Fire Protection Engineer PSJ Engineering General Contractor JH Findorff & Son

GREEN CERTIFICATION Not applicable Site Restored pedestrian paths and amenities, preserved 170-year-old elm tree Materials Nearly 92% of construction waste diverted, terracotta rain-screen façades Energy Heat-recovery system, solarshading, daylighting controls

of Henry Mall, was expanded through additions in 1937 and 1956. The 1937 addition contains murals by WPA-era artist John Steuart Curry that were carefully preserved in-situ during the renovation and construction. Flad, along with historic preservationists at Isthmus Architecture, restored the 1912 and 1937 buildings’ exteriors, upgraded the interiors to house instructional spaces, and demolished and rebuilt the 1956 building, which was between the other two buildings. The infill section added two new auditoriums to the southernmost biochemistry building, and the architects distinguished the exterior of this new portion by adding a gabion wall with bricks salvaged from the 1956 building. This creative reuse of material contributed to the project’s construction waste diversion rate, which totals 97 percent by weight and 90 percent by volume.

The second component of the complex is the biochemistry addition, previously designed by Flad and completed in 1998. The third and most drastically altered portion is the biochemical sciences building, which incorporated the 1906 agricultural journalism building and an-

other 1985 biochemistry addition to create one cohesive complex. Flad restored the 1906 building down to its details such as oil-rubbed bronze hardware that was made to match the originals; the 1985 addition, located on the north side of the biochemical sciences complex, is currently under renovation. The centerpiece is a new six-story tower containing research laboratories that Flad Architects inserted between these two existing buildings.

Although the height of the new tower nearly aligns with the 1985 structure, most of the adjacent historic buildings lining Henry Mall rise only three stories.

To mitigate this shift in scale, project architect Mitchell Fox says the architects designed the tower to be “buoyant.” An abundance of glass and anodized aluminum contributes to this lightened effect, and the rhythm and proportions of the fenestration echo modules established by existing buildings. The play of light and shadow further animates the tower’s façade. The architects also referenced more traditional materials used throughout the campus, particularly its terra-cotta roofs. They used terra-cotta, a material considered sustainable because of its

The 1937 Biochemical Sciences building houses two WPA murals by noted artist John Steuart Curry.

This public stair includes a scene of doctors curing children afflicted by rickets, a disease that was cured through research at the university.

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longevity, for the tower’s rain-screen façade system and to create sun-shading elements.

Along the base of the new tower, a loggia lends human scale and provides the added benefit of shading the lobby against sunlight. Within the lobby and the tower’s public spaces, the architects applied the same approach of reinterpreting historic materials in a modern way to create a sense of comfort and familiarity. They brought terra-cotta tile into the lobby and lined the main stair that ascends the six-story atrium with acid-etched glass. Cascading down the center of the stair is an installation by Seattle-based artist Norie Sato, which forms a helix reminiscent of DNA strands. Interspersed throughout the building and adjacent to the atrium are many flexible and collaborative lounges that allow students and faculty to mingle and discuss research. In corridors and laboratories, durability was the guiding factor in material selection so surfaces can withstand abrasive chemicals and the impacts of carts carrying samples and equipment.

The University of Wisconsin–Madison is where Vitamin D was first isolated; as a nod to this historic detail, the architects let natural light wash the tower’s inte-

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rior though they also installed interior sun-shading devices and daylighting controls in laboratories. Daylighting contributes to lowering the energy consumption of the building, which according to energy models, is projected to be 21.8 percent more efficient than a similar building designed to the base code. Labs are energy-intensive as a rule, Fox notes, and for safety purposes they require a tremendous amount of ventilation.

But to offset energy needs, the design team installed a heat-recovery system to capture excess heat from laboratories.

The labs are outfitted with variable-airvolume chemical fume hoods, but when such a high level of ventilation isn’t needed, the hoods can be dialed back.

The designers achieved the goals of creating a facility that supports groundbreaking research and is also sustainable, but one of the greatest successes of the project, Fox says, is the exterior green space that was recaptured. By demolishing the 1956 building, the architects could reopen a mid-block pedestrian passage that was part of the original 1908 campus master plan by Peabody, Laird and Cret. The passage, which is lined with planters and seats and a café that spills out from the 1906 building, reestablishes the severed connection between Henry Mall and the western portion of the university campus and creates a front door for the new tower that is otherwise boxed in by existing buildings. The new site design also preserves and frames a 170-year-old heritage elm, a survivor of the Dutch Elm epidemic. No matter how complex the research methodology is and the spaces that house it become, the tree serves as a poignant reminder that the most basic building block is nature. gb&d

Dialogue Mitchell Fox The UW–Madison campus is rich in architectural history. Was it controversial to insert a modern tower into this context? Madison is a progressive town, and the university, which operates its buildings for 50 or even 100 years, is interested in longevity. Even though the new research tower is very modern from the outside and is somewhat of a departure from its context, it reflects this context through material selection and articulation.

A six-story brick masonry box would be very inappropriate.

Why not pursue official LEED certification?

The client, the State of Wisconsin, is progressive in its outlook, and it is very interested in energy savings for all the right reasons.

However, the state doesn’t push LEED certification; they have their own sustainability standards, some of which use LEED as a model. They are results-oriented rather than focusing on tallying points to reach Silver or Gold status.

What’s your top priority when designing academic structures? Sustainability and functionality are key in designing buildings for campuses, but it’s not just about the labs and classrooms; it’s about the break rooms, lobbies, and informal spaces for students and faculty to gather. Campuses are places for people.

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PORTRAIT: Mike Rebholz

ABOVE A pedestrian path runs between the new biochemical sciences building and the renovated 1912 and 1937 biochemistry buildings. The grade-level connection restores the original vision of the university master plan and helps ease travel across campus, while a second-story bridge provides an interior connection. As a gesture to the clay tile roofs on the oldest buildings, the tower is clad in a terra-cotta rain screen and sunshading system.

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Faced with an incredibly small plot of land to work with on this project, the design team took any opportunity to add architectural flourishes, such as the oversized ramp seen in the middle photo.

S P O T L I G H T LE A RN

St. thomas The Apostle School Griffin Enright Architects

Photos: Benny Chan

Griffin Enright Architects’ work on St. Thomas the Apostle School goes against typical notions that Catholic schools are housed in historic churches. The architecture firm was hired to design a new building that would house the gymnasium, art room, and library, but the Los Angeles school didn’t have too much space to expand. The team was able to more than double the area of the school while adding a requisite 100 parking spots, which was accomplished by putting the parking area below a new playground for students. With little space, the team sought to maximize architectural impact wherever possible, such as adding a modern, oversized handicap entrance ramp to the main entrance. The building is set apart from the original school building to still allow natural light into both buildings. gb&d

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Marks the Spot

The W Hotel is an example of high design and high efficiency. Water, waste, and energy totals have been reduced even as its first-floor public spaces have been revamped by Natoma Architects.

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The W Hotel in San Francisco received simultaneous energy and aesthetic overhauls. It was the seventh hotel in the country to reach LEED-EB Silver.

Inspired by a 19th-century writer, the renovations at the W Hotel in San Francisco put it on the map as a place for sustainable design and ideals

By Benjamin van Loon

PROJECT LOCATION San Francisco Size 385,000 ft2 Built 1999, renovated 2011 Program Hotel Awards 2010 Green Business Award for Best Practices for Small Companies, San Francisco Business Times; 2011 Stars of the Industry Award for Good Earthkeeping, America’s Hotel & Lodging Association

TEAM OWNER Starwood Hotels & Resorts Architect Hornberg + Worstell Interior Architect Natoma Architects Structural Engineer Middlebrook + Louie Structural Engineers

GREEN

PHOTO: W SAN FRANCISCO

CERTIFICATION LEED Silver Site Downtown location with intentional connectivity Water Low-flow fixtures and waterless urinals reduce water use by 32% Energy Energy Star-rated fixtures and sensors reduce energy use by 12% Lighting 70% CFL and LED lighting Recycling 85% of waste recycled or composted

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As the newly revamped W Hotel in San Francisco shows, green is as much in the mechanisms as it is in the metaphors. The architect for the hotel’s renovation of its public spaces, Natoma Architects’ Stanley Saitowitz, drew his metaphor from lines penned by 19thcentury San Franciscan writer Ambrose Bierce: Careful now. / We’re dealing here with a myth. / This city is a point upon a map of fog; / Lemuria in a city unknown. / Like us, / It doesn't quite exist.

