Green Building & Design (gb&d), #26

Princeton’s vision for 2020 68 The promise of structural wood 94 BIG‘s twist on the condo 28 Face time with Interface 122 G R E E N B U I L D I N G & D E S I G N M A R C H +A P R I L 2 014

THE SMART PARK

Guest Edited by Larry Kearns

HUNTER’S POINT REPRESENTS A NEW ERA OF ECOLOGICAL ENGINEERING 108

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

In This Issue gb&d ®

March + April 2014 Volume 5, Issue 26

68

108

28

76

94

Princeton University’s new building projects bring a dream team to campus as it works to reduce emissions to 1990 levels by 2020

How Hunter’s Point Park fortifies New York City and represents a new era of ecological engineering

Terra Group partners with Bjarke Ingels Group and Raymond Jungles to put a twist on the typical Miami condo

Javier Molina draws on his experience as a working-class Latino to design two green schools in Los Angeles

Perkins+Will’s Earth Sciences Building puts structural wood back on the board

2020 Vision

gb&d

Long Live Queens!

BIG in Miami

Safe Havens and Gathering Places

Going With the Grain

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Table of Contents gb&d

Up Front

Approach

Trendsetters

Green Typologies

10 Guest Editor

20 Cawley’s Green

34 The Six Sense

46 Power and Light

Larry Kearns has an activist’s heart and an engineer’s mind

Standard

Change comes to Dallas commercial development

12 Editor’s Picks

21 Sum of Its Parts

Kearns offers a few tips from his playbook

14 From the Portfolio

Inside the Exelon Gymnasium by Wheeler Kearns Architects

16 Defined Design

Living architecture at Hotel Seven4One

Butler Armsden thinks outside the box

23 Retrofitting the

Retrofit

How job-order contracting can save millions of dollars

25 Konami’s Expansion

The gaming giant upgrades to green

Zeller Realty Group’s Bob Six greening real estate

37 Energy on Demand

Penn State pilots a smarter smart grid

40 An Alternative Power

Couple

Oaktree Development sees our modular future

Nova Scotia Power completes a LEED Platinum landmark

52 Working Smarter

Leggat McCall Properties opts for a client’s own energy solutions

54 From Operating

Rooms to Offices

42 Smarter, Brighter,

Faster, Stronger

CFA Institute makes its new home in a historic hospital

Lumigent offers more reliable lighting retrofits

56 Helping Georgia

Bloom

New products and old desert technologies from Super-Sod

PHOTOS: GREG RICHARDSON (WZMH ARCHITECTS); JEFFREY TOTARO

46 4

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gbdmagazine.com

GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

60

Inner Workings

Spaces

Tough Builds

Punch List

60 New Beginnings in

84 Foam, Glass, & Wood

114 Wharton Expands

122 Person of Interest

New Jersey

The stunning Springwood Center is a sign of hope for Asbury Park

65 Inside a Portland

EcoDistrict

Hassalo on Eighth will replace a parking lot with live/work space

Digsau taps new products and century-old wood

90 Desert Magic

An Anasazi-inspired residence by Jon Dick

100 Dining in Style

Eating at the first LEED Platinum dining hall

Westward

Inside the Penn business school’s LEED-CI campus in San Francisco

118 Station 27 Goes

Vertical

Dallas digs for a LEED Platinum fire station that has more

George Bandy Jr. explains Interface’s green compass

124 On the Boards

Goettsch Partners plans unique riverfront offices

126 Material World

The green possibilities of GKD’s metal fabrics

102 Perfect Pitch

127 Discussion Board

Houston’s stunning new soccer stadium

Designers discuss their most influential authors

106 Louisiana Landmark

128 On the Spot

Trahan Architects bends materials and minds

Guest editor Larry Kearns answers our questionnaire

“People want to know why we don’t use wool or jute. The fact of the matter is that things designed by nature are also designed to break down.” 122 gb&d

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Editor’s Note Human Capital

PHOTO: SAMANTHA SIMMONS

On a recent Friday night, I walked into a newly rehabbed building on Chicago’s South Side. It was packed with people and filled with the sound of live jazz and lively chatter.

A long bar clad with salvaged wood faced a set of reclaimed booths. There were beer-bottle chandeliers, church pews converted into drink counters, and old mirrors fashioned into menu boards.

This was the first time the public had seen the space, which was phase one of a new community building at 69th and Peoria, an intersection not many Chicagoans visit due to news reports of shootings and gang wars. That night, however, we got a glimpse of what could become a safe haven for neighborhood youth, a hub for creative professionals, and—if that night’s crowd was any indication—a place for interaction between racial groups still too often segregated.

Interestingly, while there I ran into friends who are creating their own safe haven in Humboldt Park, a part of Chicago with similar challenges, by opening a Montessori school. Even as we celebrated this project, we dreamed of building another. Why? Because spaces that take into account “human capital”—to use a favorite phrase of Larry Kearns, our guest editor (p. 10)—are vitally important.

Ninth Street Elementary School in Los Angeles (p. 76), for instance, is a safe haven for its students, many of whom are homeless. Javier Molina, a principal at Quatro Design Group, drew from his experience as the son of a single mother who worked long hours to support her family. His colorful building wraps an inner courtyard that provides sanctuary for the children.

Our second feature also centers on education but explores a world that must feel completely foreign to the students of Ninth Street Elementary. Princeton University, like many colleges, put a sustainability plan into place several years ago, but we’re concerned with the coming six years. By 2020, Princeton plans to have reduced its carbon emissions to gb&d

1990 levels—and it’s on track. More visibly, the next several years also will bring the completion of three new high-performance complexes designed by top architects including Steven Holl, Tod Williams, and Christiana Moss (p. 68).

Still other projects invest in people not through pedagogy but through play. Hunter’s Point Park in Queens (p. 108), designed by Weiss/Manfredi and Thomas Balsley Associates, provides green space that connects the public to New York’s waterfront.

And yet the story only begins with the green space; engineered into the park are gabion walls and bioswales to create what Marion Weiss calls a “critical, hard-working, resilient perimeter.” As we face the realities of climate change, parks such as Hunter’s Point offer cost-effective ecological solutions to storm surges and other related disasters.

“I think to the extent that cities can rebuild themselves to put human-capital building projects in places of prominence, that’s on the right track,” Kearns says in our Q&A. I wholeheartedly agree, and that night, at the opening of my friends’ building, I experienced the power and optimism that is possible when people come together and reclaim a corner of their city. It was a reminder that we have reason to hope.

Cheers,

Timothy A. Schuler, Managing Editor tim@gbdmagazine.com ON THE COVER Hunter’s Point Park

by Thomas Balsley Associates and Weiss/ Manfredi is a beautiful barricade. The serenity of this summery shot

by Albert Večerka, Esto, is juxtaposed against the park’s other function: to protect New York from superstorms and other natural disasters.

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Index People & Companies

# A

B

C

D

E

F

G

8

150 North Riverside, 124 Aelux, 42 Andersen, Kyle, 65 Anderson, Ray, 122 Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment, 70 Andlinger, Gerhard, 70 Archaeo Architects, 91 Architecture 2030 Challenge, 118 Ballard, Daniel, 26 Balsley, Thomas, 110 Bandy, George Jr., 122 Basora, Zaida, 118 BBVA Compass Stadium, 103 Beyer Blinder Belle, 72 Big Ass Fans, 57 BIG, 30 Bigelow, Ellis, 21 Bigelow, Ron, 21 Birt, Bernadette, 115 Blanchaer, Carl, 48 British Columbia Building Code, 98 Busby, Peter, 96 Butler Armsden Architects, 21 Butler, Lewis, 21 California Public Utilities Commission, 25 Carlidge, Stephen J., 60 Cawley Partners, 20 Cawley, Bill, 20 Center for Math and Science, 81 CertainTeed, 39 CFA Institute, 54 Chan, Harrison, 50 City of Dallas, 118 City of Houston, 103 City of Philadelphia, 37 Commonweal Conservancy, 91 Copeland, Ben Jr., 56 Department of Energy, 37 Digsau, 86 Dynamo Soccer Team, 103 Earth Sciences Building, 96 Energy Efficient Buildings Hub, 37 Ethos Three Architecture, 25 ETwater, 56 Exelon Gymnasium, 15 Fire Station 27, 118 Foamglas, 86 Foit, Jana, 96 Galisteo Basin Preserve Residence, 91 Gause, Bill, 52 GBD Architects, 65 General Fund Energy-Efficiency Program, 23 Gensler, 116 GKD Metal Fabrics, 126 Goettsch Partners, 124 Grand Bay Hotel, 30 Greenbuild, 11 GreenStaxx, 40

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GridSTAR Center, 37 H HardiePanel, 63 Hassalo on Eighth, 65 Hills Brothers Plaza, 116 HOK Architects, 126 Horst Architects, 16 Hotel Seven4One, 16 Hunter, 56 Hunter’s Point South Waterfront Park, 110 I ICON Venue Group, 103 Ingels, Bjarke, 30 Inspiration Kitchens, 11 Interface, 122 Interfaith Neighbors, 60 J Jones, Reba, 23 JQ Engineering, 119 Jungles, Raymond, 30 Juno Lighting Group, 53 K Kearns, Larry, 11 Kent Denver School, 100 Klipfel, Arthur, 40 Konami Gaming, 25 L Lakeside Graduate Housing, 73 Legacy Center, 21 Leggat McCall Properties, 52 Lewis Center for the Arts, 72 Lopeman, John, 25 Los Angeles Community College District, 81 Los Angeles Unified School District, 77 Louisiana State Museum and Sports Hall of Fame, 106 Lucy, Stephen, 119 Lumigent, 42 M Manfredi, Michael, 110 Martha Jefferson Historic District, 54 Martha Jefferson Hospital, 54 Martin-Harris Construction, 25 Martin, David, 30 McGeough, Gerry, 96 Mellon, Harry, 23 Mission College, 81 Molina, Javier, 77 Moss, Christiana, 74 N Newmiller, Ray, 25 Ninth Street Elementary School, 77 Nova Scotia Power, 48 Noyes, Gwendolen, 40 Nyquist, Tom, 73 O Oaktree Development, 40 P Pasternak, Skip, 42 Patrick, Howard, 86 Penn State University, 37 Perkins+Will, 53, 96, 119 Philadelphia Navy Yard, 37 Pittsburgh Corning Corporation, 86 Pontious, Kent, 119 Populous, 103 Princeton University, 69 Q Quatro Design Group, 77

R

S

T

Riley, David, 38 Rodriguez, Ricardo, 77 Rowe Clark Math & Science Academy, 15 Sanderson, Mark, 86 Schapira, Emily, 43 Schmidt, Bryan, 100 Schneider Electric, 52 Schuler, Krystina, 86 Schuler, Steven, 86 Semple Brown Design, 100 Shore Point Architecture, 60 Six, Bob, 34 Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, 11 Smith, Scott, 24 Solar Decathlon, 37 Spear, Jeff, 103 Spring Valley Construction Company, 21 Springwood Center, 60 Square D, 53 Steven Holl Architects, 70 Studio Ma, 70 Super-Sod, 56 Swetz, Dave, 21 Terra Group, 30 Tesla, 12 The Energy Coalition, 25 The Gordian Group, 23 The Grove at Grand Bay, 30 The Spinnaker Group, 30 Thomas Balsley Associates, 110 Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects, 70 Trahan Architects, 106 Tsien, Billie, 70 U University of British Columbia, 96 University of Florida, 126 University of Southern California, 77 US Postal Service, 25 V Van Valkenburgh, Michael, 70 Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, 73 Vance, Christine, 23 W Weiss, Marion, 110 Weiss/Manfredi, 110 Wharton School of Business–San Francisco, 115 Wheeler Kearns Architects, 11 Wheeler, Dan, 11 Whiting-Turner Contracting Company, 54 Wilcox Plaza at Las Colinas, 21 Williams, Guy, 54 Williams, Tod, 70 WZMH Architects, 48 Z Zeller Realty Group, 34 Zeller, Paul, 34

gbdmagazine.com

GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

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

gb&d

10 Guest Editor

Larry Kearns has an activist’s heart and an engineer’s mind

12 Editor’s Picks

Kearns offers a few tips and tricks from his architectural playbook

14 From the Portfolio

Inside the Exelon Gymnasium by Wheeler Kearns Architects

16 Defined Design

A two-story living wall animates the façade of Hotel Seven4One

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9

Larry Kearns, a principal at Wheeler Kearns Architects in Chicago, sits in the waiting area he designed for Inspiration Kitchens, an award-winning restaurant and job-training site in Garfield Park.

UP FRONT

Guest Editor Larry Kearns

If you don’t live in Chicago, you may not know many Larry Kearns-designed buildings, but I guarantee you’re familiar with at least one thing in his portfolio: the term ‘Greenbuild.’ That’s right, if you’ve attended or even heard of the Greenbuild conference—which this year comes to New Orleans—you have Kearns to thank. In fact, many of us can be grateful for Kearns’s work. As an architect, his efforts to design high-performance, socially redeemable projects in hard-hit urban neighborhoods will leave our built environment far more livable than before he began his career.

Kearns graduated from the University of Miami in 1985 with a Bachelor of Architecture and joined Skidmore, Owings & Merrill immediately after. Within five years, Kearns was a principal alongside Dan Wheeler at Wheeler Kearns Architects. When he’s not designing award-winning buildings such as the Exelon Gymnasium (p. 14), he’s usually reading (learn what on p. 12) or jotting notes on how to reinvent our education system (make no little plans, and all that).

Larry and I met at Inspiration Kitchens in Garfield Park, another award-winning project of his, and over a lunch of catfish po’boys and fried-green tomatoes, we talked about a need to understand ecosystems, the problem with buildings as money-making machines, and the stifling remnants of America’s agricultural past. —Timothy A. Schuler, Managing Editor

IN CONVERSATION with Larry Kearns

PART 1: NOT LANDING THE UFO gb&d: I want to chat about this place (Inspiration Kitchens) a little bit. It’s been open a few years—though it wasn’t here when my wife and I lived down the street—and I’m astounded that it keeps winning awards.

What’s so resonant about this project?

Larry Kearns: It’s probably the most ambitious project we’ve had and probably the most audacious, in terms of taking on multiple problems. What struck me when I first learned of this project was that I had been to the Museum of Science and Industry’s [display on] the issue of food deserts in Chicago.

And I remember the largest circle being centered in this neighborhood. So when I first heard about it I said, “Okay this is somebody who didn’t just happen to find this location, but [who is making] a very premeditated, motivated move to make change.” When they added the idea of being ambitious from an environmental point of view too, that sold us on it. gb&d: You just jumped out of your chair— Kearns: It’s one of those projects where you say, “We will make them succeed. We will carry this over the goal line.” I think this project has had a longer lifespan because a lot of people still don’t know about it. People are still encountering it. It wasn’t meant to be a project that has a disruptive or conspicuous presence. This was more about an incognito addition to the neighborhood, where you’re weaving fabric together—not trying to land the UFO.

PHOTO: SAMANTHA SIMMONS

gb&d: Frank Gehry style. arry Kearns comments on L Perkins+Will’s Earth Sciences Building at the University of British Columbia and much more. Use the list to the right to jump to his thoughts, insights, and questions.

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT 1. A school for homeless youth, p. 76 2. The promise of wood, p. 94 3. New life in Asbury Park, p. 60 4. The gb&d questionnaire, p. 128 5. Most influential author, p. 127

Kearns: Right. A lot of people can look at this project and see success, whether you don’t care about architecture and just care about the environment or if you only care about social causes. There’s a lot of facets to this.

The conversation continues on p. 15

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UP FRONT

Editor’s Picks An Architect’s Playbook Text by Larry Kearns

▼

“OUTSULATED” THERMAL MASS Incorporating large amounts of thermal mass within a well-insulated envelope doesn’t save energy, but it dramatically reduces demand power levels. Think of a four-cylinder engine versus a muscle car. Beyond longevity, this is one of the most ignored sustainable building strategies. We used the strategy for Hansberry College Prep (pictured) and for a project where it took two weeks to notice that the winter heat wasn’t working.

SPRAY-FOAM ROOFING For reroofing projects, this obviates the landfilling of enormous amounts of hazardous waste. It is the only material that provides all four barriers required of a building envelope: a wet-water barrier, a thermal-insulation barrier, a water-vapor barrier, and an air barrier, all with a highly reflective coating. Roofs can be recoated throughout their lifetimes to renew warranties. This school has a spray-foam roof, and we continue to use the product. biofoamusa.com

TESLA MODEL S I drive the 718th Model S ever made, which currently has 12,000 miles on the odometer. After putting a deposit on a concept two-and-a-half years before delivery, the results continue to amaze. The overwhelming attention and praise is well deserved.

If Tesla is able to pull off a Third Generation, the environmental impact to global warming will make building improvements seem paltry. teslamotors.com

EXCLUSIVE EXTRAS Take a ride with us in Larry’s Tesla Model S at gbdmagazine.com.

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▼

▲ AEROGEL-FILLED UNIT SKYLIGHTS One of the most useful nano-technologies available to architects, these dramatically reduce energy losses traditionally encountered with daylighting from above. We’ve used these numerous times, including in the LEED Gold Exelon Gymnasium (p. 14). cabot-corp.com

MY LIBRARY It travels with me wherever I go, courtesy of iPads and iPhones. Highlights for designers willing to venture out include The World Without Us by Alan Weisman, Uncommon Carriers

by John McPhee, The One World Schoolhouse by Salman Kahn, The Idea Factory by Jon Gertner, The Great Degeneration by Niall Ferguson, and Measuring America by Andro Linklater. Sustainability needs to support people in addition to profit and planet.

PHOTOS: STEVE HALL / HEDRICH BLESSING (HANSBERRY); SAMANTHA SIMMONS (TESLA)

▼

For a building, you need an architect.

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Philadelphia Green Produced for the Delaware Valley Green Building Council for Greenbuild 2013.

Custom Publishing by gb&d Start a conversation today. 312.256.8483

These aerogel-filled skylights help bring daylight to 90% of the gym’s spaces without the typical energy loss. The gym uses 56% less energy than a comparable baseline building.

UP FRONT

From the Portfolio Exelon Gymnasium

IN CONVERSATION with Larry Kearns Continued from p. 11

gb&d: Were there any environmental challenges in terms of the site itself? What was the building before, and what was its condition when you came in?

Kearns: Completely dilapidated. This building was built in the same year that the [Garfield Park] Conservatory was built. So 1908. It was built as an industrial factory. They made the sensoring components for metal-working lathes. And those north-facing skylights were there in 1908, not for the environment but as an inexpensive way to light an industrial floor. gb&d: I really liked your Discussion Board question (p. 127). I want to turn it back on you. Did you have an author in mind that’s been an influence on your design philosophy, or human philosophy?

Kearns: I would say John McPhee, who I would characterize as someone who goes in-depth and makes captivating nonfiction and makes connections that somebody who confines himself to a particular discipline probably wouldn’t want to do. Like his book Uncommon Carriers—that’s the best environmental thesis you could ever have, but it’s not written that way. It’s just stories about people.

PART 2: FISHING IN THE EVERGLADES

PHOTOS: MARK BALLOGG, BALLOGG PHOTOGRAPHY

Inside one recent (and award-winning) project by guest editor Larry Kearns Winner of an AIA Chicago Design Excellence award for its high-performance skylights, which help light 90 percent of the space, this gymnasium and gathering space in Chicago’s Humboldt Park neighborhood provides the Rowe Clark Math & Science Academy a LEED Gold facility for both athletics and academics. The unique ceiling, designed

by Larry Kearns of Wheeler Kearns Architects, not only provides daylight but also absorbs noise and conceals the mechanical systems and audiovisual equipment. Massive concrete walls create a super-insulated envelope, and heat recovery and occupancy sensors further conserve energy. Most importantly, the gym has raised the profile of the struggling charter school, boosting recruitment and empowering students and faculty.

DETAILS LOCATION Chicago Size 1 2,000 ft2 Completed 2011 Cost $3.5 million Certification LEED Gold heeler Kearns Architects Architect W Client Rowe Clark Math & Science Academy General Contractor Bulley & Andrews

gb&d: I have environmentalism in my blood because my dad was a soil conservationist for the federal government for his entire career in Kansas.

Kearns: Oh wow. That’s a thankless job.

People don’t realize how critical—I mean, their whole livelihood depends on it and everybody’s like, “I’ll do the minimum.” Right?

It’s always, “I’ll do the minimum. Whatever’s required by law.” gb&d: Oh yeah. Every day was a battle. He’s retired now. But other people have a conversion experience—like Ray Anderson from Interface where he literally goes from one way of thinking to another sort of overnight.

What was your path like?

Kearns: I grew up as a native Floridian south of Miami, and I spent the majority of my time outdoors, fishing in the saltwater part of the Everglades. I spent every waking moment trying to get to really remote places. These were parts of the Everglades only frequented by The conversation continues on p. 17

gb&d

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UP FRONT

Defined Design Hotel Seven4One

DETAILS LOCATION Laguna Beach, CA Size 6,000 ft2 Completed 2013 Architect Horst Architects Owner Hotel Seven4One

Horst Architects’ take on this hotel in Laguna Beach, California, both modernizes and connects it to the area’s waterfront cottages. Natural materials and finishes fill the 13-room Hotel Seven4One that allow it to stand out while firmly tying it to the aesthetics of adjacent buildings like the historic Orange Inn, which was established in 1931.

By Christopher James Palafox Photos by Aris Iliopulos

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pervasive / pər-ˈvā-siv / adjective Spreading to all parts of something. The hotel’s relationship with nature can be seen throughout the building but is most readily apparent on its two-story exterior living wall that simultaneously defines the building’s façade and links to its lush Laguna Beach surroundings. boutique / bü-ˈtēk / noun A small company that offers highly specialized services or products. Besides obviously functioning as a boutique hotel that offers high-end, modern amenities, the space offers more specialized services. One could enjoy the luxury spot as a group vacation rental or for a private wedding or event.

gbdmagazine.com

UP FRONT

IN CONVERSATION with Larry Kearns Continued from p. 15

fishermen or drug runners. There’s a richness to these ecosystems that most people are ignorant of, and like anything else, it’s that Inuit quote: if you don’t understand it, you don’t care. Part of getting people to care is having a working knowledge of what these places are about and why we should care. How drastically wrong my parents’ generation got it. I admire the bravado going to the moon, but obviously the pendulum swings back after you realize what you’ve wrought.

“How drastically wrong my parents’ generation got it. I admire the bravado going to the moon, but obviously the pendulum swings back after you realize what you’ve wrought.”

This boutique hotel has not one dramatic living wall, but two—one on the street-facing exterior and another in an inner courtyard.

seasoned / ˈsē-zənd / adjective To give distinctive quality to as if by seasoning.

Weathered wood dotted with wormholes references the neighboring architecture and its history.

The use of Cor-Ten steel for the fireplaces gives the rooms an earthly, worn quality that harkens to the area’s natural beauty and the building’s past.

gb&d: As someone who thinks about sustainability on a project-by-project level, I’m sure you also think about the health of our city. In Chicago specifically, I’m curious how you’d diagnose us. Are we sickly? Are we on the road to recovery from past environmental injuries?

Kearns: The single-biggest hurdle in Chicago, [which is] no secret, is the school system.

Because it’s the thing that will either fix the city or render it forever on its way to becoming Detroit or worse. It’s a challenge that’s uniquely rooted in human habits. I came here from a zoning hearing, and at the last zoning hearing we had people vehemently arguing against how charters are profiteering from the city’s poor and how the highest-performing charter in the city is evil. People have really closely held preconceptions that are wrong a lot of the time. Like the small school thing, the small class-size thing, which are time and time again proven not to be real factors.

What I find unusual is that the people most genuinely affected or limited by the [quality of the] education are the ones who oppose the change. It’s pretty remarkable to see. So that’s what I’ve spent most of my non-architectural time thinking about. The Tribune just issued an RFP for urban ideas, and I’ve been sitting on this idea for remaking urban education for years now, so I’m actually writing this stuff down. Maybe it gets paid attention to, and maybe it doesn’t.

The conversation continues on p. 18

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UP FRONT

Continued from p. 17

gb&d: An urban issue that plagues me, because it seems so formidable, is this cycle of economic disinvestment in a community.

There’s poverty, then there’s gentrification, and you slowly start to see positive development. That gentrification is good for a time, but it leads to really cheap design and bad planning, and people jump on the bandwagon to try to make a quick buck. Then you’ve made this non-place, so people leave, and the cycle continues.

For example, Whole Foods is moving into Englewood, and the city’s abuzz about that. It’s probably not 100-percent good or 100-percent bad, but you can see it being this anchor that 15 years from now will potentially displace people.

Kearns: If you look at the city as a living organism, some parts are dying, some parts are rebuilding. To a certain extent, this is a natural occurrence. But the issue that bothers me most is that problems aren’t solved, they’re moved. That’s running in place. That’s not leading to any sort of advancement.

In terms of planning, I think a lot of things that prevent progress are misconceptions, or preconceptions I should say, about where that takes place and how it takes place. The whole walking to school and taking summers off to harvest the vegetables—there are so many remnants of how the city needed to be at one time that are hampering it. So I would put education on major transportation lines, I would let kids go as far away as they could, I would have schools that are dramatically different where no kids learn the same way. If I told you right now to learn something, what are you going to do? Are you going to go find 29 other people and hire a talking head?

It’s ludicrous.

I think to the extent that cities can rebuild themselves to put human-capital building projects in places of prominence, that’s on the right track. Like this park here (gestures outside), I would call that vitally important, in terms of a quality-of-life issue. This is something Chicago got right a long time ago. A lot of good stuff was done here that we can still capitalize on, which was also our thought with this project. We’re grafting on to something that was developed post-Civil War, then rebuilt or reimagined in the early 1900s and has really sustained the city. This park has always been, well largely, maintained and heavily used.

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AIA 2014 CONVENTION Get the scoop on this year’s AIA National Convention as it comes to Chicago. Go online for the latest info, sneak peaks, exclusive interviews (and invitations) and more. gbdmagazine.com search: AIA

BEHIND THE SCENES Read an extended conversation between guest editor Larry Kearns and managing editor Tim Schuler and go inside the making of the issue with outtakes from the photo shoot at Kearns’s award-winning Inspiration Kitchens and behind-the-scenes photos at Wheeler Kearns Architects’ offices in Chicago. gbdmagazine.com search: Larry Kearns

UNDER CONSTRUCTION See amazing in-progress photos of the Earth Sciences Building at the University of British Columbia, designed

by Perkins+Will and notable for its structural use of wood.

See the project start to finish online. gbdmagazine.com search: University of British Columbia

PHOTOS: MELANIE LOTH (KEARNS)

IN CONVERSATION with Larry Kearns

The conversation continues on p. 125

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

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

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20 Cawley’s Green Standard

The changing face of commercial development in Dallas

21 A Home, Broken Apart

Butler Armsden thinks outside the box for a California residence

23 Retrofitting the Retrofit

How job-order contracting helped San Francisco save millions

25 Konami’s Efficient Expansion

Ethos Three Architecture helps the gaming giant upgrade to green

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APPROACH “It takes time for a culture to change. When I can show [tenants] that our energy-efficient buildings will save them 17 percent off their electric bills, it helps.”

Bill Cawley, Cawley Partners

Cawley helps green the Lone Star State

 Despite low demand, Bill Cawley pursues LEED for commercial development in Dallas  Low energy costs strike a chord for shrewd Texas tenants

Cawley Partners principal Bill Cawley says the 14 percent higher construction costs of his first environmentally conscious building scared him to death.

Fortunately, everyone survived, the building was successfully sold, and he says green is now the company standard.

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Chalk it up to good instincts. Cawley’s Dallas-based development, management, and leasing company built its first LEED Gold building in 2006, but not because of tenant demand. It took hope and good intentions to go that route, given that even today the bulk of potential tenants

in Texas do not ask for LEED-certified office space.

“The primary leasing considerations are location, facility amenities, and efficient floor plates,” Cawley says. “But we lease on a plus-electric basis, so when I can show them that our energy-efficient buildings will save them 17 percent off their electric bills, it helps when all other factors of competing buildings are the same.”

Cawley speaks of a slowly changing cultural regard for green building in this fossil-fuel rich state—the firm also has owned or developed buildings in Colorado, California, and Utah—but he was on to something from the start. Cawley Partners’ early adoption of Earth-friendly, energy-frugal construction reflects a larger trend reported by the USGBC, which ranked Texas second on its list of states with the most LEED-certified projects in 2012, second only to California.

On a LEED-square-feet-per-capita basis, Texas ranks tenth. gbdmagazine.com

APPROACH

Cawley is currently developing Knoll Trail Plaza, a four-story, 120,000-squarefoot building strategically situated midway between the Dallas–Fort Worth and Love Field airports. Although it’s still in the design stage, Cawley says the development will include LEED-qualifying green features found in previous projects: minimized water use, maximized storm-water management, an energy-efficient envelope, and responsibly sourced materials, including recycled bricks.