Lemuria is a mythical ‘lost land,’ whose elusive borders shift according to the whims of a fleeting desire. The fog in San Francisco is an equally transient creature, able to transform the city through interplay of light and shadow.

Saitowitz’s redesign uses the ideas of ‘map’ and ‘fog’ throughout the design to inspire a new, contextual sort of hotel experience that corresponds to the W’s mission to create an ‘eclectic urban retreat.’ “We took a very contemporary approach to . . . that interpretation of San Francisco,” says Michael Pace, general manager for W San Francisco. “The whole pattern of this design is woven into the public space.”

Originally constructed in 1999 and designed by architects Hornberger + Worstell, the 385,000-square-foot hotel in the heart of downtown San Francisco’s NoMa district received LEED-EB Silver certification in 2010, predicating Saitowitz’s redesign of the 31-story building, completed in 2011. The two separate initiatives set the precedent for what the W brand is moving forward. “This was the third hotel for the W brand, and the first one built from the ground up,” may–june 2013

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“It became a prototype for what a new build would look like for the future, in terms of both design and sustainability.”

Michael Pace, W Hotel San Francisco

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and the bulbs were changed to CFLs and LEDs in public and back-room spaces.

The waterless urinals in the public bathrooms save 300,000 gallons per year, and 1.0-gpf toilets and 2-gpm faucets and showers reduce water even further. Additionally, the hotel recycles and composts more than 85 percent of its waste, and by reusing laundry bags and clothes hangers, more than 250,000 plastic laundry bags and 350,000 metal hangers are diverted from landfills every year.

“We also introduced variable frequency drives on our hot-water heater and installed a third, smaller water chiller to take the energy load off the two large chillers when the hotel has a low occupancy,” Pace says. “The two chillers that were on the roof were far larger than they needed to be. It’s amazing how much energy we started saving when we added the third chiller.”

One of the W’s most visible energysavers is the hotel’s dynamic-glass façade, engineered by View (formerly Soladigm).

A demonstration kiosk in the lobby shows how the glass uses electrochromic technology to transition from clear to variable tint, reducing heat gain and glare without shades or fritting.

Although the redesign was too late to contribute to the LEED rating, all elements included by Saitowitz were designed to respond to LEED guidelines with low-VOC finishes, LED lighting, recycled construction waste, and other subtle sustainable features. “We really wanted to revamp the food and beverage experience of the hotel,” Pace says of the redesign’s primary goal. “The public spaces needed a remodel, so we took the two bars, the restaurant, and the area we call ‘the living room’ and gave [Saitowitz] two criteria: we wanted to continue building to LEED standards and to design with the idea of W’s New York aesthetic export with respect to the local culture.”

In the public area of the hotel, Saitowitz mimicked the ‘fog’ idea by removing the doors to create an interior flow to the

Go behind W's red the e with Sta sign Saitow nley itz on p146

The dynamic glass façade of the W Hotel lets in plenty of daylight without glare or heat, aiding the building in its energy-reduction goals.

space and adding a dot pattern on the ceilings and wall covers, and the LEDbacklit grid forms on the walls represent the grid pattern of the city. The hotel restaurant, Trace, echoes the sustainable initiatives set by the brand, focusing on farm-to-table food concepts; local produce, draft beers, and wines; and honey gathered on-site from the hotel’s rooftop beehives.

Based on its reputation for sustainability, the hotel has been a focal point for green building organizations such as Greenbuild, which targeted the W as a gathering place for its 2012 conference.

“We have a really good relationship with Greenbuild and other organizations, because I want people to know what we’re doing,” Pace says. “I want to tell people the story about how we can make a positive impact on the environment and also manage the brand integrity.” gb&d gbdmagazine.com

PHOTOS: W SAN FRANCISCO, SPENCER A. BROWN (PORTRAIT)

Pace says. “It became a sort of prototype for what a new build would look like for the future, in terms of both design and sustainability.”

Saitowitz’s renovations began at the tail end of 2009, when the hotel was putting the finishing touches on its LEED-EB submission. The subsequent certification made the hotel the seventh in the United States and the first major hotel brand in the world to achieve this level of certification. “When I came to the W in 2007, the hotel team approached me to help them put some green initiatives in place—it was literally a grassroots initiative,” Pace says. “After analyzing the hotel, I was also committed to putting the brand first and not putting any sustainability initiatives in place that would deter from the brand experience.”

Beyond treating the hotel as a prototype for branded architecture, Pace initiated and oversaw a concerted effort to incorporate sustainability into the W’s prototypic schema—an effort that is now continuous for all of the international brands overseen by Starwood Hotels & Resorts, which aims to reduce energy by 30 percent and water usage by 20 percent in each of its hotels by 2020.

In speaking with some of his former partners, Pace realized that LEED Silver would be easily attainable for the building, which has 404 guest rooms, 15,000 square feet of meeting space, two bars, and a restaurant in its program. In the interest of serving the triple bottom line, Pace hired two LEED APs, who were enrolled at Presidio Graduate School in San Francisco, to consult on the W’s green overhaul. “With two students and sheer sweat and tenacity, it took us under one year—with no capital improvements—to help us earn LEED Silver,” Pace says.

Since 2008, the hotel has reduced its energy use by 20 percent and its water use by 32 percent. As an aspect of the overhaul, more than 70 percent of the lighting was attached to motion sensors,

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S P O T L I G H T PL A Y

Camp Prairie Schooner el dorado Inc

Summer camp is a great pastime of anyone’s childhood, and although you knew every nook and cranny of your favorite cabin, every camper would notice the new architecture at Camp Prairie Schooner in Kansas City, Missouri. The Girl Scouts camp commissioned El Dorado Inc to design new bunk houses, completed in spring 2012, for the camp. The vibrantly colored bunk houses have a foundation made of cast-in-place concrete and continuous grade beams that run parallel to the length of the walls. The building walls and ceiling are made of metal panels with skylights and woodand aluminum-clad windows. These new bunk houses are meant to be minimalist so the girls will spend the larger portion of their time outside but still have a nice place to rest at the end of the day. gb&d

PHOTOS: MIKE SINCLARI

The bunk houses at the camp are built on concrete foundations with corrugated metal panels for the walls.

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The InterContinental Hotel–San Francisco delivers impressive energy savings without sacrificing a single drop of opulence, thanks to a tenacious team of engineers and industry partners

By Jennifer Nunez

It’s the more luxurious side of sustainability, a side necessarily inhabited by many hospitality groups, which cater to guests who hold varying ideas about ‘being green.’ In 2011, the InterContinental Hotel–San Francisco was certified LEED-EB Gold due to massive green measures spearheaded by Harry Hobbs, the hotel’s director of engineering. Hobbs and his staff have achieved their successes through various initiatives and a clear commitment to helping the environment without sacrificing the look, feel, or experience of the hotel.

Before the doors opened in 2008, management made clear that a culture of sustainability and responsible business practices needed to be developed.

Initiatives were already beginning to

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take place, and Hobbs wanted to have an opening day pep rally. “I had 250 of our new employees raise their right hand and solemnly pledge that they would support our efforts to green the hotel,” he says. “I had been exposed a few years prior to the LEED process and was absolutely convinced that its approach toward third-party validation of green practices was the right way to go.”

Hobbs says many people make claims about a building’s green aspects, but sometimes if you lift the hood, you might find that those are exactly what they are—merely claims. Hobbs’ goal was to separate the hotel from the world of empty claims and make it evident to its guests that the InterContinental had “walked the walk.”

Hobbs says he couldn’t have achieved this without his LEED consultant Jubilee Daniels, who was a key team member in helping the hotel achieve its Gold status.

“She worked tirelessly,” Hobbs says. “She brought vigor and tenacity to the project.

There is no way I could ever repay her.”

Achieving the Energy Star label was an equally important feat for the InterContinental, and it wasn’t an easy battle.

When the hotel debuted in 2008, it was rated 69 on Energy Star’s scale of zero to 100, six points shy of the level required for a label. But fortunately, the building was part of a USGBC pilot program, in which 50 hotels were shepherded through the Energy Star process. Only three went on to obtain the label—and the InterContinental was one of them. gbdmagazine.com

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The InterContinental San Francisco achieved a LEED Gold certification in Existing Buildings, which made it the largest building to receive that certification in California at the time.

Charged with reaching LEED Gold, director of engineering Harry Hobbs took full advantage of the Pacific Energy Center across the street to prove that high-efficiency lighting can work in an upscale hotel.

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The InterContinental uses a combination of CFL, fluorescent, and sensor-controlled lighting throughout the hotel.