“It takes time for a culture to change,” Cawley says, referring to tenants as well as contractors that have had to revise sourcing and working methodologies.

“Old bricks, for example, make great walls, flooring, and sidewalks. It costs more to clean them up, but our construction people are learning to recycle them properly.”

The firm invites bids from multiple construction firms in the area, with

Dallas-based Spring Valley Construction Company winning one recent project in part because the firm has several LEED APs on staff. Other Cawley projects also in the works to meet similar standards are Wilcox Plaza at Las Colinas in Irving, Texas, and Legacy Center in Plano, Texas. Texans expect energy costs to rise in the future and for inflation to accelerate as well. As that unfolds, Cawley believes his company’s buildings will continue to take on greater value.

As an avid organic gardener, Cawley draws inspiration for eco-conscious buildings from his own greenhouse at home. That’s an avocation that takes some time to bear fruit, invariably after some creative problem solving. When those homegrown tomatoes ripen and satisfy the palate like nothing else can, the results far overshadow the time and effort required to get there. gb&d —Russ Klettke

RIGHT Wilcox Plaza at Las Colinas will be pursuing LEED certification after its completion this year. The building was designed

by Morrison Dilworth + Walls, a Dallas-based architecture firm.

LEFT The 120,000-sqaure foot, four-story Knoll Trail Plaza will be completed in November.

Some of the building’s green features include reclaimed bricks for the exterior, enhanced indoor air quality, and an energy-efficient envelope.

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More than the sum of its parts  Butler Armsden Architects breaks up the single-family home for its LEED Platinum residence in Menlo Park, CA Hallways? Where you’re going, you don’t need hallways—but you might need a bridge. Ellis and Ron Bigelow’s residence in Menlo Park, California, turns the inside outdoors by replacing corridors with a bridge that connects two of the home’s three pavilions at the second floor. The idea places circulation space away from the home in order to minimize stagnant air; the remainder can be flushed by the home’s ducted fan system.

“This house needs to respond to its context,” says Dave Swetz, a designer at Butler Armsden Architects (BAA) and the project manager for the Bigelow residence. Ron, a retired environmental law attorney from Houston, told BAA that he wanted a green home that also functioned like a typical home and was less concerned with green certifications.

Even so, BAA president and principal Lewis Butler says, “When someone comes up with the idea of building a green house, we’re going to take it to [LEED] Platinum.”

The architects used their first LEED Platinum home, an AIA Award-winning residence in Tiburon, California, as a starting point. But instead of creating a dwelling meant to showcase all that green building could be (like the Tiburon home that netted a whopping 114 points), Butler and his team sought to create “a reasonable, down-the-middle, LEED Platinum house” and are expecting 99 points for their second LEED Platinum effort. march–april 2014

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WHERE QUALITY IS AT HOME

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APPROACH

he Bigelow Residence T upends the currently popular notion of having an open-concept house by creating three pavilion living spaces (see floor plans below).

PROJECT LOCATION Menlo Park, CA Size 3 ,542 ft2 Completed 2013 (expected at press time) Program P rivate residence

TEAM ARCHITECT B utler Armsden Architects General Contractor M oderna Homes Landscape Architect Shades of Green Landscape Architecture Client Ellis & Ron Bigelow

GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Platinum (expected) Recycling 9 0% of existing home recycled or diverted from landfills Materials Reclaimed redwood siding, fly-ash concrete, FSC-certified flooring, aluminum roof paneling Water H ot-water recirculation pump, lowflow faucets and toilets, permeable pavers, high-efficiency drop irrigation Energy Net zero, photovoltaics, insulated low-E windows and doors, 50% glazed exterior Lighting Recessed LED lighting and surface mounted fluorescent lighting

The understated result is still a netzero residence with an innovative pavilion design that deconstructs how single-family homes function. The structure is actually a cluster of three buildings that can be operated separately but are meant to be used as one building. The zones are divided into service, sleeping, and living areas. These segments are not only used to regulate temperature, they are meant to encourage an indoor-outdoor lifestyle that responds to the building’s surroundings.

“Let’s not jumble our kitchen, living, dining, and bedroom all in one constricting square but distribute these programs in a way that actually makes sense and serves the user,” Swetz says. Initially, the house was conceived in an L-shape, but a desire to pull the house apart pushed the structure to its unique form. Not only novel, the structure also allows one to look in all four directions when standing gb&d

at the centrally located entryway nestled between the three pavilions. These undisturbed sight lines split the house spatially across the north-south and east-west axes to separate the sections organically.

With the exception of the home’s high-performance, low-E windows, supplied by Unilux and imported from Germany, the home is fully Californian.

By sourcing the majority of its materials from within 500 miles of its Menlo Park location, Swetz and the BAA team created a unique house that captures the spirit of California. This includes using reclaimed redwood siding from neighboring Redwood City, highlighting the state’s Spanish heritage through elements like stucco walls, and highlighting the state’s Asian influences through the use of floating roof panes and the composition of the pavilions—an idea borrowed from the Japanese pavilion at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago.

Nearly 100 percent of the Menlo Park project was recycled or diverted, including the Bigelows’ old tongue-and-groove ceilings, which BAA architect Reba Jones repurposed for her own home. The rest of the old building was repackaged as a possible kit home. gb&d —Christopher James Palafox

A quicker, easier way to retrofit  The Gordian Group streamlines retrofits, renovations, and new-build projects  Job-order contracting brings sustainability and efficiency to the public sector In 2008, San Francisco was facing a $500 million budget deficit in its general fund, and the city sought to reduce energy use—quickly. That, however, didn’t seem possible. “We were using the design-bidbuild method, and it would take us years to implement projects,” says Christine Vance, who was then heading up the city’s General Fund Energy-Efficiency Program. Ultimately, though, the plan was made possible through a process known as job-order contracting.

The concept is simple if you understand the traditional construction process, which involves putting together a bid specification package, advertising the package, reviewing bids, and awarding the job to one lucky firm. The process is a burden on facility owners, especially those who have small construction jobs, such as replacing the roof on a local high school or retrofitting lighting.

Given the size and scope of San Francisco’s energy-efficiency projects, Vance and her team saw the opportunity to apply job-order contracting and consulted with the experts—The Gordian Group, a South Carolina-based construction procurement data and consulting firm whose founder, Harry Mellon, developed the job-order-contracting methodology.

The company maintains a catalog of more than 260,000 construction tasks— from hanging drywall to installing vinyl march–april 2014

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APPROACH

“We often struggled doing design-bid-build projects. [Job-order contracting] is a perfect model for energy-efficiency projects, which involve repairs and replacements.”

Christine Vance, Energy Coalition

80% $3m

Reduction in procurement time with job-order contracting

Cost of 10 retrofits in San Francisco with job-order contracting, versus four with other methods

Gordian procurement solutions have helped organizations streamline retrofits for 24 years.

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BELOW The City of Chicago used joborder contracting to affordably convert its alleys to permeable pavement, which allows rainwater to naturally drain into the ground.

flooring, each with an accompanying technical specification—and adjusts the cost of all 260,000 tasks based on local materials, equipment, and labor costs. Customers, such as Vance, then run a procurement process, and general contractors bid with their markup, called an adjustment factor, for work over a set period of time. “Essentially, they say, ‘Over the life of the contract, whatever construction job you ask me to do, I will use the cost information in that catalog multiplied by my adjustment factor, and that will be the fixed price,’” says Scott Smith, vice president of sales and marketing for The Gordian Group, who adds that once a contract is in place, the customer can do as many construction projects as it wants, simply issuing a purchase order against the job-order contract for each one. This process reduces the procurement time by almost 80 percent because the customer doesn’t have to go back through the procurement process. “It’s really dramatic,” Vance says. “Like most public agencies, we often struggled doing design-bidbuild projects. This is a perfect model for energy-efficiency projects, which involve repairs and replacements.”

The methodology can be used for any number of sustainable retrofit projects, such as those the City of San Francisco needed. “Over the four years I was managing the program, we implemented more than $15 million in retrofits in more than 100 facilities, from simple

gbdmagazine.com

APPROACH

lighting projects all the way to substantial mechanical-system replacements,” Vance says. “It was going to take us a couple of years to do our American Recovery and Reinvestment Act-funded energy-efficiency project under designbid-build, but with The Gordian Group and job-order contracting, we went from audit to construction on all 10 facilities within four months, finished lighting in seven months, and finished mechanical in 12. Perhaps most notable is the fact that with our $3.6 million budget, we were able to complete retrofits for all 10 facilities; if we’d been using design-bidbuild, we could have only afforded the mechanical projects in four of them.”

The Gordian Group currently is using job-order contracting for sustainable retrofits for major public entities, including the US Postal Service. Between 2009 and 2011, the USPS audited 69 million square feet of its facilities and identified 3 trillion Btus of potential energy reduction that would result in annual energy savings of $188 million. Through job-order contracting, it completed thousands of individual projects, from lighting retrofits to replacement of HVAC controls.

As for Vance, she’s now brought job-order contracting to The Energy Coalition, a nonprofit organization that seeks to bring energy efficiency to public entities in Southern California.

“We have 14 lighting and mechanical contractors on board in 12 counties, and systemized procedures for how those teams collaborate with energy engineers to quickly retrofit facilities,” Vance says of the program, which is funded by the California Public Utilities Commission.

“Customers get a competitively priced turnkey retrofit solution, and from an industry perspective, the program allows public agencies to go to scale and address issues of not just climate change but upgrading building infrastructure through a regional procurement solution.” gb&d —Julie Schaeffer gb&d

Although Konami didn’t specifically ask for sustainable features, Ethos Three added a geothermal plan to its new facility.

Konami doubles down in Vegas  Ethos Three designs a LEED Silver facility for game-maker Konami  Production facility will conserve energy while doubling space Konami Gaming’s Las Vegas headquarters will be expanding to more than twice its current operating size to accommodate increased production and consolidate its operations. Companies usually can’t foresee future growth, and Konami, one of the gambling industry’s top five slot-machine manufacturers, recently has seen a tremendous increase in demand. Because of its current facility’s size, most of the company’s storage is handled off-site, but the addition will streamline Konami’s operations, reducing energy consumption. The almost 123,000-square-foot facility will be supplemented with office space and conference rooms to house the sales team and the company’s research and development arm, which, because of space constraints, also currently is housed off-site.

Originally, Konami aimed for a base LEED certification, but when it hired Ethos Three Architecture, the local design firm brought in plans for a geothermal system, and the company found itself on the edge of

LEED Silver. With 177 six-inch diameter wells pumping water 375 feet deep for geothermal energy, the system will cut 35 percent of the structure’s energy costs. “The original building, though efficient at the time, did not have a lot of the LEED requirements addressed,” says Ray Newmiller, vice president of pre-construction at Martin-Harris Construction, which performed a cost-benefit analysis for various project components.

“We’re redoing the existing system— both the lighting and HVAC system,” says John Lopeman, cofounder of Ethos Three. “That’s a complete retrofit—taking the existing structure that wasn’t really designed to be expanded or LEED certified and expanding and making it certified.” All the lighting will be redone with LEDs, Geothermal wells at reducing energy Konami’s new facility use by an additional 15 percent and roughly halving the existing facility’s energy use when combined with the Depth of the geothermal. geothermal wells Besides these new systems, FSC-certified wood, low-VOC finishes, and regional and recycled materials Reduction in annual energy use will lend to the

177 375’ 35%

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APPROACH

Konami’s new location in Las Vegas prioritizes daylight in its lobby and office spaces.

The facility expects to achieve LEED Silver status.

LEED certification, and the building itself contains recycled concrete and steel.

Although it did not earn any additional LEED points, extensive daylighting was employed for the facility’s office spaces, but a storage mezzanine stymied similar daylight levels in production areas.

Bringing these sustainable attributes to the building was not the only challenge in creating the four-story complex.

Konami sought to continue operations throughout the project, and in order to create a seamless transition, the two-

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“We have to thread the needle to make sure we can find that slowest time and move very quickly to get them operational and ensure there’s no downtime.”

Daniel Ballard, Ethos Three Architecture

year plan is to build a shell building of the new expansion before migrating equipment to larger areas. This includes having to replicate some production facilities so employees can switch building sides while remodeling must take place. As Daniel Ballard, Ethos Three’s principal for the project, explains, “We have to thread the needle to make sure we can find that slowest time and move very quickly to get them operational and ensure there’s no downtime.” gb&d —Christopher James Palafox

gbdmagazine.com

GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

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

gb&d

28 BIG in Miami

Bjarke Ingels and an inspired team put a twist on typical condo design

34 The Six Sense

Zeller Realty Group’s Bob Six on how he became a green convert

37 The Demand of the Microgrid

Penn State hopes to create a smarter grid—and a smarter homeowner

40 The (Alternative) Power Couple

Oaktree Development builds on past success to invest in a modular future

42 Smarter, Brighter, Faster,

Stronger

Lumigent offers clients software for more reliable lighting retrofits

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BIG TRENDSETTERS

Terra Group partners with Bjarke Ingels and Raymond Jungles to upend the typical Miami condo with innovative yet grounded design

in Miami

By Kathryn Freeman Rathbone

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TRENDSETTERS

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TRENDSETTERS The Grove at Grand Bay

Coconut Grove, one of Miami’s most exclusive enclaves, doesn’t look like a typical Miami neighborhood.

Absent is the glitzy art deco architecture and the sleek, soaring high-rises. Instead, it’s better known for its low-key, low-slung buildings and thick groves of trees. “Coconut Grove is a special neighborhood,” says David Martin, the president of Terra Group, one of Miami’s premier development conglomerates.

“It’s very intellectual, it’s low density, and it has some of the best schools in Florida.

It’s an amazing destination.”

These qualities, along with the rising demand for what Martin calls “intelligent luxury living,” attracted Terra Group to Coconut Grove as a site for its boldest development yet. This location also gave Martin an opportunity to experiment with a typical Miami typology: the condo building. “There’s never been a building boom in Coconut Grove because permitting and restrictions are so strict,” Martin says, explaining, in part, the neighborhood’s lack of high-rise development.

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“But it’s a unique place for a new product, and it’s one of the most refined submarkets in Miami. It was time to do something special.” With such loosely defined ambitions, Terra Group bought Coconut Grove’s old Grand Bay Hotel and began planning.

From the start, Martin knew that progressive luxury would define the development, which became formally known as The Grove at Grand Bay. Terra Group wanted to combine design innovation, green initiatives, and premium luxury services to create a new standard for Miami condo living that wouldn’t disrupt the neighborhood’s character. To accomplish this, Martin knew he had to find both an architect and a landscape architect who could deliver cutting-edge design that fit seamlessly into Coconut Grove’s quirky sensibility.

Both commissions turned out to be easy hires. Martin chose Danish architect Bjarke Ingels of BIG (Bjarke Ingels Group) to design the buildings and Miami native Raymond Jungles to complete the site with a lush,

ABOVE Working with Terra Group to raise the bar for residential development, Bjarke Ingels designed The Grove at Grand Bay as two twisting towers above a 2.5-acre garden conceptualized by Miami native Raymond Jungles.

sustainable landscape. He also brought on The Spinnaker Group, one of Miami’s leading sustainable building consultants, to make sure the project fulfilled as many green design parameters as possible. Ingels helped jump-start the site plan when Martin brought him on board. “I had seen some of BIG’s other work, and I knew Bjarke has a really good sense of place,” Martin says.

“When we started talking, he understood Miami’s tropical climate immediately, and he blended that with his Danish sensibility.” Choosing Jungles was an equally easy choice.

“Raymond had a studio and a home in Coconut Grove for many years,” Martin says.

“There’s a saying, ‘Keep the nut in Coconut Grove,’ and gbdmagazine.com

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PROJECT

GREEN

LOCATION Miami Size 600,000 ft2 Completion 2 015 (expected) Program 96 luxury condominiums, 2.5-acre landscaped garden

CERTIFICATION LEED Gold (expected) Materials Florida stone, FSCcertified wood, low-VOC paints and finishes, reclaimed topsoil, replanted mature trees Water Low-flow fixtures, native vegetation with proper soil depths, high-efficiency irrigation Energy High-efficiency lighting systems, passive solar shading Windows First project in Miami to use clear low-E glass

TEAM DEVELOPER Terra Group Architect B IG (Bjarke Ingels Group) Landscape Architect Raymond Jungles, Inc. Sustainability Consultant The Spinnaker Group

“The twist expands frontage on the east and gives better views to the residences. It also keeps the neighbors’ views from being obstructed. The form generates equality between the buildings.”

DAVID MARTIN, TERRA GROUP

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we knew that with both designers, we would be able to keep that special bohemian quality.”

The Grove at Grand Bay’s integrated building design and landscape architecture hits on this feeling by introducing a look that’s totally new to the neighborhood without being brash or outrageous. After more than 200 design iterations, BIG delivered a pair of twisted towers that blend with the natural tree canopy surrounding the site. And unlike most Miami condo developments, The Grove comes far from meeting its allowed square footage allocation, so even though it looks different, its size isn’t visually overwhelming.

“When we assembled the site, we bought the old Grand

Bay Hotel and the lot next to it,” Martin says. “We had site entitlements to build out 1.3 million square feet, but we’re only doing about 600,000.

Less, in this case, is more.”

Combined, the towers offer 96 units, each 4,000 to 5,000 square feet with brise-soleil patios that add an additional 1,500 square feet of outdoor living space. The buildings’ twisting shape provides more than just aesthetic interest.

“The twisting allows for unique floor plans because all the building mechanics are in the core,” Martin says. “Each unit can be programmed as its owner desires because there’s no plumbing stack, et cetera.” The twisting also gives each unit 12-foot-high ceilings, 12-foot balconies, and maximized daylight—a march–april 2014

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TRENDSETTERS

welve-foot balconies offer more T than great views of Biscayne Bay; they provide passive solar shading for each unit. In addition, highperformance glass helps lower the building’s heat coefficient.

rarity in Miami, where eightfoot ceilings, narrow balconies, and dim living quarters are common in condos. BIG chose a primary palette of exposed concrete and clear, low-E glass to balance the buildings’ bold form. That glass, Martin notes, is a first for Miami residences. “We wanted more volume and more height in the buildings, and we wanted to have 12-foot sliders and windows, but we needed to lower the heat coefficient,” he says. The low-E glass accomplishes this without sacrificing views, and those views are further

enhanced by the built-in rotation of the buildings. “The twist expands frontage on the east and gives better views to the residences,” Martin says.

“It also keeps the neighbors’ views from being obstructed.

The form generates equality between the buildings.”

On the ground, nearly two-and-a-half acres of native vegetation, spread across a system of sloping terraced gardens, help BIG’s buildings appear natural in Coconut Grove. “Terra Group brought BIG on, and it was just awesome,” says Jungles of the initial design process. “They

“We reused as many trees as possible.

We used big trees like live oaks and sabal palms. They make the site feel like a tree house.”

RAYMOND JUNGLES, RAYMOND JUNGLES, INC.

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had already done studies for the hardscape when we came on. It became immediately apparent that it would have to be a garden, and that we were going to use the landscape to blend the project into the fabric of Coconut Grove.” To keep the site feeling like a mature estate, Jungles made a bold move: he relocated existing trees not once, but twice.

“We reused as many trees as possible,” he says. “We used big trees like live oaks and sabal palms. They make the site feel like a tree house.” To ensure the trees take to their replanting, Jungles also added soil and planted additional low-maintenance species native to Miami’s climate. “Proper soil structure isn’t usually present in big condo developments, but here we have the proper soil depth,” he says.

“This means that the plants are low maintenance and will require less irrigation. They will create a habitat.”

Equally important are footpaths and a central swimming pool, which bridges the site’s drop-off point.

“Water is a central part of the garden, so we did a large pool to reflect that,” Jungles says. He also built in benches and crisscrossed the site with paths so that residents can enjoy the grounds throughout the day; the experience is

based in part on the sun. “The light is better in different parts of the garden during different parts of the day, and the benches let people follow the sun around,” Jungles says. A public footpath cuts across the north and west sections of the site, inviting all Coconut Grove residents to walk through and enjoy the landscape.

When construction finishes in early 2015, the site will look fully mature.

“Everything will look finished because we’ve used big trees,” Jungles says. “When it’s done, people will feel like it’s a beautiful contribution to Coconut Grove.” Martin agrees, adding that such design cohesion would not be possible without total collaboration among the different design teams. “Bringing together thinking, collaboration, and chemistry has been a huge asset for this project,” he says.

“This design-driven approach has been followed through for every decision, and residents are overwhelmingly positive.” This is the exact outcome Martin hoped for. At The Grove at Grand Bay, bold new design has successfully integrated condo living into one of Miami’s oldest, most treasured neighborhoods—all while keeping Coconut Grove sufficiently nutty. gb&d gbdmagazine.com

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The Six Sense

Interview by Christopher James Palafox

After 30 years in commercial real estate, Zeller Realty Group’s chief operating officer, Bob Six, came to his senses. If you had asked him about LEED certification in 2007, he would have had some choice words for you. “There’s an eight-letter word that I will use: ‘bullshit,’” Six says. “I would have said, ‘This doesn’t work from an economic standpoint, so let’s not waste our time.’”

But after gathering knowledge on green trends, Six developed a new view. As a 56-year-old father, he realized that he wanted to leave the world as a better place for his children, which led him to engage Paul Zeller, Zeller Realty’s CEO, in a discussion about changing the company’s sustainability practices.

We sat down with Six and asked him about his journey. gb&d: Your eventual reason for prioritizing sustainability had to do with your children, but how did this change come about?

OPPOSITE B ob Six is the COO of Zeller Realty Group, a full-service realty firm with offices in Chicago, Denver, Indianapolis, and Minneapolis.

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Bob Six: After doing some reading and gathering more knowledge, I realized that sustainability was more than a trend—it was here to stay.

I personally started to take a look at things differently. One of the mantras we try to use is: “I don’t care how we did it yesterday. If we did it for the first time today, how would we do it?” gb&d: Was there any specific research you recall that led to this new viewpoint?

Six: The one that really changed my mind was a study by the University of San Diego’s Center of Business Real Estate and CBRE (the real estate services company), that found in LEED buildings employees were happier, productivity was greater, and the buildings were selling for 25 to 65 basis points less than your traditional office buildings, which translated to an increase in value of two to five percent. gb&d: How did you convince the rest of the company?

Six: As an investor we have to be a little more diligent in our pursuit of creative value, and that’s why that particular model became so meaningful for us. We had a building with $14 million in net operating income. We estimated that it would cost us about $200,000 to get LEED Gold certification.

The cap rate reduction in a sale scenario was the portion of the study that was most intriguing to us. We took a conservative approach and said, if we spend $200,000 and this building will sell for a minimum 25 basis points less, then this $14 million in NOI will have a value that is $4 million greater. gb&d: What are the challenges of your specific market?

Six: Finding the opportunities that justify the risk. If you want to pursue a sustainable platform it doesn’t mean simply go and get certified.

It is an ongoing process—you

need to continue to monitor your operations over the LEED certification period to demonstrate to the USGBC that you’re committed to maintaining a sustainable environment and asset. gb&d: Even with those challenges, what is most exciting to you in the industry?

Six: For me, these buildings are like the Lionel trains I treasured from my childhood because of the unique individuality of each train and the desire to collect them all. What young boy of my vintage growing up didn’t either have or dream of having a Lionel train set? For me, to be involved in this type of commerce as an adult is very exciting and gratifying because it allows me to continue collecting prized assets. gb&d: What would you say is your firm’s standout project?

Six: The Wrigley Building is an iconic jewel of the Chicago skyline. We didn’t realize how challenging it was going to be to maintain some form of LEED certification because we were changing the majority of the systems for the better as well as replacing all of the windows with more energy-efficient windows. We were creating a 21st-century asset in the skin of a 20th-century gem. With having made the commitment to do these improvements, we also created an Achilles’ heel because the drop in occupancy during the extensive renovation would gbdmagazine.com

PHOTO: SAMANTHA SIMMONS

How Zeller Realty Group’s chief operating officer, Bob Six, decided green was more than a trend—and began piloting his billiondollar company toward a more sustainable, more profitable future

TRENDSETTERS

“I don’t care how we did it yesterday. If we did it for the first time today, how would we do it?”

BOB SIX, ZELLER REALTY GROUP

have caused The Wrigley Building to fall out of LEED certification compliance by renewal time. With our partner, GOBY, we were able to come up with a thoughtful and reasonable solution to maintain LEED certification through that time period. gb&d: In a competitive industry, what sets Zeller Realty Group apart?

Six: There are a lot of things I could say that are probably obvious and hackneyed—things like our senior executive staff has been together for a minimum of 15 years, and the partnership and mutual respect has grown through that time period and has allowed us to work much closer together and almost seamlessly as a unit. [But what really sets us apart is] that ability to ostensibly see around corners, see opportunity where other people don’t see it. That’s what we describe as our “special sauce.” It’s based on our experience, our successes, yes, but it is also based on some of our failures. You can’t truly be successful if you don’t stub your toe every now and again. gb&d: What upcoming projects are you excited about?

Six: Our plaza at 401 North Michigan Avenue is the largest privately owned plaza in the city. Watch it over the next three years and see what happens. gb&d

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TRENDSETTERS

The Demand of the Microgrid

Penn State’s net-zero demonstration home at Philadelphia’s Navy Yard hopes to bring efficiency to the masses

By Christopher James Palafox

BELOW Penn State’s GridSTAR project is a testing ground for microgrids and has an accompanying website that will publish its findings, including information on grid management, cyber security, and smartgrid economics.

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Everyone has spare batteries lying around. Their untapped potential is awakened only in case of emergency—when the power goes out or in a TV remote crisis—before being unceremoniously stowed away for another rainy day, left to clutter drawers until their services are needed.

Such is the life not only of the AA battery, but also of the modern solar-powered home’s backup battery or generator—a life of untapped energy. Penn State University’s newest project, the GridSTAR Center, aims to put that battery to work at all hours of the day. GridSTAR intends to show the future of intelligent power distribution and erect a LEED Platinum demonstration house for that microgrid to show visitors how it works.

Setting up in the Philadelphia Navy Yard, the project is an opportunity for the university to teach homeowners, homebuilders, and the industry at large about

important technologies that will save money while contributing to the continued conservation of energy and resources. The 1,200acre former naval shipyard has been transformed into a City of Philadelphia-owned industrial park that will serve as a national center for energy and sustainability research. In addition to the demonstration home, the site is home to the Energy Efficient Buildings Hub—one of the nation’s largest research facilities on building efficiency and economics.

The GridSTAR project is an extension of the university’s 2007 and 2009 efforts in the Solar Decathlon. Penn State kept its home from the 2007 decathlon and turned it into a laboratory and teaching facility. From there, the university built momentum, interest, and countless industry partnerships that have allowed it to garner a $125 million grant from the Department of Energy to fund this larger microgrid project.

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TRENDSETTERS GridSTAR Center

“We have the capability to build affordable, smart-grid-capable, solar-energy homes,” says David Riley, Penn State’s director of the GridSTAR Center. “We need to change the culture to inform homeowners about what they should be asking for and show them what’s possible.”

When a home is equipped for solar power, it is typically paired with a backup battery or generator; in the case of an outage, the battery can stretch out and use solar energy to survive without the grid. But unless the power goes out or the solar module’s energy store is depleted, the battery does nothing for the homeowner. Compound that with battery maintenance, and the user has a rarely used piece of equipment that requires more work than its worth.

A smart grid, however, allows a homeowner or building owner to put that battery to use every day.

An active energy storage system in the smart grid is able to charge batteries when electricity is cheaper at night, then discharge during the day, minimizing the amount of expensive daytime energy one needs to purchase. The battery also

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BOVE The Philadelphia Navy Yard was A chosen for the GridSTAR project because it has an unregulated microgrid. Within that microgrid, there is a highly monitored subgrid where different components and system configurations can be tested for research.

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TRENDSETTERS

“It’s not an experiment—these technologies really have a lot to offer consumers and utilities.”

DAVID RILEY, GRIDSTAR CENTER

helps even out power shortages and surpluses. Imagine a residential community where every home has a solar array. When the sun is shining, the array creates loads of power, but then a cluster of clouds shades the sun, dramatically dropping the amount of power being produced. Once the clouds clear, it causes another jolt of electricity in the grid. The batteries smooth out this variability while also minimizing the risk of blowing transformers that can’t handle such fluctuations.

The final source of value that these batteries hold is called demand response. Utilities sometimes struggle to meet peak demand loads when high-energy load equipment is turned off and on in factories, cities, and stadiums. GridSTAR introduces the idea of a home that is able to respond to a utility’s demands—an on-call home that the utility can either ask to charge up its battery or discharge it to help the overall aggregate variable energy demand in the community. Because utilities will pay users for this service, a homeowner’s battery no longer sits superfluously but generates revenue. The payback, admittedly, is not enormous, but it helps lower the cost barrier for a renewable

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energy system, which is a major goal of the GridSTAR project.