PROJECT LOCATION San Francisco Size 600,000 ft2 Completed 2011 Program Hotel

TEAM CLIENT InterContinental Hotel–San Francisco Architect Patri Merker Architects Lighting Consultant Pacific Energy Center Lighting Designer Luminae Souter Associates

GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Gold Water Faucet aerators reduce flow to 0.5 gpm Energy LED lighting, water-side economizer Recycling Hotel-wide recycling program Cleaning Green Seal Certified chemicals, HEPA filtered vacuums, micofiber cleaning cloths

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“Many of that group dropped out because they were in the thirties and forties and fifties and saw no hope of being able to achieve the threshold of 69 to qualify for LEED certification, let alone 75 to get an Energy Star label,” Hobbs says. Three to four months into the project, Energy Star underwent changes, which gave the hotel a new, higher score of 64. But through rigorous energysaving efforts, that score climbed to 87 within just a few years. “My utilities rep at Pacific Gas and Electric said he knows of no other hotel that has achieved an Energy Star rating as high as ours,” Hobbs says.

Finding the perfect energy-efficient lights for the InterContinental was one of the biggest issues. However, Pacific Gas and Electric’s Pacific Energy Center (PEC) was conveniently across the street from the hotel, and Hobbs took full advantage of the resource. “I started to knock on their door and say, ‘Hey, let me be your living room; let’s work together to demonstrate that emerging technologies can have a place in a high-end luxury hotel that is aesthetically acceptable,’” Hobbs recalls.

The PEC and Northwest National Lamps partnered with the InterContinental to work on finding the best lighting for the project. After a rigorous elimination process, Hobbs and his team selected six different bulbs and then fitted them into the existing fixtures for a test run one night. The light output by the energy-efficient bulbs was much less than expected. “We were absolutely disgusted with the output,” Hobbs says.

“We were about six to eight months into the project and didn’t feel like we had a win at all.”

A few days after the big letdown, the lighting designer, Michael Souter of Luminae Souter Associates, presented an MR-16 LED. “We went into the hotel hallway and put it in a fixture illuminating artwork,” Hobbs explains. “He glowed when we looked at the output. When I showed it to our ownership group they said it was better than the original.”

Overall, the hotel installed 1,000 LED bulbs, which helped the InterContinental save nearly $40,000 a year in electricity costs.

A huge contribution to the Energy Star label was the 2010 installation of the gbdmagazine.com

InterContinental Hotel–San Francisco SPACES

OUR SERVICES INCLUDE:

• COMPLETE BUILDING SYSTEMS INTEGRATION • DESIGN ENGINEERING • INSTALLATION • PROGRAMMING • COUNTER SALES • UL LISTED PANEL SHOP • TRAINING

PHOTO: MARK LEET (TOP)

20788 Corsair Boulevard • Hayward, California 94545 (510) 293-6040 / (510) 293-6050 • www.ace-corporation.com

water-side economizer for the rooftop HVAC system. The InterContinental spent $250,000 flying the heat exchanger device to the roof of the hotel, modifying its chiller piping, and implementing the device. The projected return on investment, based on calculations, indicated that management could expect 1,800 hours of economizer operation, but the hotel has seen substantially more savings, reducing energy demand for airconditioning by eight percent and saving $75,000 a year in electricity costs. The Energy Star rating went up to 79 in the following year.

Water conservation can be a tricky category for hotels because they have so many guests on any given day, but the InterContinental saved as much as possible by installing aerators that reduced fixture use to 0.5 gallons per minute, saving approximately two million gallons of water per year. And although the LED lights, HVAC systems, and low-flow fixtures aren’t really there to dazzle the clients of the hotel, the InterContinental Hotel–San Francisco’s efforts prove that luxury and sustainability can go hand-inhand. gb&d gb&d

ABOVE The hotel uses 100% renewable energy through Renewable Energy Credits and Verified Emission Reductions; it also installed solar panels to power the trash compactor and has regenerative breaking power in its elevators.

BRAMPTON SOUTHWEST QUADRANT RENEWAL

The Southwest Quadrant Renewal Plan is designed to reinforce the Brampton historic downtown as the ‘heart’ of the City. The site redevelopment will provide two new civic presences on the south side of Queen Street, heralding the intensification and rejuvenation of the current Civic Centre.

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In q u i r e W i t h i n Don’t be confused by its classical shell. The Health Care REIT headquarters is an ultracontemporary workspace and the first LEED Platinum building in northwest Ohio.

By Tina Vasquez

A curtain wall was inserted in various places around the building to let in natural light, and the entry plaza is paved with permeable pavers to reduce runoff.

PROJECT

GREEN

LOCATION Toledo, OH Size 132,656 ft2 Completed 2010 Program Corporate headquarters Awards AIA Toledo 2012 Honor Award

CERTIFICATION LEED Platinum Site 160 acres of existing open space Materials Sustainable and regional materials Water Half-acre pond collects storm-water runoff for nonpotable irrigation Energy 250 kW photovoltaic solar array Landscape Program to restore site habitat and vegetation to predeveloped conditions, native and adapted plant species

TEAM ARCHITECTS Duket Architects Planners, Centerbrook Architects Client Health Care REIT MEP Engineer JDRM Engineering Civil Engineer Dean Frederick Landscape Architect Jay Brewester

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In 1992 Duket Architects Planners partnered with Centerbrook Architects on a project for the University of Toledo in Ohio. The project was successful and the partnership amiable, so the two firms decided to join forces again in 2008 for the renovation of a 1970s office building for Health Care REIT, a leading real-estate investment trust in Toledo.

According to Michael Duket, principal at Duket Architects, Centerbrook has a great reverence for history, and when necessary, it also has the skills to infuse historic structures with a modern attitude. That’s what happened here. The gbdmagazine.com

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Large fins and louvered wood walls diffuse the light coming in through the building’s south-facing, insulated skylights placed above each atrium.

team outfitted the structure with glass walls to bring in natural light and added a pond to manage storm water. We asked Duket and the firm’s LEED administrator, Gary Ashford, who developed the project’s sustainable strategy, about the specifics of the renovation.

Photos: Feinknopf Photography (INTERIORS)

You were basically transforming an incredibly outdated structure into a cutting-edge facility. What were some of the challenges you faced during the renovation?

Michael Duket: The schedule was one of the biggest challenges. The owner required occupancy within 18 months from beginning of design through movein, which was extremely aggressive. We developed a blended design/construction schedule, which allowed demolition and exterior work to begin early. The detailed interior was completed in the last four months. There were many hectic days, but the schedule was met successfully.

In terms of the design, what was the client expecting to see from the project?

Gary Ashford: We were fortunate to work with a sophisticated client who values good design and understands the effect the work environment has on employee performance. They also wanted to create a model for sustainable development, a “living laboratory,” to demonstrate how a corporate sustainability mission can be accomplished in the marketplace.

Duket: Because of the desire for enhanced natural light and views, the manipulation of the façade was an important focus of the design process. Shaping the interior spaces in an inspiring way was also imperative.

How concerned was the client with the natural environment surrounding the project?

Ashford: Prior to being developed into a corporate campus in 1972, it was vacant gb&d

ABOVE An outdoor space with vegetated roof trays was created above the one-story portion of the existing building. The green roof elements, combined with high SRI asphalt shingles and membrane roofing, diminish heat island effect.

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Skylights bring natural light deep into the building, and daylight sensor controls automatically dim the building’s artificial lighting relative to the amount of natural light available.

The barrel-vaulted great room uses FSC-certified wood throughout, including in the ceiling and the walls, which are a wood veneer panel system with concealed doors, shades, and media equipment.

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Health Care REIT Headquarters SPACES

“The property could have been sold off to a developer and carved into pieces. Instead, Health Care REIT created a very special place for the community.”

Michael Duket, Duket Architects Planners

Photos: Feinknopf Photography (LEFT)

farmland that was relatively undisturbed from pre-European settlement in the area. Historically, the site is part of the Oak Openings Region, which is a natural habitat for many unique biological species. As a practical measure, the LEED boundary area was defined within the project construction limits, but the owner is managing the entire site as a protected open space resource.

The Health Care REIT headquarters is the first LEED Platinum building in northwest Ohio. Was this the goal from the very beginning or did it happen along the way?

Duket: Health Care REIT owns and manages health-care facilities all over the country, and a commitment to sustainability and energy efficiency is part of its business model. Initially, the intent was gb&d

to design the building and manage the property to be as energy efficient as possible. Everything on the building interior was removed, so there was an opportunity to provide an energy-efficient building envelope and MEP systems. Once Health Care REIT committed to the LEED process, we were on a quest to achieve as many points as possible to gain certification. Once everyone was truly engaged, the owner accepted the challenge to pursue Platinum certification, so what began as an offhand proposal became the expectation.