These features all bring historically expensive sustainable energy systems closer to the masses, and modular building techniques play an integral role in their large-scale deployment. “If you use a modular construction technique, the labor savings and the economies can be translated into higher quality construction, more energy-efficient wall and attic construction, and more upgraded, more efficient appliances,” Riley says, explaining that people often turn up their nose to a modular home because they think it’s some kind of manufactured, low-cost home. On the contrary, a modular construction environment actually produces the highest quality homes, he says.

The home’s solar-integrated roof shingle, CertainTeed’s Apollo II, illustrates the benefits of these techniques. Solar panels are traditionally installed after the roof is complete, but this product can be installed while the roof is still flat, before it is craned onto the frame, which can lead to an 80 percent reduction in installation time and labor costs.

The all-electric demonstration home has demand-response lighting and shading systems, an

BELOW The GridSTAR Center’s demonstration home is all-electric and has a PV array on its roof. It was constructed as a modular building.

electric-vehicle charger, a utilityinteractive electric water heater, and a mini-split air-conditioning system, which is the most innovative of the bunch because it connects the air-conditioning system directly to the solar array, when normally, the direct current power in an array is converted to alternating current and distributed to the home before being converted back to direct current by the mini-split, an obvious inefficiency.

Riley says many of these systems have similar real-world impacts. “It’s not an experiment,” he says. “These technologies really have a lot to offer consumers and utilities.” In fact, the project’s partners have already been approached by a developer to help implement a similar technology in a 500-home community.

“We’ve got a nice demonstration home, but we hope we have a market-transformation tool,” Riley says. “A big part of what people ask is, ‘Will it be an actual net-zero energy home?’” But the answer is that it still takes a sensitive and conscious occupant to pull it off.

Penn State has built a smarter grid, but what it really wants to build is a smarter homeowner. In the near future, it will be time to change our batteries. gb&d

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TRENDSETTERS

The (Alternative) Power Couple Arthur Klipfel and Gwendolen Noyes put down green roots in 1969 and haven’t looked back. In fact, they’re still looking forward—into the future of modular building.

Gwendolen Noyes and Arthur Klipfel put their money where their housing is. They still live in the factory-built, urban-infill housing community they designed and developed in 1998. As cofounders of Oaktree Development and both trained architects, Noyes and Klipfel have created sustainable, multifamily, transit-oriented developments in or near Boston for more than 40 years.

Today, they are using their patented GreenStaxx building system to further increase efficiency in the design-build process.

gb&d: What in your backgrounds brought both of you to green building?

specifications, and the supply chain. The green is baked in.

Arthur Klipfel: Coming from a small town in Ohio in multifamily housing, I had a real distaste for urban sprawl.

Noyes: This whole system is the heart of what we’re doing. It adapts well to infill housing because it can work with an existing infrastructure and at any scale.

Gwendolen Noyes: As a young girl, I lived on an organic farm. I spent a lot of time just drawing site plans for agriculture communities. Eventually I went to the University of Pennsylvania School of Architecture and studied with Ian McHarg, who wrote Design With Nature.

He was big at Penn.

gb&d: What sort of influence have you had on each other professionally?

Klipfel: She’s had a great passion for green, and I share that. I think my contribution to our partnership has been on the design and economic level.

Interview by Christopher James Palafox gb&d: How does your overall design intersect with your life philosophies?

Klipfel: I graduated from Yale in 1965 with an undergraduate degree in economics. My love of the downtown and a desire to make things affordable got me into multifamily housing.

Noyes: We can’t parse out different parts of our lives and say, “Now I’m going to be an environmentalist.” It’s all one thing.

I’ve been a Quaker for the past 40 years, and doing things simply, in unity with nature, has been a priority for as long as I can remember. gb&d: Can you explain your GreenStaxx system?

Klipfel: To reduce the complexity of the design-build process, we’ve created stacks of units that represent different parts of the building. They go together like LEGO blocks. We take a specific site and lay a grid down that fits the site and metrics of the blocks, and then arrange the grid so you can put in different units. gb&d: What’s the benefit?

Klipfel: They are completely pre-engineered. When you put that block in place you already have the dimensions,

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Noyes: Art has an economics background, and he is always paying attention to how the bottom line also shapes a building. gb&d: You always design to LEED standards—do you look beyond that criteria?

Klipfel: We actually made a trip to Vienna to meet some of the Passive House people there. Our principal designer in our office passed her exam, and we’re very pleased about that because it’s not easy.

Noyes: The Passive House standard is the Holy Grail. Because of the market discipline that we must work within, we look at working with it as pushing the “state of the shelf” rather than the state of the art. gb&d: Are there any projects in your portfolio you’re particularly proud of?

Klipfel: In the ’80s, we built a 175-unit project in a blighted area. It was right next to the Green Line station downtown [in Cambridge] and along a canal. It triggered a federal grant to upgrade the canal into something that today is one of the hot spots in Cambridge.

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TRENDSETTERS

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For More Information Contact Jeffrey Rhodin Managing Director jrhodin@sea.us.com (781) 704-4789 (cell) Noyes: We’re now in the process of getting the building permit for a project that will have every green, smart-growth bell and whistle you can imagine. We just completed another building under the auspices of a state program to encourage affordable housing in downtown areas, and they have trumpeted this project as their poster child for the program.

ABOVE Oaktree Development used its GreenStaxx system on Chelsea Place, a LEED Silver, four-story, 56-unit development in Chelsea, MA.

4 Militia Drive, Suite 6 Lexington, MA 02421 (781) 652-8282 Mon - Fri 8am - 6pm www.sea.us.com

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Klipfel: The state’s idea was to increase housing density in exchange for more affordability. gb&d: What sets you apart from other green designers?

A MESSAGE FROM SUSTAINABLE ENERGY ANALYTICS

Noyes: We push the design/sociology edge of the box. One of the things our buildings can do is relocate wellness and preventative healthcare into a place where people live.

Analytics was an integral part of the team on Oaktree Development’s Chelsea Place project. The firm helped the project meet the requirements to achieve LEED Silver certification. “Sustainable Energy Analytics was a great addition to our team,” says Brian Donley, the director of development for Federal Realty Investment Trust, the real estate investor and owner of the project. “They did their job and more. They found issues that could have really had negative consequences and proposed practical solutions. We have a much better building as a result.”

Klipfel: It’s not just a mechanical product—it’s a lifestyle we’re developing. gb&d: What do you think will be the lasting impact of your work?

Noyes: One thing that gives me the most pleasure is to go back and visit some of the buildings that we developed 34 years ago and see that they have not only been durable, but they’ve also blossomed to foster vibrant neighborhood communities. gb&d gb&d

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> Development & Design/Build Services > Built with the patented modular GreenStaxx system > Mixed-use / Multi-family > Smart Growth / Transit-oriented > Constructed to LEED standards Gwen Noyes, SVP Marketing 617.491.9100 x101 gnoyes@oakdev.com

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TRENDSETTERS

Smarter, Brighter, Faster, Stronger In a fast-evolving industry full of data with few who understand it, Lumigent provides clients with the tools to become their own lighting experts with its audit-to-proposal platform

By Christopher James Palafox

Proven by Frasier, a successful spinoff happens when the right product is introduced at the right time. Moving from the working-class shenanigans of Cheers to the upper crust hijinks of a radiotherapist may seem like an unlikely leap, but history has borne stranger fictions than the sitcom’s popularity. Lighting retrofit expert Aelux made a much more natural move: spinning off its backroom in the form of Lumigent. Poised for success, Lumigent is positioning itself as the answer to a company’s lighting problems that it didn’t know it had. A portmanteau of “luminance” and “intelligent,” the startup splintered off in April 2013 in order to bring smart lighting solutions to the entire industry.

And Lumigent wants to raise the bar for everyone—even former competitors.

To bring its standards-lifting product to the entire marketplace, Lumigent had to break free from Aelux. More than just a move to

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ABOVE S kip Pasternak has taken his expertise in the lighting industry and created Lumigent, a company that ensures smarter, more profitable lighting retrofits.

avoid the possibility of a conflict of interest, Lumigent appeared to have a market-transforming product that could stand on its own.

According to Lumigent, the software already in the marketplace was severely underpowered; many companies simply relied on spreadsheets and their own knowledge to create lighting proposals. What Lumigent offers is software that makes lighting specifications and report-generation quick and easy so that building owners can more

easily understand the benefits of implementing an energy-efficient lighting and controls project.

AN ‘AHA’ MOMENT Before Lumigent officially became its own company, Skip Pasternak, the founder of both Aelux and Lumigent, spent six years developing this software for Aelux. Slowly he realized it could be its own entity. The software began as a simple, Web-based audit collection platform that morphed into a comgbdmagazine.com

TRENDSETTERS

PHOTOS: SEAN ALLGOOD, AELUX (THIS PAGE)

prehensive “audit-to-proposal” program with analysis that includes a description of product specs, proposed retrofits for each area, and the corresponding impact on energy reduction, cost savings, subsidies, and tax benefits.

“At the risk of sounding boastful,” Pasternak says, “we were frequently told by customers that our proposals were the best they’d seen, with an ability to translate extensive data points into an easy-to-understand format. That was our ‘aha’ moment.” With the market potential for energy-efficient retrofits being as vast as it was, Pasternak and his team spent much of 2010 and 2011 making the software scalable for commercial deployment so that other stakeholders in the renovation or retrofit market could benefit from their experience.

Lumigent is product agnostic, offering only the best, vetted lighting solutions and technologies available. Because lighting is at times the “low-hanging fruit” in green buildings, many of the technological advancements have happened at breakneck speed.

Staying an expert in the field can prove to be time-consuming and costly, but Lumigent strives to turn its clients into instant experts.

AN ALL-POWERFUL PROGRAM Aelux needed something that could take audit information and give back a sophisticated output quickly as salespeople were spending most of their time crafting proposals. After investing more than a million dollars into the project that would become Lumigent’s raison d’être, the team created an interface that allowed salespeople or companies to input audit data, take a handful of gb&d

pictures, and then let the program do the heavy lifting. The program translates that basic information and generates a proposal that includes rebates from local utilities, product pricing, and labor costs.

In lighting projects, especially retrofits, the cost of waiting can be immense, so by streamlining this process and saving time for client companies, Lumigent can produce a significant and instant payback.

Lumigent is looking beyond its software. By breaking off the whole Aelux backroom, it brought its staff, expertise, and processes so that now even Aelux is a client of Lumigent. In addition to the software, Lumigent is offering services in packages or à la carte in order to serve a variety of markets.

That could mean Lumigent takes care of rebate paperwork or goes so far as taking on the rebate risk itself and reducing the project cost off the top. Or Lumigent may help coordinate installation or even perform the initial audit.

By offering such diverse services, Lumigent is hoping to attract a wide range of clients, from electrical distributors who want to keep a local contractor base without needing to have a specialized department to big energy-service companies that have their own internal lighting departments but struggle with keeping up on indus-

ABOVE Lumigent’s methodology and software were used during the lighting retrofit of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.

“At the risk of sounding boastful, we were frequently told by customers that our proposals were the best they’d seen, with an ability to translate extensive data points into an easy-to-understand format.”

SKIP PASTERNAK, LUMIGENT

try changes and trends. Lumigent also sees the possibility of helping companies with large portfolios where facilities managers can be trained on how to enter audits using the system in a sort of Lighting 101 training.

AN UNKNOWN SOLUTION “We had built the software for ourselves,” says Emily Schapira, Aelux’s vice president of marketing and business development, “and we realized this was simply good software that lots of people could use, so we put it into the marketplace.” That software is constantly being refined and updated. In the coming months, a tablet version of the application will take the cloud-based software offline in the event that sites aren’t equipped with reliable networks. Although Lumigent continues to grow and expand on its core concept, it is still looking to carve out its niche.

It had a presence at 2013’s Lightfair, but hopes to create a bigger splash this year.

“Frankly, we have a solution not everyone knows they need,” Schapira says. “They know they have this problem, but they don’t know how to solve it, so they just look for the traditional, cumbersome solutions. We’re putting something into the marketplace that people don’t even know to search for.” When companies finally look for the answer to their lighting problem, Lumigent will be there to light the way. gb&d march–april 2014

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The magazine for today’s leading green professional.

Publishing the most cutting-edge projects, programs, and products on the market.

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

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

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WORKPLACES

46 Power and Light

A former Nova Scotia power plant becomes a LEED Platinum landmark

52 Schneider Works Smarter

Leggat McCall Properties opts for a client’s own energy solutions

54 From Operating Rooms to

Offices

The CFA Institute uses the bones of a historic hospital for its new home

56 Making Georgia Bloom

Super-Sod consolidates offices and demonstrates desert technologies

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GREEN T YPOLOGIES WORKPL ACES

GREEN T YPOLOGIES

Nova Scotia Power and WZMH Architects team up for a LEED Platinum headquarters that connects the Canadian utility to its customers and city

PHOTO: GREG RICHARDSON

By Christopher James Palafox

WZMH Architects opened up this Nova Scotia office building by sawing windows into the faรงade and creating access points along the harbor for employees.

POWER AND LIGHT

PROJECT LOCATION Halifax, Nova Scotia Size 129,000 ft2 Completed 2011 Program Office space, cafeteria, conference center Awards Canadian Urban Institute– Canadian Brownfield Sites, 2013 Award of Excellence in Project Development, Building Scale; SAB Magazine Canadian Green Building Award, 2013; Nova Scotia Lieutenant Governor’s Design Awards Medal of Excellence, 2012

TEAM ARCHITECT WZMH Architects Associate Architect Fowler Bauld & Mitchell Client Nova Scotia Power Project Manager Aecon Buildings Atlantic Structural Engineer B MR Structural Engineering Mechanical & Electrical Engineer M&R Engineering

GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Platinum Site Adaptive reuse of existing building Waste 87% demolition reused Water R ainwater collection, heat pumps use water from harbor for heating and cooling Energy Chilled-beam system, daylighting and daylight sensors, deep seawater cooling, titanium heat exchangers Air Demand-control ventilation Landscape A dds an access point adjacent to Halifax harbor

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A

s a public utility provider, Nova Scotia Power is acutely aware of the value of energy. And because executives felt a responsibility to promote sustainable practices when constructing the company’s new offices, plans were hatched for a new headquarters in Halifax that could serve as a symbol of energy conservation and also bolster its relationship with customers, employees, and surroundings.

The company hired WZMH Architects and in fall 2011 completed the project, which became the first building in Atlantic Canada to achieve LEED Platinum certification. Interestingly, the new office repurposes a derelict power plant that dates back to 1902. Closed since the 1970s, the building’s adaptive reuse serves as a reminder of the past while gesturing toward the future.

WZMH was charged with adapting the space without introducing any volume outside the building, and it did so while

retaining many of the existing elements.

“The open structure inside the building created a wonderful space with its exposed steel cage,” says Carl Blanchaer, a design principal at WZMH. “We didn’t want to lose that character.” To preserve the aesthetic, the design team kept the fundamental structural frame within the building intact, allowing for atrium and galleria spaces to be created. The six-story glazed entrance creates sightlines all the way through to Halifax Harbour, even granting direct access to the harbor boardwalk. The harbor itself plays a role; below the building, pipes bring cool seawater into a heat exchanger that powers the building’s mechanical chilled-beam system.

WZMH also freed the former power plant from its windowless existence by sawing into the building’s nearly impervious concrete shell. These new openings

“The open structure inside the building created a wonderful space with its exposed steel cage.

We didn’t want to lose that character.”

CARL BLANCHAER, WZMH ARCHITECTS

The power plant circa 1960

gbdmagazine.com

PHOTOS: GREG RICHARDSON (THIS PAGE); TOM ARBAN (OPPOSITE)

GREEN T YPOLOGIES WORKPL ACES

The former power plant’s structural steel skeleton was preserved in order to maintain an industrial aesthetic and reduce materials use.

GREEN T YPOLOGIES WORKPL ACES

“Nova Scotia Power wanted to make the building accessible. They didn’t want to be a utility company that wasn’t approachable.”

HARRISON CHAN, WZMH ARCHITECTS

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ABOVE Social spaces flank the atrium of Nova Scotia Power’s offices. Places of respite near entrances and stairs help encourage interaction between colleagues.

BELOW A north-south section diagram of the former power plant shows the five-story height of the office building’s main atrium.

PHOTOS: TOM ARBAN

permit 75 percent of the workspaces to be daylit, increasing transparency and creating a healthful place to work.

Daylight sensors help regulate power consumption, and a high-performance clear curtainwall wraps the structure to insulate the building without obscuring views. To ensure the best air quality, demand-control ventilation was used for the HVAC systems.

Around the atrium, WZMH introduced social spaces. Every floor adjacent to the atrium contains an oasis area where people can gather, get coffee, and interact with one another. Inter-floor stairs adjacent to those respite spots encourage employees to walk between floors rather than taking elevators and take part in these casual encounters.

Meeting rooms are grouped around these spaces.

By including entrances for the public on both the street and boardwalk sides of the building, the utility company hopes to create stronger connections with the larger context of its surroundings.

“Nova Scotia Power wanted to make the building accessible,” says Harrison Chan, another principal at WZMH. “They didn’t want to be a utility company that wasn’t approachable.” This receptiveness to the public even extends to the company’s cafeteria—it’s open to everyone. gb&d

gbdmagazine.com

This oculus is one of many features that helps bring daylight to 75% of the workspaces. An exterior curtainwall opens up the building and provides views of the outdoors.

GREEN T YPOLOGIES WORKPL ACES

SCHNEIDER WORKS SMARTER

DETAILS

By Julie Schaeffer

Most companies don’t have the opportunity to use their own products to construct their offices, but Schneider Electric is one of the exceptions. When the $30.8 billion Paris-based energy management company constructed a new global research and development center in Andover, Massachusetts, it populated the building with its building-technology products.

Below, Bill Gause, executive vice president and partner of Leggat McCall Properties, the private real-estate company that worked with Schneider Electric on the buildout, shares the inner workings of making the client a part of the build.

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gb&d: How did Leggat McCall become a part of this project?

Bill Gause: We acquired two foreclosed buildings from a lender in July 2010. One of them had tenants, but the other, which included about 160,000 square feet of space, was empty. As we went about the leasing process, we came into contact with Schneider Electric, which was looking to consolidate and relocate a number of its research and development operations in eastern Massachusetts into a new facility. The company settled on our building with the understanding that they’d be able to expand it by approximately 80,000 square feet to

meet the needs of its growing workforce. gb&d: Did Schneider Electric specify anything in particular for the project buildout?

Gause: Schneider Electric is at the forefront of the building-technology business and is focused on making energy safe, reliable, efficient, productive, and green. It is a global company that offers integrated solutions across multiple market segments, including non-residential building, utilities and infrastructure, industries and machines manufacturers, and data centers and networks to help its customers make the most of their energy. Over the past several years, Schneider Electric acquired several companies throughout Massachusetts and wanted to consolidate all of the companies’ business units and employees into one facility. With this consolidation, Schneider Electric is fostering more cross-discipline integration of its technology and creating a

new, world-class research and development laboratory and a “StruxureLab,” where it tests and validates its solutions.

The new building will reflect the company’s technological sophistication by incorporating its own energy-efficient products and solutions into the facility’s design, which will reduce energy use and operational costs in the long run. gb&d: Did the client ask you to incorporate the use of those technologies in the new complex or was it something you chose to do as the building owner?

Gause: We built the core and shell of the new building, and Schneider Electric took over from there. Schneider Electric did use many of its gbdmagazine.com

PORTRAIT: ALYSE GAUSE

Leggat McCall Properties unveils a cutting-edge R&D facility filled with Schneider Electric’s own energymanagement solutions

LOCATION Andover, MA Size 235,900 ft2 (158,600 ft2 renovation, 77,300 ft2 new construction) Completed 2013 Architect Perkins+Will Developer Leggat McCall Properties Client Schneider Electric

GREEN T YPOLOGIES

We Build...

W GREEN. “With [Schneider’s] SmartStruxure solution, the entire building, from heating and air-conditioning to security, will be controlled from a computer at one central location.” BILL GAUSE, LEGGAT MCCALL PROPERTIES

own products in its buildout, including its SmartStruxure solution, which maximizes building efficiency and reduces operating costs by delivering integrated building information, real-time data from building systems, trend visualizations and other information that enables the company to effectively monitor, measure and optimize the building’s performance through its life cycle. With the SmartStruxure solution, the entire building, from heating and air-conditioning to security, will be controlled from a computer at one central location. The solution also facilitates the exchange and analysis of data from different building systems, including energy, lighting, and fire safety. The facility includes Square D by Schneider Electric electrical switchgear, Juno Lighting Group by Schneider Electric lighting fixtures, and several other Schneider Electric products and solutions. gb&d: How did you incorporate sustainability into your portion of the project?

Gause: The building had to be designed in accordance with a relatively new stretch energy code mandated by Andover. That code requires a building to consume 20 percent less energy than a traditional building. So we looked at everything from the HVAC system to the glass load on the perimeter. We incorporated a chilled beam cooling system, which involves gb&d

significantly higher up-front costs but substantially lower operating costs that lead to a payback over time. Materials, such as paints and carpets, are all low-VOC. All of the materials we used, from steel to gypsum, has a recycled component, and materials were sourced locally to the extent they were available locally. Daylighting—along with a design that places workstations on the perimeter—reduce the energy load from lighting. Occupancy sensors mitigate the extensive use of electricity when people aren’t present. There are also electric-car charging stations, another Schneider Electric product, at the site. gb&d: What were some of the challenges you faced with this building?

Gause: The site is relatively tight, shoehorned in between a number of wetlands, so we went through an extensive permitting process with the local conservation commission, and we were careful to make sure there was no impact on the surrounding wetlands. Otherwise it went smoothly, thanks in part to a collaborative effort between Leggat McCall Properties, Schneider Electric, and the design team at Perkins+Will.

For example, we made a conscious decision to use Perkins+Will—which Schneider Electric was using for the fitting out of the interior—for our work on the base building. We felt that would minimize any conflicts. gb&d

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GREEN T YPOLOGIES WORKPL ACES

FROM OPERATING ROOMS TO OFFICES CFA Institute makes its home in a triple-landmarked Charlottesville hospital

By Lindsey Howald Patton

There’s an old joke that goes like this: How many Virginians does it take to change a light bulb? The answer is four: one to screw in the bulb and three to stand around talking about how good the old one was. So it’s appropriate that, when seeking a Charlottesville, Virginia, base to bring together about 450 area employees, the CFA Institute decided to make its home inside the earliest surviving building on the former Martha Jefferson Hospital campus.

MOVING INTO A HOSPITAL Martha Jefferson Hospital was founded in 1903 by a group of seven physicians.

They built their hospital on East High Street, forging a relationship with the surrounding residential community that would continue as the hospital flourished and grew. The Patterson Building on Locust Street was built in 1929 to serve as Martha Jefferson’s new headquarters, and the hospital eventually expanded to about eight acres and nearly 300,000 square feet. Until a few years ago, the hospital’s day shift alone brought around 850 employees to the neighborhood, plus an estimated 1,000 visitors and patients a day.

The hospital recently relocated to a brand new facility east of Charlottesville, and it was announced that a new tenant would be moving into the old Patterson Building. CFA Institute, a nonprofit professional organization for the investment industry, would occupy Patterson’s 28,000 square feet and a larger 116,000-square-foot 1970s-era wing on the south side of the campus.

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plus side, projects like these allow an opKEEPING HISTORY ALIVE portunity for the careful, satisfying work The Patterson Building is a historic of reclamation. Original terrazzo and landmark three times over. It’s situated hardwood flooring, finishes, nine-foot in the Martha Jefferson Historic District and protected by state and federal ceilings, and plasterwork on the walls landmark designations. The structure were revealed and repaired, and original is a sturdy, no-nonsense building with single-pane windows were sent just 50 common-bond brick, a double chimney, miles away for refurbishing and setting and an asphalt shingle roof. back into spaces they had occupied for Guy Williams, head of finance and nearly a century. risk management at CFA Institute, says More freedom could be exercised with that the board of governors for CFA Inthe non-landmark South Wing, which stitute was in favor of the adaptive reuse was skinned and gutted to adapt to a and the positive impact it would have more efficient, natural light-friendly on the community. “It was an extremely office layout. For comparison, one of pleasant experience, from my perspecthe former office spaces used by CFA tive, to present to the board all of the Institute—it was leasing four in the area various alternatives and have them overfor its employees before this—was built whelmingly support this,” Williams says. in 1999, but the South Wing still has 40 The project, however, was not without its percent more natural light flowing in challenges. through new transom windows, glassThe contractor, Whiting-Turner rimmed cubicles, and glass walls for Contracting Company, says the chalinterior offices. lenges consisted of what you’d find with any historic building—the surprises you ADAPTING FOR THE FUTURE just can’t account for until you start Not only did CFA Institute face the digging in. Many floors had non-adherchallenges associated with adapting a ing fireproofing, historic space, but it also did it some retaining in accordance with LEED Gold walls weren’t up certification standards. Some to standard, floors of the major green initiatives were found to be involve the mitigation of waless operating energy than uneven. But on the ter, sewer, and power in-house.

22%

a comparable building due to optimized building systems and solar panels

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GREEN T YPOLOGIES

“On top of the fact that we’ll be using TOP When completed in 2014, CFA Institute’s less water than the hospital required, offices will be daylit we’re putting in a greywater reuse and feature highly system,” Williams says. By diverting sink efficient mechanical and shower water and the condensation systems and solar off of the HVAC system for lavatory flushpanels. ing, the system curbs the organization’s BOTTOM Because intake of public water by 70 percent it kept the bones of while reducing sewage discharge by 30 the Martha Jefferson percent. Solar panels, located on the roof Hospital, CFA Institute and invisible from the ground to comply with regulations against interfering with was able to use less construction materials. the historic façade, will allow the office to run on 22 percent less energy than a building of similar program and size, and solar hot-water tubes will further reduce energy load and carbon emissions.

The end result? It’s impossible to list just one payoff. Williams and the rest of CFA Institute are thrilled to be the new neighbor on the block who preserves, rather than disrupts, the fabric of the surrounding historic community. The residents, the sound of ambulance sirens fading from their DETAILS minds, have welcomed these LOCATION Charlottesville, VA quiet, 8-to-5 commuters with Size 144,000 ft2 open arms. Construction and Completed 2014 (expected) use of the building put far less Certification L EED Gold strain on the environment (expected) than a new building without Architect B askervill green technologies, and state Client CFA Institute and federal subsidies and tax General Contractor Whitingcredits for green building and Turner Contracting Company historic preservation made Owners Representative JM the project cost effective. Use Zell Partners of the municipal water and Legal Representative Steven sewer system plummets, and Blaine, LeClairRyan Virginians get to enjoy this Property & Move good old space for many more Management CBRE years to come. gb&d gb&d

CONGRATULATIONS CFA :: LEED® Certified

:: 915 East High Street :: Charlottesville, VA

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GREEN T YPOLOGIES WORKPL ACES

MAKING GEORGIA BLOOM Super-Sod demonstrates desert water technologies and its own sustainable systems at the company’s new Georgia location

By Tina Vasquez

W

hen Ben Copeland Jr. returned home from studying water use on an agricultural trade mission trip to Israel with the Georgia Department of Agriculture, the Super-Sod vice president knew it was time for rural Georgia to get green—and it couldn’t have come at a more perfect time. Based in Ft. Valley, Georgia, Super-Sod, famous for its turfgrass sod and seed, had been operating out of two small offices that were 20 miles apart. After undergoing some internal restructuring, it decided to combine the two offices, but neither space was large enough to house all of the employees. It made the most sense to start fresh.

“We wanted more than a boring office building,” Copeland says.

“We wanted our new office to reflect who we were as a company, and we wanted it to showcase what we do. On my trip to Israel, I learned so much about blending new and old technology together to maximize water use. I started to think about how for thousands of years people have been able to make the desert bloom with limited water resources through the use of rudimentary technology like cisterns, yet here in Georgia, where

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we experience plenty of rainfall even in a ‘dry’ year, we weren’t really being good stewards of our resources. Our new office is a step in the right direction.”

With Super-Sod’s new headquarters, sustainable landscaping is key. One of the building’s most important features is its butterfly roof, which captures more rainwater than a traditional gabled roof.

Super-Sod invested in an ECO-MAT Subsurface Drip Irrigation system

by Hunter, an extremely efficient way to water the company’s many product displays around the perimeter of the office. Not only does it use less energy, but it also cuts down on evaporation and, according to Copeland, is like “injecting water directly into the plant.”

The company spent just $400 on a new technology that has already paid for itself: the ETwater HermitCrab, an irrigation controller that uses internet-based technology to determine when, how, and for how long plants should be watered.