ABOVE The floor-to-ceiling curtain walls create a strong relationship between interior and exterior spaces, a relationship that is strengthened by other outdoor features such as an outdoor dining area, a roof terrace and garden, walking paths, and landscaping.

In what ways does the project demonstrate Duket Architects’ best practices?

Duket: Because of our ability to work as part of a team of dedicated professionals, including the owner’s representatives, may–june 2013

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JDRM Engineering, Inc.

To reduce potable water demand, Duket Architects Planners added this retention pond to collect storm water for irrigation, and much of the 160-acre property was converted from manicured lawn to nonirrigated prairie grass.

Congratulations to Duket Architects Planners on your recognition.

JDRM Engineering, Inc. is a consulting engineering firm providing professional mechanical, electrical, and technology engineering services to architectural firms, contractors, institutions, universities, hospitals, and industrial facilities. JDRM Engineering has diverse experience in the design and specification of building facility’s mechanical, electrical, and technology systems.

Special in-house capabilities include audio/visual, arc flash hazard analysis, security, distance learning, telephone/data cabling, networking design, and geothermal HVAC design.

JDRM Engineering, Inc. 5604 N. Main Street Suite 200 • Sylvania, Ohio 43560 Phone 419.824.2400 • Fax 419.824.2409

jdrm.com

ABOVE Near the north end of the site, a 1.6-acre, 250kW photovoltaic array was installed to provide 20% of the building’s annual electricity.

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CM, and contractors, one gains a remarkable sense of accomplishment working with a group of people from different disciplines creating something great.

Everyone had something to contribute.

Ashford: We approach each project considering its physical setting, budget, and client needs—and this was no different.

We listen a lot and try to minimize imposing preconceived ideas on a solution.

When you look back at the process from its beginning to its end, what was the most unique aspect of this project?

Duket: The property could have been sold off to a developer and carved into pieces. Instead, Health Care REIT created a very special place for the community that is open for events and special activities. It is truly a community asset.

Ashford: I’m not aware of any other renovation projects that have achieved certification at this level. gb&d gbdmagazine.com

space S L I V E

S I ea t t le n f i l l SRM Development takes a sustainable approach to its urban 230 Broadway project

By Julie Knudson

The new 230 Broadway is rife with aesthetic flourishes, such as the timber beams above, and green elements, such as the landscaping and green walls below.

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In the heart of Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood, a new mixed-use development is giving residential and retail space users easy access to the area’s expanding mass transit system. Located just a half a block from the city’s new light rail station and perched directly atop the train tunnel is 230 Broadway, an urban infill project that boasts a blend of residential and commercial space, plus three stories of underground parking. “The location is key for transit in this area,” says Trevor Ashenbrener, a project manager at SRM Development, 230 Broadway’s developer. “It’s close to light rail and close to downtown.”

The project features 234 residential units and roughly 23,000 square feet of retail elements. A parking lot, a handful of residential and retail spaces, and a farmer’s market were removed to make way for the new development, but several businesses that occupied the location prior to demolition, including Noah’s Bagels and Bank of America, have returned now that the project is complete.

Amenities abound at 230 Broadway.

The underground parking area features six electric-vehicle charging stations and it has wiring for an additional four. A theater and multipurpose room is located on-site for residents to use for meetings and other events. SRM also added a green roof, covering a third of the total roof space, so folks have an unexpected urban oasis. The green roof helps keep the building cool, and while the area is famous for rain, Ashenbrener says, “We didn’t use the green roof for storm-water calculamay–june 2013

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SPACES PLAY LEARN WORK LIVE

“We didn’t use the green roof for stormwater calculations. We included it to give people a place to hang out above the city.”

Trevor Ashenbrener, SRM Development

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ABOVE The roof deck at 230 Broadway helps keep the building cool and creates an outdoor space for residents above the Seattle skyline. From the deck, residents can see downtown, the Space Needle, and Elliott Bay.

tions. We included it to give people a place to hang out above the city.”

Through Seattle City Light’s Built Smart program, a Seattle-area green building program that emphasizes residential development projects, the project qualified for $131,000 in rebates, thanks to features such as Energy Starrated fixtures and motion sensors that help minimize energy use. “The lighting is maintained at 50 percent, but as soon as somebody goes into the space or a car drives in, the sensors pick up that motion and turn the other half of each fixture on,” Ashenbrener says. The sensors are used continuously in the parking garage, and they also control lighting levels in the residential corridors at night.

Local suppliers such as Bellmont Cabinet Company, a manufacturer in nearby Sumner, Washington, were tapped whenever possible. “They have LEED-rated cabinetry products, and we used their soft-close drawers and doors,” Ashenbrener says. Hard-surface flooring, low-VOC paints, low-E windows, and R38 roof insulation round out the project’s sustainable aspects to make it a Built Green 3-Star project. gb&d

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VERBATIM

Dan Schimberg on reinventing student housing for Cincinnati and beyond

Dan Schimberg is president of Uptown Rental Properties, which developed Views on Vine for University of Cincinnati students.

As told to Gary N. Bowen

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When I began this business, it was virtually impossible for students to find a quality place to live after moving out of the dorms. Back then, the student housing industry was embryonic and fragmented because off-campus landlords around universities didn’t really care about their reputations due to the natural churn in student renters from year-to-year. I felt like we could do better, so I renovated a home with quality fixtures and features. It rented quickly and for a very fair return. I replicated that formula, and in a few years Uptown had a reputation for quality housing around

the University of Cincinnati, offering nice, clean, and affordable places to live.

As today’s off-campus student housing industry emerged, we were positioned to provide a larger number of quality multifamily units because we discovered the broad gulf between what the market was delivering and what students actually want. The days of Animal House are long gone. Today’s service involves clean, safe and affordable residences. It’s about location, but there’s more. There’s a large group of people who attend universities who are not ready to leave behind the features they grew up with. They want may–june 2013

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VERBATIM Dan Schimberg

Views on Vine is scheduled to open in fall 2013, and the student-housing complex is expected to receive LEED Silver.

About Dan Schimberg Title President Company Uptown Rental Properties Education University of Cincinnati Age 50 First Job Stereo sales Mantra “Operate with respect for all, and conduct yourself with integrity.”

Hidden Talent Winter sports Definition of Leadership “Hire the people you trust, and trust the people you hire to bring their brains to work.”

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a clean bathroom, windows that work, environmental comfort—in short, a place to live that’s on-par with the homes they come from.

What we did in the days before LEED was understand that off-campus housing is a fixed budget issue. Years ago, landlords didn’t grasp why the lack of energy-saving features forced students to pay more money to the electric company, leaving less available for the rent. We recognized that good windows, energysaving appliances, and good insulation justifies fair rents and lowers utility costs. The fact that all of those are LEED features as well is a happy coincidence.

But Uptown’s decision to do that 20 years ago was more about our desire to help students keep their housing expenditures in the fixed-cost category, which makes our properties more attractive. We like to take LEED features that benefit our student residents as they help lower our own turnover costs before re-renting, features such as sustainable materials that cut down on replacement, highefficiency appliances and HVAC, smaller designed spaces that heat and cool more efficiently, good insulation. It’s a win-win for the resident and for us.

We’re drawn to urban infill development because we’re “reusing dirt” rather than breaking new ground; we’re picking locations that are near public transportation and utilizing existing city infrastructure. At the end of the day, we strive for a win-win, for our students, for Uptown, and for a practical design and location that enhance the urban environment.

We partner with several LEED-centric

contractors. Our recently-completed Jefferson House complex was developed with Turnbull-Wahlert, which is a highend general contracting firm that has developed a couple of projects for us, both of which are certified LEED Gold.

Turnbull-Wahlert has established a specialized niche in LEED development, and we enjoy working with them.

Our Euclid Square, Views on Vine, 65 West, and Vine Street Flats projects are all LEED for Homes Silver. In all of them, extremely efficient design is critical.

They feature open floor plans with no interior corridors and are slightly smaller than most apartments, but residents don’t notice due to the abundance of windows, higher ceilings, more glass and balconies, which makes for greater energy efficiency, appealing aesthetics, and higher quality of living. Our units are primarily studios and single bedrooms, along with traditional two and four bedrooms. We try to design our apartments with high resident turnover in mind.

And that means it has to be high-end, utilitarian, and practical in order to effectively manage.