“The HermitCrab system is amazing because it only provides the exact amount of water the plant will need,” Copeland says. “It can save up to 50 percent water savings of a regular irrigation system, and it doesn’t require that you redo your entire system.” Of course Copeland also ensured that the new office space featured two cisterns;

DETAILS LOCATION Fort Valley, GA Size 3,000 ft2 Cost $110 per ft2 Completed 2013 Owner P atten Seed Company / Super-Sod Architect W illiam Stanford, II General Contractor Affinity Building Systems

“People literally stop by to check out the building.

It’s so much more than what we were trying to do; this building has become more than just an office space.”

BEN COPELAND JR., SUPER-SOD gbdmagazine.com

GREEN T YPOLOGIES

the one aboveground holds 9,400 gallons of water and the one belowground holds 7,600 gallons.

Water use was the starting point, but Super-Sod also capitalized on the Georgia sunlight by adding as many windows as possible and purchased energy-efficient fans from Big Ass Fans, a choice that drastically reduced the building’s energy use. According to gb&d

ABOVE The new Super-Sod building features a 9,000-gallon above-ground cistern that irrigates its sod plots and Drivable Grass permeable pavers.

Copeland, at the height of summer Super-Sod’s most expensive energy bill was $250. At just one of its former offices, half the size of their current one, energy bills easily could reach $400. The building also features spray-foam insulation, and local, renewable wood was used for flooring, walls, and ceilings.

“Our new office is sustainable, but more than that, it’s education-

al,” Copeland says. “We stick out because our building is so different than every other building in rural Georgia. People literally stop by to check out the building, and while they’re here, they can learn about the new and old technology being used. It’s so much more than what we were trying to do; this building has become more than just an office space.” gb&d march–april 2014

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

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

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60 New Beginnings in New Jersey

A sign of life blooms on the forgotten west side of Asbury Park

65 Inside a Portland EcoDistrict

Hassalo on Eighth will replace a parking lot with live/work space

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INNER WORKINGS

Springwood Center Blight, degradation, and a deep cultural rift have defined the west side of Asbury Park, New Jersey, for the past 40 years, but the first commercial building to go up on the west side since 1972 represents the area’s road to renewal

Asbury Park, New Jersey, literally exists as a city divided. The North Jersey Coast Line, a commuter rail line that leads to New York City only 60 miles away, runs right down the middle of the city, dividing it into east and west sides. In its heyday, the east side was known for its prime beachfront while its west side was characterized by Springwood Avenue, a street known for its lively nightclubs and music scene. But rioting in the early 1970s brought Asbury Park’s cultural life to a startling halt, and the west side was hit particularly hard. “From 1973 until 2011, not a single permit was pulled for a new commercial building on that side of the city,” says Stephen J. Carlidge, principal at Shore Point Architecture. Which is part of what makes Springwood Center, located at 1201 Springwood Avenue, a groundbreaking project. It is the first building to go up under Asbury Park’s ambitious west side redevelopment plan, and it represents not only the city’s commitment to improving the community, but also the unique steps it’s willing to take in order to get there.

By Kathryn Freeman Rathbone

PROJECT

GREEN

LOCATION Asbury Park, NJ Size 27,500 ft2 Completed 2 012 Program Mixed-use building with residential and retail space Awards AIA New Jersey Merit Award for Excellence in Architecture, 2012; Monmouth County Exemplary Planning Award, 2012; SARA Design Award of Merit, 2012

CERTIFICATION Not applicable Materials No-VOC paint, bamboo flooring, soy-based blown-in insulation Water L ow-flow plumbing fixtures Lighting High-performance window glazings, operable windows, motion and daylight-override sensors

MULTIPLE OWNERS Springwood

Center sits on an urban brownfield site that was once home to an underground oil storage tank. With the help of capital taken from the New Jersey Hazardous Discharge Site Remediation Fund, Asbury Park cleaned up the land so that it met EPA clean-lot standards. Interfaith Neighbors, a local nonprofit that is working to regenerate the area, bought the site from the city for next to nothing. “Springwood Center actually sits on three adjacent city lots,” Carlidge says. “Asbury Park sold them to Interfaith Neighbors for one dollar.”

Asbury Park and Interfaith Neighbors co-own the three-story building: Asbury Park owns the second floor, Interfaith Neighbors owns the third, and the two stakeholders co-own the ground floor.

TEAM ARCHITECT Shore Point Architecture Developer Interfaith Neighbors Contractor Benjamin R. Harvey Company

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PHOTOS: JEFFREY TOTARO

RIGHT The building’s placement and exterior design are intended to make a statement about positive change for Asbury Park, NJ.

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Contemporary materials such as glass, iron, and concrete enliven an otherwise blighted street corner. Ground-floor retail and bike racks make the building publicly accessible.

A nearly transparent building inside and out, Springwood Center’s high-performance windows bring in daylight while sensors shut off electric lighting when possible.

INNER WORKINGS

CONTEMPORARY MATERIALS “We wanted to make a big splash on a

small budget,” Carlidge says of Springwood Center’s looks. In order to drive pedestrian traffic and streetscape interest, the architect sited the building hard on the corner and finished it in glass, corrugated iron, concrete block, and HardiePanel, a fiber cement siding. Working together, the materials not only help Springwood Center fit into its industrial context, but they also make the building look extremely contemporary. “We wanted to make people stop and look,” Carlidge says of his material palette and form choices.

And the spire? Even though Asbury Park limits new construction to a 30-foot vertical height, the city building code allows for spires. Carlidge added one for extra visual oomph.

RIGHT The façade is made of steel and polished concrete to achieve a textured look.

OPPOSITE The second floor senior center has an outdoor terrace that can be seen from the front as part of the architectural cutout in the façade.

PHOTOS: JEFFREY TOTARO

SECOND FLOOR 1 SENIOR CENTER LOBBY 2 OUTDOOR TERRACE 3 COMMUNITY ROOM 4 ADMINISTRATION OFFICES 5 ART STUDIO 6 TECHNOLOGY LAB 7 KITCHEN

GUEST EDITOR LARRY KEARNS This is a case where a single multipurpose building proves to be greater than the sum of three otherwise individual projects.

Having the corner animated is a continual invitation to extend the rebirth further into the neighborhood.

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SUNLIGHT AND SHADE

A UNIQUE INCUBATOR

pringwood Center’s design incorporates S smart, low-key green features that boost the building’s sustainability, starting with the roof. “We canted the top of the building seven degrees so that it slopes away from the building on the south and the east,” Carlidge says. This design move turns the roof into a canopy that helps shade the building, reducing heating and cooling needs. The roof is also structured for a solar array, and Interfaith Neighbors hopes to add one once it has the funding.

Inside, the building features bamboo floors, no-VOC paints, Energy Star appliances, soy-based blown-in insulation, and high-performance glazing on its windows, all of which are operable. Carlidge paid extra attention to the lighting, installing motion and daylight override sensors inside and outside. If a room is unoccupied, the lights go off, and if the sun is shining, the building’s lights adjust to cut down on artificial light output and energy consumption.

Springwood Center’s program is unique.

On the first floor, a police substation abuts other retail spaces, Asbury Park’s new senior center occupies the entire second floor, and up on the third floor, eight families rent out affordable housing units managed by Interfaith Neighbors. The mixed uses, although unusual, have so far proved an incredible success. “The housing units are occupied, and the public spaces are always busy,” Carlidge says. “The senior center especially—many people come in the morning and eat their three meals here. They stay the whole day.” Interfaith runs two booming businesses geared toward community prosperity on the first floor. In one space, a business incubator teaches Asbury Park residents how to start and run small businesses. In the space next door, Interfaith runs a culinary and restaurant training program, where local teenagers learn how to work in front-ofhouse and back-of-house positions. Each program lasts 16 weeks, and employment is guaranteed with successful completion. gb&d

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INNER WORKINGS

Hassalo on Eighth GBD Architects transforms a surface parking lot into a thriving EcoDistrict for 1,000 lucky Portlandians

Hassalo on Eighth is the ultimate revenge of the pedestrian.

The project, which broke ground in 2013 and is slated for completion in early 2015, is a multibuilding development of apartments, retail, and offices that largely replaces a parking lot in central Portland, Oregon. Its vision, using the language of a framework developed in Portland, is for an EcoDistrict, which “focuses on the neighborhood rather than the building,” says Kyle Andersen, a principal at GBD Architects. The development—three new buildings and a renovated office—is targeting Platinum certifications under both LEED-NC and LEED-ND ratings and successful implementation of EcoDistrict ideals. By Russ Klettke

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DESIGNING COMMUNITY The EcoDistrict idea places emphasis on liva-

bility, a value seen in Hassalo’s location amidst a cluster of office buildings while adjoining an established residential neighborhood. Andersen and his team chose to design smaller, more affordable apartments, informed by similar housing in Toronto and Manhattan. With 25,000 jobs in the walkable vicinity, the population influx will support new retail development, including a grocery store. Developers also hope to attract edgier, locally owned shopkeepers to contribute to neighborhood character. “This project takes advantage of all that exists there today to develop a vibrant, diverse community propagated by sustainability,” Andersen says.

he EcoDistrict started T in Portland as part of the Portland Sustainability Institute. In addition to the four planned in Portland, EcoDistricts are being built in Austin, TX; Boston; Seattle; San Francisco; and Washington, DC.

RETROFITS AND REDUCTIONS Each building will use a high-performing enve-

lope to reduce energy consumption by 30 percent when compared to similar buildings, and Andersen says that the retrofit of the 1970s-era office building will reduce its energy use by up to 50 percent. An efficient mechanical system and a water loop capitalizes on synergistic heating and cooling for the retail spaces, and solar-thermal cells on one of the new apartment buildings will preheat domestic water.

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INNER WORKINGS Hassalo on Eighth

“This project takes advantage of all that exists there today to develop a vibrant, diverse community propagated by sustainability.”

Kyle Andersen, GBD Architects

WATER AND WASTE

TRANSIT OPTIONS

PROJECT

Hassalo takes water conservation to a rare level.

The only concern raised in planning the develop-

The development largely replaces non-absorbent surface parking with a storm-water system that uses an open-air cistern, incidentally demonstrating the natural ebbs and flows of seasons, and vegetated roofs and bioswales also treat runoff.

Taking it further, a daily output of 60,000 gallons of greywater and blackwater will be treated onsite with a living machine system composed of three parts: an anaerobic tank, above-grade tidal cells (aerobic treatment via plants), and ultraviolet light exposure. The resulting Level 4 Class A standard water will be reused for landscaping, cooling tower replenishment, and toilets, with excess water going to the aquifer through state-permitted, on-site dry wells.

ment was the potential influx of traffic. But 1,200 new parking spaces will be built underground— remember, this is still a business district—and car-sharing companies, bicycle parking (required

by Portland zoning), and access to mass transit are abundant. “We have a bike hub in the lower level of the existing office building,” Andersen says. “Think of this more as a bike valet—you can leave your bike there for repairs and pick it up after work.”

LOCATION Portland, OR Size 592,616 ft2 (housing), 59,287 ft2 (retail), 271,000 ft2 (office) Completion 2015 (expected) Program Urban district with housing, retail, and office space

BELOW When completed, the district will have 657 apartments available for rent, bringing people to live in the area.

BELOW RIGHT The plan shows the four Hassalo on Eighth blocks with the existing office space in the northwest corner.

TEAM ARCHITECT GBD Architects Developer American Assets Trust Civil Engineer H HPR Structural Engineer KPFF Consulting Engineers Mechanical/Electrical Engineer Glumac General Contractor Turner Construction

SENSE OF PLACE

To the uninformed newcomer, few of these benefits are immediately apparent. What matters, Andersen says, is “to focus on the first 30 feet of the project.” By this he means the close vicinity of what the pedestrians really see, noticing what’s immediately forward and back, up and down. That includes the canopies and entry walls of retail establishments and residential structures. The design team also is installing a gardened public plaza where people can gather, rest, or recharge in the outdoors. The orientation of the district provides for vehicular and active transport, facilitating full integration with the rest of the city—a city that has three additional EcoDistricts planned. gb&d

GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED-NC Platinum (expected), LEED-ND Platinum (expected) Materials Brick, metal paneling, wood cladding Windows Aluminum-clad wood windows, thermally broken punched window system Energy Solar thermal preheats residential domestic water Water Rainwater capture and reuse with vegetation, cisterns, and bioswales Wastewater Greywater and blackwater treated by Living Machine NE MULTNOMAH ST

NE NINTH AVE

NE SEVENTH AVE NE HOLLADAY ST

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

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

gb&d

68 2020 Vision

Princeton University’s ongoing building projects bring a dream team to campus as it works to reduce emissions to 1990 levels by 2020

76 Safe Havens and Gathering

Places

Quatro Design Group’s Javier Molina draws on his experience as a workingclass Latino to design two new sustainable schools

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2020 VISION Princeton University is on track to reduce its emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. With three major building projects in progress—led by Tod Williams, Steven Holl, and other renowned architects—sustainable design is renewing the university’s legacy as it steps into the future.

BY C H R I S TO P H E R J A M ES PA L A F OX

RENDERINGS: DBOX, STUDIO MA, STEVEN HOLL ARCHITECTS

FEATURES

FROM TOP Princeton’s Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment, designed by Tod Williams, will be completed in 2015.

Studio Ma’s Lakeside Graduate Housing will open this year. And the Lewis Center for the Arts, by Steven Holl’s office, is expected to be completed in 2017.

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Thirty years before the Declaration of Independence was signed, Princeton University was chartered in Elizabeth, New Jersey, making it the country’s fourth-oldest college. Yet even with this rich history, Princeton has little desire to return to the past; the sustainability plan it established in 2008 looks consistently toward the future, except in one area—carbon emissions. Princeton plans to reduce its emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, despite significant growth in the past decade and a half.

All signs point toward the school succeeding in its goal, in part due to the world-renowned talent the school has assembled to help.

Princeton’s pedigree as a leader in the sciences—35 Nobel Laureates and 20 National Medal of Science winners are associated with the school—has helped place it at the forefront of green building.

With the introduction of the 2008 sustainability plan, Princeton set its sights on reducing annual carbon emissions by 17 percent, from 114,700 metric tons to just 95,000 metric tons. Steering clear of shortsighted carbon offsets, the school is deploying an aggressive program based on the reduction of greenhouse gases, resource conservation, active education, and civic engagement, driving emissions reduction plans on its own terms.

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FEATURES Princeton University

P R I N C E T O N ’ S V I S I O N A R I E S

Michael Van Valkenburgh Title President & CEO At Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates Based New York City Working On Princeton Campus Master Plan Known For B rooklyn Bridge Park and Teardrop Park in New York City

inspired design, and Princeton has hired renowned architectural talent, including such respected studios as Steven Holl Architects, Studio Ma, and Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects (TWBTA), to bring its plans to life and help shape the campus of 2020.