Until recently, Uptown primarily served the Cincinnati community, but in the last few years, the firm has begun to carefully expand its footprint into other parts of the country. We’re involved in a rather ambitious off-campus student housing development in a southern state. The project is not seeking LEED certification, but we are incorporating a lot of LEED design features into the development just because it makes the property more valuable and sustainable to us. gb&d gbdmagazine.com

GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Up Front Approach Trendsetters Green Typologies Inner Workings Features Spaces Tough Builds Punch List Join the conversation! @gbd_mag

126 District of Columbia consolidated Forensic Lab

A smart building unifies departments

131 Willow Glen town Square

A new landmark for an existing downtown 134 Jennette’s Pier Building for hurricane weather

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Urban Laboratory Greening Forensics

Who Whiting-Turner Contracting Company What District of Columbia Consolidated Forensic Laboratory Where Washington, DC

By Erin Brereton

The curtain wall on the south elevation has louvers to allow more or less daylight into the building; inside, an efficient HVAC system with chilled beams and energy-recovery air-handling units were installed.

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Whiting-Turner met unusual challenges in constructing the new forensic lab, including lead-lined panels required by the X-ray room.

BackstorY

38,473

Washington, DC’s Public Health Lab, Metro Transit Police, and the medical examiner’s office were once under different roofs, and for the city to remedy this, it needed a brand new and very large building: a 350,000-squarefoot structure that would offer all three offices access to cutting-edge scientific and forensic facilities. By creating the District of Columbia Consolidated Forensic Laboratory with energy-saving elements that could help reduce operational costs, the project was poised to offer a financial payoff, and housing DC’s metro police, public health, and autopsy services in one location would also allow for increased collaboration during investigations.

The city chose a location in DC’s Southwest district, just south of the National Mall, close to public transportation and the courthouse, where scientists and law enforcement officials make frequent trips. The site was also home to a two-story red brick building occupied by the First District Metropolitan Police Department.

Baltimore-headquartered WhitingTurner Contracting Company partnered with architecture firm HOK and engineering company Vanderweil to help bring the project to life. “The goal of the project was to replace an old and inadequate facility and provide a modern, state-of-the-art facility for the city’s first responders,” says Nancy Beavers, Whiting-Turner’s vice president of projects.

Tons of contaminated soil hauled away from the Consolidated Forensic Laboratory’s site at the beginning of the project

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Beginning

After the First District police department relocated to a former school several blocks away, the two-story structure on the site was demolished. The WhitingTurner team then focused on what had been beneath it. “We knew there was some petrol-based contaminants in the may–june 2013

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TOUGH BUILDS

soil, but the quantity was unknown,” Beavers says. Under the supervision of a third-party inspector, 38,473 tons of contaminated earth were identified, removed and taken to a specialty disposal location.

Soil quality wasn’t the only challenge the project faced. Construction vehicles couldn’t be lined up along Sixth Street because of a neighboring firehouse. To complete work before rush hour began, the team poured the concrete foundation at night, starting at 10 p.m. “That way no concrete trucks were stuck in traffic, we could get our scheduled pours in more [quickly], and there was no impact on traffic,” Beavers says.

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Challenges

Because the building houses the city morgue, which necessitates a dedicated exhaust system and other unique elements, the plans included several special safety and design requirements. To minimize direct sunlight when investigators are examining crime scene evidence, the design specified that labs be placed on the side of the building with northern exposure and the offices face south for optimal sunlight and reduced electricity use. A special large elevator was added so investigators could bring vehicles that might have been involved in crimes into the building from

the street to the facility’s lower level to be examined.

The morgue and biosafety level-3 area, which handles pathogens that need to be contained, were outfitted with a wall-panel system, which is designed for contamination-prone environments, from fiberglass-reinforced composite manufacturer Arcoplast. “The panels were chosen for their capability to provide a barrier system and withstand frequent washing,” Beavers says. “They’re easily wiped down and can withstand impact and chemicals.”

Safety was a high priority during installation. Lead-lined fiberglass-reinforced composite panels were mounted gbdmagazine.com

Photo: Alan Karchmer

The team has applied for LEED-NC Gold certification and expects to receive 47 to 48 points, including 32 points for design and 14 points for construction credits—well within the 39 to 51 range of the Gold level.

District of Columbia Consolidated Forensic Laboratory TOUGH BUILDS

The building saves 2 million gallons of water annually by reusing storm water in the facility’s cooling towers, and thanks to the green roof, there is zero storm-water runoff.

The autopsy bays are lined with windows, which is rare.

in the X-ray room primarily over the weekend when personnel weren’t in the building. A consultant was hired by HOK to suggest proper room-shielding requirements because of the lead, and Whiting-Turner and its subcontractor set up protocols to ensure that materials were properly disposed of, exhaust systems were blocked off, and proper entrance and exit areas were used when panels were cut to fit certain wall areas.

“We tried to keep it contained, and not have anyone else working in the area,” Beavers says. “We quarantined it because we wanted to make sure there would be no airborne lead or anything of that nature.” Whiting-Turner also discussed the protocols during a weekly safety meeting to remind on-site employees not to enter the enclosed area when work was in progress.

Greening

Environmentally friendly lowVOC carpet tiles from flooring manufacturer Mohawk Group’s Lees Carpets brand; caulking materials; and paint from Sherwin Williams’ low-VOC, low-odor Harmony line were used during construction, along with four- and six-foot chilled beams in office, conference, and select lab areas.

The design also leveraged natural light to illuminate open office space.

The south wall of the building features a louvered shading system from commercial-building product-provider Colt Group. The louver essentially works as a sunscreen system made of glass that modulates to provide different coverage based on weather conditions. The design won a Washington Building Congress Craftsmanship Award for ornamental

“The goal of the project was to replace an old and inadequate facility and provide a modern, state-ofthe-art facility for the city’s first responders.”

Nancy Beavers, Whiting-Turner Contracting Company gb&d

metal. Similarly, the autopsy area was outfitted with blackout shades for privacy. “But they have the ability to have a bright space, if they choose to,” Beavers says. Occupancy sensors were added to reduce energy use, and similar sensors are used to control heating and air-conditioning in the building.

Storm-water runoff is repurposed to irrigate planting areas along the southern side of the building through a lowimpact tree pit. “Even though we’re in an urban setting, the landscape around the facility uses a lot of planting areas to add vegetation,” Beavers says. “Now planting areas are collecting water instead of it flowing off.”

After the building was completed in July 2012, security personnel were the first to move in. Other groups followed through October. DNA testing, firearm research, and fingerprinting can now be conducted in-house, along with potentially infectious autopsies—allowing DC’s three different departments to work faster and more efficiently. “It’s the first time all three entities have been brought together,” Beavers said. “There is a work and a cost benefit—all three can share training, conference, and other rooms, and they can now conduct their own forensic work, instead of having to send it out to external labs for results.” gb&d may–june 2013

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TOUGH BUILDS

existing fabric Honoring history in san jose

Who Kahn Design Associates What Willow Glen Town Square Where San Jose, CA

By Lindsey Howald Patton

ABOVE Construction for the new town square in San Jose, CA, cost $12.5 million to build. The owner of the property, Alex Byer of Paja Investments, was a long-term resident of the South Bay area.

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History

When word of President Lincoln’s assassination trickled into California in 1865, a tiny community called Willow Glen changed the name of its main street to Lincoln Avenue. In the years that followed, local businesses sprouted up along Lincoln and thrived, making it the commercial anchor of the unincorporated township.

Since then, its residents have fought to keep it intact.

In 1925, the city of San Jose proposed a railroad cutting straight through the community, but the residents rallied, incorporated the town, and voted it down.

Willow Glen eventually rejoined sprawling San Jose, but in the 1960s, a highway that would bisect the neighborhood was proposed, and again, residents successfully blocked it.

Kahn Design Associates stepped into a deep local tradition when Alex Byer of Paja Investments brought this Berkeleybased architecture firm in to rebuild the commercial corner of Willow Street and Lincoln Avenue. Yet the resulting Willow Glen Town Square has been a huge success with even the community’s most protective residents because of its subtle touches and sensitivity to Willow Glen history.

Integrity

Kahn Design Associates created a blend of public and private space that attempts to reverse troubles faced by the waning main streets of America. The firm needed to make an area that would bolster the commercial district for the long-term— during a recession, no less—while stitchmay–june 2013

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TOUGH BUILDS

BELOW The location of this new plaza was prime real estate, but developer Alex Byer gave it to the community as public space.

BOTTOM Willow Street Pizza is a neighborhood staple and was preserved in the design.

ing the development into the existing fabric of Lincoln Avenue, and the corner of Lincoln and Willow already housed one beloved local institution—Willow Street Wood-Fired Pizza. So important is the eatery, that Byer was determined to keep it.

“Alex Byer isn’t a typical developer,” says Charles Kahn, principal and found-

er of Kahn Design Associates. A long-term resident of the South Bay area, Byer has a tendency to hold on to his properties instead of flipping them for a quick profit.

The short-term trouble of a recession, then, didn’t deter him.

Throughout the project, Byer and Kahn Design Associates maintained a uniquely populist perspective. The Willow Glen Town Square Plaza was a purely public space with a gently splashing fountain and native landscaping, and it has new but old-fashioned lampposts with state-of-the-art HID bulbs by Sternberg to help set off the evenings. Kahn says that corner is prime leasing space in the area. “Alex’s decision to give that back to the community was really great,” he says.

Demolishing several city blocks to build a mall was like creating something from whole cloth, Kahn says, but the history was a defining factor for the project.

“To try to fit a project like this into the existing fabric of the neighborhood requires real subtlety and close attention to what that existing fabric is,” he says. The 1991 Willow Street Wood-Fired Pizza brick building was successfully preserved and remained open as the construction went on around it; it also got a new outdoor patio in the rebuild.

Willow Glen Creamery, a frozen yogurt shop that stood where the corner plaza is today, stayed open until the final phase of construction and then moved into the new development.

Amenities

The plaza is a deep notch in the streetfacing corner of the L-shaped building. From there, shoppers, diners, and customers enter through a lobby, which is floored with a 60 percent recycled terrazzo by San Francisco’s Associated Terrazzo and lit by a custom glass chandelier designed by Neidhardt, another California firm. Both the lighting and flooring feature a willow leaf pattern—

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Willow Glen Town Square TOUGH BUILDS

“To try to fit a project like this into the existing fabric of the neighborhood requires real subtlety.”

Charles Kahn, Kahn Design Associates

the graphic identity Kahn Design Associates created for the space.

The lobby is located behind a threestory tower, envisioned as an iconic lighthouse structure that would stand at this busy intersection for decades to come. “I think the single most sustainable feature was creating a building that the community loves and has embraced that will be part of this community long after I’m gone,” Kahn says. “The greatest energy cost for any building is building it. If we can build something that will last 100 years or longer, that’s one of the best things we can do for the environment.”

The tower is clad in a distinctive, partially recycled-content red tile by Crossville, which, along with the tiled roofing and stucco exterior, evokes a lightly modern Mediterranean architectural style. Bike racks are also on the site and so are showers for tenants and employees, in which low-flow bathroom fixtures

by Kohler and Symmons reduce water consumption by more than 42 percent.

On the Lincoln Avenue side of the L-shape, the street level houses restaurants and retail, and above that are office spaces in a variety of shapes and sizes; some are as small as 200 square feet. “We actually designed the offices so someone could have a home office,” Kahn says.

“They wouldn’t have to get in the car and drive all the way to San Francisco, if they were able to work locally most days of the week.” This, Kahn says, is true mixeduse where people can be working, living, shopping, and eating all in the same immediate area.

Opening

Before construction began, a community meeting was called. Residents came out to hear Byer and Kahn speak about their plans for the historic commercial district.

When they finished with the slideshow, there followed a beat of silence, and then one of the residents said, “I just have two words for you. Bra-vo!”

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That seal of approval from Willow Glen propelled the project forward, and in turn, the project has revitalized the community. The opportunity to officially celebrate came during a grand opening block party in November 2012. Willow Street Pizza and Willow Glen Creamery passed out samples from buildings old and new, retail shops opened their doors for the first time, painters daubed designs on children’s cheeks, and Willy Wonka and Italian chef figures on stilts entertained the crowd.

During the festivities, a community newspaper reporter asked Byer what was next for the square. He replied, “We’re going to sit back and enjoy the fruits of our labor.” gb&d

ABOVE The lighting fixture in the lobby is made of glowing glass discs that are arranged in a doublehelix pattern. Below it, the flooring features symbolic willow leaves.

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Hurricane Zone Rebuilding a Landmark

Who North Carolina Aquarium Society What Jennette’s Pier Where Nags Head, NC

By Tina Vasquez

The newly constructed Jennette’s Pier is built to withstand a Category 3 hurricane, which can bring winds up to 135 mph. The original building was destroyed in 2003.

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TOUGH BUILDS

“The old pier was entirely destroyed, but we saw it as an opportunity to demonstrate sustainable design.”

Mike Remige, Jennette’s Pier

The site’s three Bergey wind turbines produce 75,000 kWh of electricity for the facility. They also serve as a very obvious reminder of the sustainable measures in place at the pier.

scene

Nags Head, North Carolina, is the ultimate vacation spot. The small resort town boasts picturesque views complete with miles of sandy beaches and the Atlantic Ocean as far as the eye can see. But there is a downside to North Carolina’s famed Outer Banks; every year, residents and tourists have to plan for Atlantic storms from June 1 to November 30, otherwise known as hurricane season. In September 2003, the violent Hurricane Isabel touched down on the shores of the Outer Banks with winds up to 105 mph, destroying thousands of homes and one of the area’s most beloved landmarks—Jennette’s Pier.

Destroyed

Originally built in 1939, Jennette’s Pier was the area’s first fishing pier and arguably one of its biggest tourist attractions. Considered the social center of the area in the 1940s, ’50s, and ’60s, its unique positioning is at the exact waterfront location where the area’s three main highways meet—Highway 12 from the south, Route 158 from the north, and Route 64 from the west. According to Mike Remige, director of Jennette’s Pier, it was devastating when Hurricane Isabel destroyed the beloved and historical landmark. When the North Carolina Aquarium Society purchased Jennette’s Pier in conjunction with the North Carolina Aquariums in 2002, it was going to be used as an outreach site for the nearby Aquarium on Roanoke Island, but after Hurricane Isabel, new plans had to be developed.

Jenette’s Pier would be the first of three planned educational ocean fishing piers along North Carolina’s coast.

Remige says that not rebuilding was not an option. “The old pier was entirely destroyed, but we saw it as an opportunity to demonstrate sustainable design,” Remige says. “Honestly we didn’t even know that a project like this could be LEED certified, but once we realized it could, we committed to pursuing it. And in April of 2012, we received Platinum . . . certification for new construction.”

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Number of steelreinforced concrete pilings that support the rebuilt pier

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TOUGH BUILDS Jennette’s Pier

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ABOVE The pier’s wastewater-treatment facility helped it reclaim 500,000 gallons of water just in its first year of operation.

Rebuilt

The task was to make the pier hurricaneproof as well as environmentally friendly. The problem was that the building was not only in a hurricane-prone area but would extend out over the Atlantic Ocean. The contractors were out in the elements for two full years, during hurricane seasons and winters. Temperatures ranged between 30 and 100 degrees. Yet by the end, the Aquarium Society met its goal of creating a safe pier and educating the public about sustainability.

Hurricanes are going to have a hard time destroying Jennette’s Pier again.

The steel-reinforced concrete structure is capable of withstanding a hurricane storm surge of 25 feet, and it has an equally impressive array of sustainable features. Three Bergey Excel-S wind turbines fulfill almost one quarter of the facility’s electric needs, and one of the pier’s shade pavilions is covered in photovoltaic panels that power some of the pier’s lights at night. The pier features a closed-loop geothermal HVAC system, 80 wells—each 200 feet deep—that circulate water to both heat and cool the building.

And an on-site wastewater treatment facility helps the pier reduce its water use by up to 80 percent.

“I’ve been in this area for over 20 years, and I can’t tell you how proud I am that the state of North Carolina built something like this,” Remige says.

“It’s such a gift to the community and an amazing educational tool. Kids like my daughter are growing up thinking of wind turbines and solar panels as a normal part of a building. Not only is that amazing, but it’s the way it should be.” gb&d

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 138

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Groundwork

How PPAs are changing green building

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Architect to watch

Tonic Design’s Katherine Hogan

New ideas for old green products Show & Tell

A writer inspires Stanley Saitowitz

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PUNCH LIST

Architect to Watch Katherine Hogan

Interview by Erin Brereton

How did your early work in your career help prepare you for your position at Tonic?

I worked for Will Bruder + Partners in Phoenix for a summer and got to go back full-time when I first graduated, which was a very wonderful experience. One of his descriptors of his work is that he always tries to find the extraordinary in the ordinary—to look at a material and try to use it differently and to examine space and context, which were all really good messages. I did a fellowship after that, where I worked in year increments on particular projects. A lot of the work was to further socially conscious design.

I’ve done some really interesting projects and got to understand the client as not just someone who comes to you with a significant amount of money—the client is any person who needs a building.

You’ve been with Tonic Design since 2008. How did you come to specialize in residential and small-scale commercial projects?

Once you do a few, you get better and better at them, but it also lends itself to the design-construction aspect of our firm.

We have a pretty intimate relationship with our clients and can execute both.

How has the industry changed since you started?

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There’s a lot more software and technology. We’re always trying to stay connected with how people are making things and standard building practices.

Did you face any challenges being a woman in a traditionally male-dominated profession?

Not really—in school and other offices, I always just tried not to think that way.

We’re not only design; we also do construction, which is probably even more of a male-dominated industry. But my perspective was that everybody confronts his or her own challenges, and people think of people in different ways. I just didn’t want to focus on that.

Carolina Museum of Art that was a really significant public project for us. People visit the Lowe’s Pavilion outdoor classroom every day, get married there, take photographs and play music there—it’s a larger audience. We wanted to stay involved in the museum, so I applied to join the Contemporaries Board. Last year, I was asked to be on the advisory board at Syracuse University. I was really excited about that; I felt it was a great way to stay connected to the School of Architecture.

What differentiates Tonic Design in the marketplace?

Sometimes, the best opportunities are on the jobsite, not when you’re doing the drawing, but when you’re there, standing in place, rearranging cabinets, or seeing that a window should be shifted to frame a particular tree. It’s really hard to count on just the drawing phase. A lot of architects we admire really enjoy the process of being able to craft on-site. However, when the typical contractor is asked to do a lot of those things, the owner starts to incur change orders. Because we work with a design-build model, we can have a dialogue between the designer and contractor to make projects even better. gb&d

What types of projects interest you the most?

I definitely enjoy residential projects. We have a lot of great clients here who are trying to do something unique. We’re always trying to do different things that reach out further into the architectural community and develop the construction-design method of our practice, not just from the business or results perspective, but to achieve really good design.

Have any recent projects presented you with unique personal or professional opportunities?

We recently did a project at the North

ore Want m ne eri of Kath ork? �s w Hogan d gb&d a Downlo ad! for iP

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Photos: Allen Weiss (portrait); James West

Katherine Hogan spent the first few years of her career at a nonprofit that provided design services to small, low-income rural communities. In 2008, she joined Raleigh, North Carolina-based Tonic Design + Tonic Construction, which recently received a Small Projects Practitioners award from the AIA for its pavilion at the North Carolina Museum of Art. Hogan, an associate AIA member and a LEED AP, is a partner at Tonic, alongside firm founder Vincent Petrarca. She spoke to gb&d about the benefits of being a builder and how she plans to keep pushing the industry forward.

“Sometimes, the best opportunities are on the jobsite—not when you’re doing the drawing but there standing in place.”

Katherine Hogan, Tonic Design + Tonic Construction

Hogan’s Work Chiles Residence This three-story, steel-boned home in Raleigh, NC, had been empty for more than 40 years when Tonic signed on to renovate the property. “The house had a steel frame structure that was not in great shape,” Hogan says. “But the idea was to reuse the structure as much as possible; one of the more sustainable things you can do is to preserve an existing building.”

Tonic stripped the structure down to its framework and added a rooftop garden. The firm’s approach was to integrate the residence with the surrounding forest.

“Because it was so close to the trees, it was important to us to put some element on top of the building,” explains Vincent Petrarca, co-owner of the firm. “You can now see the sky and get away from the tree canopy.”

Low-E glass and Energy Star appliances were incorporated into the design. “We did whatever we could to inject energy efficiency so their energy bills would be very reasonable,” Hogan says. “It’s really cost-effective, but it doesn’t look cost-effective.”

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Groundwork Powering Up for Net Zero Part two of our Groundwork series on the Green Leaf Inn looks at the benefits the hotel is seeing from its power purchase agreement with Community Green Energy

By Kelli McElhinny

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 Power Purchase Agreement Community Green Energy

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Building the first net-zero hotel in North America is an ambitious goal, and the developers of the Green Leaf Inn are getting a major boost in that effort from a third-party power purchase agreement (PPA) with Community Green Energy.

The agreement is seen by both parties as a clear win-win. “The use of PPAs allows building owners to get immediate savings over traditional energy costs for light, heating, cooling, and hot water with no up-front investment,” says Fritz Kreiss, co-owner of the Green Leaf Inn in Delavan, Wisconsin, which is near Lake Geneva, a popular summer getaway location. Beyond the cost savings, a net-zero hotel, which relies on renewable energy resources, would be difficult to achieve if the only financial incentives for ROI were tax credits.

A tight building envelope gives the project a good starting point for reduced energy consumption. The PPA makes adding photovoltaic panels, a geothermal system, a solar thermal system, LED lighting, a biomass boiler, and other features possible. “All these systems will have their own PPA, satisfying the goal of delivering

the energy needed at very cost-competitive pricing,” Kreiss says.

Kreiss notes that the energy savings are evident immediately when it comes to costs for hot water, heating, cooling, and lighting, and the PPA also offers a measure of protection against future spikes in energy costs. Ultimately, the dollars saved in energy costs can be applied to other aspects of the hotel, which will help with operating costs, but mostly, those savings will directly benefit guests. “Lowering our energy costs and initial capital investment also means we can put more into guest attractions and services while at the same time keeping our rates competitive,” Kreiss explains.

Community Green Energy was an ideal partner for the endeavor, Kreiss says because it was able to build a package of efficient systems tailored to the property’s unique specifications. “Community Green Energy combined our needs with the right energy technology options and third-party financing, making all our energy systems affordable,” Kreiss says. In addition to the equipment covered by the PPA, the Green Leaf Inn features a wind gbdmagazine.com

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“We want to show other hotel and building owners a way to save money and invest in green energies.”

Fritz Kreiss, Green Leaf Inn

Project Roster

turbine that is self-financed through more conventional means.

PPAs aren’t new to the green scene; they’ve been around since the early 1990s, but the recent uptick in interest in renewable energy along with a challenging economic climate have made the agreements even more attractive to people and developers looking to install green systems in homes, hotels, and office buildings. Not only do PPAs reduce the capital investment, they also cut maintenance costs and provide marketing opportunities.

The Green Leaf Inn’s PPA doesn’t just offer the hotel’s owners a more affordable way to go green, it also serves as an example for future hotels of this kind.

“We want to show other hotel and building owners a way to save money and invest in green energies that not only help the environment, but also serve the needs of the green-minded guest as well,” Kreiss says. “It’s better for the environment, it’s cost-competitive, and it’s better for the local economy because the more money we save, the more money is turned back into the local economy.” gb&d

At the Green Leaf Inn, Community Green Energy, which made possible the installation of the SunTrac solar panel (pictured above), is an important player, but plenty of others play substantial roles. Equipment manufacturer All Earth Renewables, for instance, produces the dual-access tracker, and the Community Green Energy Investor Network is another important resource. In addition to energy savings, a competitive bid process helped to reduce costs further.

This process identified local vendors including Anderson-Ashton for general construction and foundations, Faith Technologies for electric contracting, KMG Mechanical Technologies LLC for plumbing, and Westenn Mechanical Contractors Inc. for mechanical contracting.

Building Green with No Investment

R O

Additional opportunities include...

demand response aggregation, virtual solar power purchase agreements, electric, gas, RECs, management/procurement, community solar gardens, and community choice aggregation.

DEVELOPING AND FINANCING RENEWABLE ENERGY AND ENERGY EFFICIENCY PROJECTS NATIONWIDE.

SUPPORT@COMMUNITYGREENENERGY.COM gb&d

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Building a Net-Zero Community

Will on-site power and community energy systems be coming to a community near you?

By Michael Erickson At present, Europe uses half the amount of energy that is currently used in the United States. The European Union has mandated that all new buildings and homes be net-zero energy by the year 2018. That means in six years, all new European buildings will produce as much electricity as they consume on an annual basis and become a resource provider instead of an energy taker.

Here in the US, the target date for netzero energy is 2050, and that is only for commercial buildings. Future US energy efficiency could therefore lag more than 32 years behind Europe’s. Why? Technology is not the issue. What we lack is the public education and development of a committed national energy policy that will allow our industries to grow. And until compa-

nies have the necessary tax benefits and funding opportunities, it will be difficult to finance these alternative energy projects.

Enter Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs)—making alternative energy purchases a reality right now. PPAs provide the necessary means for businesses that are looking to meet their energy demands with alternative energy delivered at an affordable rate. They don’t want to necessarily buy and invest in expensive new equipment that will depreciate and need continual maintenance.

All they want is the end product. With a PPA, businesses get the right energy technology options delivered through third-party financing; they pay for the energy produced – a third-party pays for the equipment purchase, operation and maintenance.

Left: With a Power Purchase Agreement, you get the alternative energy of your choice, delivered at a competitive rate, with no capital investment.

ENERGY SYSTEMS FOR COMMUNITIES Develop energy systems on a communitywide scale and you have a real opportunity for saving energy and building jobs for the entire community. Moving beyond net-zero, imagine a community that is also regenerative, returning energy back to the grid, replenishing the environment with captured rainwater, reducing storm-water runoff, filling the toilets, and watering the gardens. Envision food waste composted in a small-scale anaerobic digester that not only removes this waste stream from the landfill, but creates methane for the local municipality’s vehicles and sells a soil amendment product. Excess gas generates electricity through a cogeneration system to augment a central geo-utility, which supplies an energy loop that each facility taps into for their heating, cooling and hot water. PPAs, where a community signs a contract for heating and cooling at a discount with no capital investment, make this possible.

The development of a geo-utility for the community creates wealth from the solar energy located beneath the city owned parks, parking lots, and rights of way. A geoutility district heating and cooling system allows for reduced capital and operating costs for commercial and residential buildings. A reduced utility cost along with a positive environmental impact attracts businesses or consumers looking to relocate, as well as existing businesses wanting to expand operations in their community.

COMMUNITY SOLAR GARDENS A community-owned solar farm or garden is another way to bring local power generation and savings to a community, saving 40 to 50 percent on the cost of a community installation compared to installing solar on individual homes. A 2008 study showed that only 22 to 27 percent of residential homes were a good fit for installing solar.

Shared systems like a solar garden can open up the solar market to the other 73 to 78 percent of the population. A com-

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Shared systems like a solar garden can open up the solar market to the other 73%-78% of the population.

munity solar garden or farm is a concept where a large centralized solar installation is built and owned by individuals that otherwise are unable to invest in putting solar on their own roof. These individuals are then investors in the solar garden, which provides the benefit of having local clean energy produced in their community. These larger scale community systems are small compared to a larger utility scale solar farm but are ideally suited for marginal land or roof tops in the community.

A community-owned solar farm leverages

the collective buying power of the group instead of each resident paying a premium on installing solar on their own roof.

The one thing you can count on in the future is change. As a community, you have the opportunity to make choices that provide for a better quality of living and a sustainable economic future. A PPA brings these energy and environmental solutions to your community today at no investment with third-party ownership of renewable energy systems.

Community Green Energy (CGE)

develops and finances renewable energy and energy efficiency projects nationwide.

Through Power Purchase Agreements, they provide low-cost alternative energy opportunities for companies and communities, including solar, combined heat and power, geothermal, energy efficiency, wind, and water efficiency.

•

Mike Erickson, VP of Finance at CGE, has been in the finance field for over 20 years and is active with renewable energy and other capital improvements.

Photo: All Sun Trackers from AllEarth Renewables.

A community-owned solar farm leverages the collective buying power of the group.

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Toolbox Green on Green

Airborne wind turbines and 30-year energy cells—a handful of green-building tools to expand on some already sustainable ideas

Makani Airborne Wind Turbine Makani Power was founded in 2006 to more efficiently harness the power of the wind, and its airborne wind turbine seems to be an excellent solution for making wind farms cheaper and more effective. The wind turbine is a wing tethered to the ground; it flies in patterns where the wind is stronger and more consistent, and it uses 90 percent less material than a conventional wind turbine. This style of turbine can also access wind at higher altitudes and above deep water, making it an option for developing offshore wind farms.

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Hybrid faucets by Kohler

Ecovative Biocomposites

Warmboard Radiant Heat

Kohler’s new hybrid energy system for its touchless water faucets is maintenance-free for 30 years. This means no photovoltaic-cell upkeep, no turbines to monitor, and no batteries to replace. The system has a hybrid internal capacitor that protects against high-current draws to help preserve the life of the energy cell, which is designed to store energy significantly longer than a traditional battery. (Don't miss our exclusive interview with David Kohler, Jr. on p38)

The materials used to make Ecovative Biocomposites aren’t manufactured—they’re grown. Agricultural byproducts, the parts of plants that can’t be used for food or feed, are mixed with mycelium, a fungal network of threadlike cells that act as a binding material for the byproducts. Over the course of five to seven days, the mycelium digests the raw materials, and then it is dehydrated, creating a hard surface that can be used in building applications such as insulation, SIPs, and acoustical tiles.

Warmboard is redefining radiant heating by making it more energy efficient.

The company was created in 1992 by an architect and inventor, and the system uses aluminum to conduct heat instead of concrete, the conventional material.

Because of this, Warmboard panels can use a lower water temperature, meaning less energy, to sufficiently heat a home. Using Warmboard panels on a home can also contribute up to 15 LEED points in Energy and Atmosphere and Indoor Environmental Quality.

kohler.com

ecovativedesign.com

may–june 2013

warmboard.com

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Photos: Kohler Co.; Ecovative Biocomposites; Warmboard; Makani Power

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Index Advertisers

A Anders & Falltrick Architects, 120 Antunovich Associates, 2 Automatic Controls Engineering, 115 B Bellmont Cabinet Co., 122 Bowen & Watson, 34 Brunton Architects, 34 C City Lighting Products Company, 36 Community Green Energy, 141, 142 Continental Electrical Construction Company, 31 Crossville, 130 D ECC, 69 Envision Realty Services, 72 ES2, 24 Every Building Conference, 148 G Gehrlicher Solar, 47 GH Phipps, 69 H Hart Power Solutions, 136 HOK, 130 J JDRM Engineering, 120 L Lambet Construction, 24 Leading Edge Consulting Services, 122 M Macerich, 96

Marchetto Higgins Stieve, 28 McCaffery Interests, 147 McGough, 102 Milestone Construction Company, 69 P Peerless Building Maintenance, 72 PSJ Engineering, 102 R RLPS Architects, 28 Robert Derector Associates, 6 S Schüco, 136 Selser Schaefer Architects, 24 Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, 147 Sodexo, 47 Sternberg Lighting, 130 SVPA Architects, 102 T TJH Energy Consulting, 72 Transwestern, 31 Turnbull-Wahlert Construction, 19 V Vanderweil, 130 W Western Allied Corporation, 72 Westside Mechanical Design/Build, 31 Z Zeidler Partnership Architects, 115

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Designer Stanley Saitowitz explains how a 19th-century poem inspired his design for the W Hotel San Francisco The W Brand is now focused on making each hotel particular to its local context.

For the San Francisco W, we have developed a concept based on a quote from native poet Ambrose Bierce. “This city is a point upon a map of fog.” ‘Map’ and ‘fog’ are the key elements that are expressed in the design.

One memorable aspect of San Francisco is its cubic buildings that are extruded from the grids of streets and lots, stretched out over the landscape like some encrusted map. The other is the fog that rolls in and out of the city, enveloping it like a living glacier.

The ground and sky become the floor and the ceiling of the W Hotel design,

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the floor is the map of the city, the ceiling the fog. Out of the grid of the floor, furniture as buildings are extruded; over the windows that wrap the space along Howard and Third Streets the fog descends; and along the interior wall, the city climbs upward.

The patterned carpet on the floor reflects the grids of streets and lots, and the design continues up the interior walls as backlit wooden panels. The reception desks, furniture, bars, tables, seats, and couches are cubic extrusions from this carpet map. Each piece of furniture is a fragment of the San Francisco cityscape, recreated as an interior landscape, to be sat on or in, to support the functional elements of the hotel.

These pieces of the remade interior city are enveloped in patterns of fog that cover the windows, walls, and ceilings; they are backlit and shimmering, making them both ephemeral and focal.

Fog is presented as fabrics, drapes, and

See m of the ore W San Fra Hotel ncis on p10 co 8

About STANLEY SAITOWITZ The design principal at Natoma Architects in San Francisco works in commercial, residential, and institutional architecture, and his work is internationally recognized. He was born in Johannesburg, South Africa and is a professor at the University of California at Berkeley.

pixilated wall coverings that wrap the surfaces. As one goes higher in the interior, upstairs to the bar, the fog thickens and the colors change to white and mute.

The new interior of the W is a fantasy cityscape—an image of the city as remembered in movies and songs, shrouded in glowing fog. gb&d gbdmagazine.com

photo: w hotel san francisco

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