ROOTING RESEARCH On the campus’s northeastern edge, at the corner of Olden Street and Prospect Avenue, construction is under way on the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment, which will use LEED Silver standards as its benchmark. The center is designed by TWBTA and sited

“THIS WAS AN AREA IN GREAT NEED—IT FELT LIKE THE MOST PEDESTRIAN OF BUILDINGS AND THE WORST OF LANDSCAPES.” Tod Williams, Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects

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next to the existing Engineering Quad. Founded in 2008 through a $100 million gift from international business leader Gerhard Andlinger, the center will house research and teaching areas meant to advance areas of sustainable energy development, energy conservation, and environmental protection and remediation.

“I went to Princeton for many reasons,” Williams says, “one being that it was a beautiful campus. Its landscape is as beautiful as its buildings.

That’s true throughout the campus, but it’s less true by the engineering buildings.

This was an area in great need—I was always upset about the way the buildings interfaced with the campus, and it felt like the most pedestrian of buildings and the worst of landscapes.”

In order to breathe life into this neglected corner, the concept of a garden entrance was created in tandem with Princeton’s landscape architect, Michael Van Valkenburgh.

The goal is to beautify the campus, provide shade, and most importantly, produce clean, fresh air. It accomplishes this with a more open design meant to remedy the Engineering Quad’s closed-off layout, which had been built as a series of double-loaded corridors for the sake of efficiency. Instead of focusing only on functional requirements, the new program offers a respite for researchers and students by encourag-

DETAILS PROJECT Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment Size 129,000 ft2 Completed 2015 (expected) Architect T od Williams Billie Tsien Architects Landscape Architect Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates General Contractor Sciame Energy Cascading air plenum system, high exhaust towers Water Cascading closed-loop chilled-water system, rainwater storage for plumbing Landscape Public plaza and garden, extensive vegetation cleans air

RENDERINGS: DBOX

“Princeton doesn’t just follow LEED regulations; they feel that they have—and I think they actually do have—a vision that goes beyond it,” says architect Tod Williams, a Princeton alumnus who leads a New York-based design firm with his wife, Billie Tsien.

“They are not interested in deploying green strategies that yield little return.”

Shouldering the needs of a 500-acre main campus that holds 180 buildings, 7,900 students, and 6,000 employees, Princeton’s potential for environmental leadership is great, and in 1996 it installed a cogeneration facility, laying the foundation for further transformative steps. Nine years later, the university added a 2.6 million-gallon chilled-water storage tank, which gave the campus one of the nation’s most efficient and cost-effective central power facilities.

Reaching its 1990 emissions levels while creating modern learning spaces, however, requires not only cutting-edge technology but also

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FEATURES

ABOVE The Andlinger Center’s entrance doubles as a garden and gathering space. Laboratory facilities are planted directly into the bedrock to reduce vibration.

LEFT Lecture halls use indirect sunlight from a large window and skylight to naturally illuminate the room and align the building’s design with the sustainable strategies being taught inside.

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Tod Williams Title Principal At Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects Based New York City Working On Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment Known For Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia and the American Folk Art Museum in New York City

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FEATURES Princeton University

ing movement through the building with attractive stairs, minimal elevators, and a promenade.

With this connection, the center relates to the campus organically. Grounding the building figuratively and literally, the facility has been lowered into the Earth, with the garden presenting its most visible visage. Williams and his team took a modest approach and aimed to highlight the spaces between the buildings more than the building itself. The garden is not meant to stand out as a disconnected oasis but to relate to Princeton’s other buildings and landscapes, creating an integrated campus.

Williams also wanted to emphasize the campus level— keeping it down to Earth. The focus is on the discourse that occurs outside the buildings and not just the extremely rarefied activities that occur inside where, like astronauts in white suits, researchers conduct experiments in ultra-filtered clean rooms disconnected from the outside world. When they’re done in the labs, they can enter the garden spaces, shedding their white coats and stepping out into the sunshine to rejoin the university culture.

The Andlinger Center created a paradoxical challenge for the architect. Despite a mission of finding ways to sustain the planet through energy conservation and other methods, the fact is that the requisite research laboratories

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Noah Yaffe Title J unior Partner At Steven Holl Architects Based New York City Working On Lewis Center for the Arts Known For K nut Hamsun Center in Hamarøy, Norway, and the Herning Museum of Contemporary Art in Herning, Denmark

are notorious energy users. In response, Princeton’s consulting engineers designed a cascading air system that could achieve the extremely clean conditions researchers need while using minimal energy.

A lab’s clean rooms, which must be free of low-level environmental pollutants such as dust, airborne microbes, or chemical vapors, are super-conditioned and filter air constantly. Instead of adjusting the air in isolated areas of the clean room, which is what’s typically done, the Andlinger Center’s clean rooms will feature a HEPA filter ceiling over the entire space, which lowers the static pressure loss. When it comes to air filtration, the recirculation of air is the largest power user in a mechanical system, so by lowering the pressure drop, Princeton was able to install lower-powered recirculation fans.

The research facility also will employ an innovative and efficient chilled-water system for dehumidification, again an important requirement of the clean room where the air must be extremely dry.

The chilled water from the central plant precools the clean room’s outside makeup air, then cools a condenser making a small amount of very cool water before returning to the plant. A similar process is applied to the air, where the fresh air consumed in the lecture hall and the other non-lab spaces is used as makeup air in the labs.

ACCESS TO THE ARTS On the opposite end of campus, southwest from the Andlinger Center, past Wilson Residential College, and down to the Princeton Dinky Station, is the site of the future Lewis Center for the Arts—another project meant to modernize and enhance the Princeton experience.

The performing arts play a distinct role and provide a unique outlet at Princeton, and Steven Holl Architects is erecting a complex that will revamp the university’s educational capabilities and demonstrate its green potential while designing a complex equivalent to LEED Silver standards.

Like the majority of Steven Holl’s projects, the 22-acre redevelopment, designed in conjunction with Beyer Blinder Belle, is a unique response to its site, even though the Dinky Station was moved 460 feet to the south in order to enhance the connection between the campus and the community. The project unifies three distinct spaces—the theater and dance building, the music building, and the Lewis Center building, which houses administrative offices and a gallery—by creating one lobby area, echoing the function of the courtyard above it.

“We really saw this as the heart of the project—arts interchanging ideas and the possibility of creating a building that people could spend a whole day and evening inside,” says Noah Yaffe, the

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Natalie Shivers Title Associate University Architect for Planning At Princeton University Based Princeton, NJ Working On Andlinger, Lewis, and Lakeside

Tom Nyquist Title Director of Engineering and Campus Energy At Princeton University Based Princeton, NJ Working On Andlinger, Lewis, and Lakeside

partner in charge at Steven Holl Architects. Students and visitors glimpse a blackbox theater, dance theater, orchestral space, gallery, and collaboration space all from the complex’s central heart, thanks to “invitation views” that use large windows to create a sense of transparency for both building inhabitants and passersby. This also seeks to spark encounters between those in different programs.

Like the majority of Princeton’s buildings, the Lewis Center will feature low-flow fixtures, but that’s just the beginning of its sustainable water plan. Rainwater captured on the roofs originally was going to be used for pond features and toilet flushing within the complex. By working closely with Van Valkenburgh and the project’s civil engineer, Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, a new strategy was devised that has all the roof catchment in the area feeding

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into the cooling towers at Princeton’s main chilled-water plant. This district plant powers the entire campus and is responsible for much of the university’s energy savings.

Rather than design the Lewis Center as an island, Steven Holl’s office integrated it into the existing infrastructural web, feeding the cogeneration plant even as the new building benefits from it.

Below the buildings, meanwhile, 140 geothermal wells will work with the building heat pumps to keep the facility well tempered, and LED lighting will illuminate even the performance spaces.

GREEN GRAD HOUSING Fostering an open and collaborative campus extends beyond education and research, and Princeton’s holistic approach also is seen in its Lakeside Graduate Housing project. Along the Dinky Station tracks that extend south from the Lewis Center is the site of the university’s future mid-rise and lowrise townhomes, which are designed to LEED Silver and LEED Gold levels, respectively.

The project, 13 structures on roughly 16 acres designed by Studio Ma, was initiated to consolidate graduate housing and foster a more cohesive campus community.

The site features existing woodland areas alongside new meadows and rain gardens, which help effectively manage storm water and improve the quality of runoff

DETAILS PROJECT Lewis Center for the Arts Size 139,000 ft2 Completed 2017 (expected) Cost $300 million (projected) Architect S teven Holl Architects General Contractor Turner Construction Energy Geothermal wells, LED lighting, daylight harvesting, highperformance envelope Water Rainwater catchment used for campus chillers

THIS PAGE The Lewis Center complex features organic forms and porous façades featuring digitally cut stone and ceramic-fritted glass walls. The project serves as a new campus gateway and captures storm water via green roofs, an underground cistern, and a pool.

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FEATURES Princeton University

PROJECT Lakeside Graduate Housing Size 382,000 ft2 Completed 2 014 (expected) Certifications Mid-rise LEED Silver (expected), low-rise LEED Gold (expected) Architect S tudio Ma Landscape Architect Hoehn Landscape Architecture MEP Engineer Dagher Engineering General Contractors W .S. Cumby and Costanza Builders Energy Geothermal heating and cooling, energy-efficient lighting and controls, Energy Star appliances Water L ow-flow fixtures, no irrigation after plant establishments

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ABOVE Princeton’s Lakeside project is a low-impact development that houses 715 graduate students and their families.

BELOW The townhomes and apartment buildings reference Princeton’s architecture but include recycled materials, rain gardens, and passive solar design.

options, considering not just initial cost, but also the annual operating expenses and environmental costs, the latter of which is determined with a “carbon tax” of $35 per metric ton of carbon dioxide.

The options under consideration had similar life-cycle costs—until the carbon tax was factored in. The result tipped the decision to the ground-source system.

20/20 VISION Princeton’s work is not done.

The school has six years to make good on its mission to reduce emissions to 95,000 metric tons and effectively turn back the clock to the year 1990. And as of 2012, Princeton had cut its emissions to 108,000 metric tons, which means the university is on target to achieve its goal.

Princeton is looking at its past, admitting it can do better, and succeeding.

Forward-thinking building designs by world-class architects are being matched with powerful systems to rise above outdated practices of yesteryear. Although time and hindsight will ultimately be the judge of Princeton’s sustainability plan, for now, the university is looking past its challenges and toward the forthcoming green campus.

Its vision is clear—2020 is just ahead. gb&d gbdmagazine.com

IMAGES: STUDIO MA

DETAILS

into the adjacent stream and lake. Further pushing Princeton’s sustainable initiatives, residents are allowed to park their cars in Lakeside’s garage but are prohibited from other campus lots, deterring students from driving to campus buildings. Instead, Lakeside will offer shuttle services and include pathways for pedestrians and cyclists.

“The site presented a wonderful opportunity to extend and connect Princeton’s campus to Lake Carnegie,” says Christiana Moss, a principal at Studio Ma. “The site plan orients buildings along view corridors that also coincide with the optimal solar orientation. Building masses are lean, tall, and vertically articulated, taking cues from the Gothic tradition of Princeton while maximizing southern exposure.”

The townhomes and apartments feature highly efficient ground-source heat pumps.

Princeton ran a life-cycle cost analysis to determine HVAC

Christiana Moss Title Principal Company Studio Ma Based Phoenix Working On Lakeside Graduate Housing Known For PRD 845 in Phoenix and Yuma Heritage Library in Yuma, AZ

Studio Ma, Architect • Image by DBOX Dattner Architects

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LEFT, OPPOSITE A playful courtyard connects Ninth Street Elementary School to the middle school and serves as a protected space in LA’s Skid Row neighborhood.

BOTTOM The Center for Math and Science at Mission College features a tilted PV array above the building’s courtyard that acts as an architectural flourish from afar.

Quatro Design Group’s Javier Molina grew up a working-class Latino in Los Angeles, an experience that has helped inform two new education projects: an ultra-efficient elementary school on Skid Row and a LEED Platinum college academic building

By Tina Vasquez

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SAFE HAVENS AND GATHERING PLACES

PHOTOS: LAWRENCE ANDERSON (MISSION COLLEGE)

FEATURES

Long before the gentrification of downtown Los Angeles, before the bars had mixologists and the boutique hotels and upscale restaurants raised rents exponentially and pushed out longtime residents and local artists, downtown was an affordable option for working-class families who made their livings sewing garments in the fashion district or selling verbena blossoms in the flower district.

Javier Molina belonged to one such family. His mother worked 12 hours a day downtown, and after school Molina would walk to where his mother worked in the fashion district and wait until they could take the bus to the bungalow home they shared with four other families. Molina’s mother made it clear to him that he would be attending college, urging him to consider the usual professions parents associate with success:

medicine, engineering, and law. Molina, however, had a knack for drawing and began to consider architecture early on. “I’d watch telenovelas after school, and there was one where the main character was an architect,” he says. “I remember thinking that if I were an architect I could have my own home.”

Once it was time for college, Molina settled on the University of Southern California, and in his very first design class, he knew he had made the right decision.

“It felt like home,” he says of architecture school. In 1996, not long after graduating from college, Molina cofounded a Los Angeles design firm with longtime friend and colleague Ricardo Rodriguez.

They named it Quatro Design Group.

A major point of focus for Quatro Design is educational projects, in part because of Molina’s past experiences.

One of Molina’s first jobs out of college was working for a firm that specialized in schools and public facilities, and he says he found the work incredibly meaningful. In 2010, things came full circle. Quatro Design

“I was raised by a single mother who struggled to make ends meet. The kids at Ninth Street Elementary could easily have been me.”

Javier Molina, Quatro Design Group

was chosen to handle the design of the Ninth Street Elementary School campus, located on the south edge of LA’s infamous Skid Row. The campus, composed exclusively of portable classrooms, had seen little improvement since it opened its doors nearly 30 years ago. Most of the temporary structures had been built to be used for no more than two years, but many were now decades old. The Los Angeles Unified School District gave the Ninth Street campus a score of 74 percent on its Facilities Condition Index.

Anything greater than 30 percent is considered critical.

When Molina and his mother would ride the bus, they would pass the intersection of Ninth Street and Towne Avenue where Ninth Street Elementary would eventually be built in 1984.

Now Molina was being given the opportunity to design a school that would serve as a safe haven for some very vulnerable children, a majority of which were homeless and living on or near Skid Row. Based on US Census figures, one in eight Los Angeles children live in extreme poverty, belonging to families march–april 2014

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FEATURES

 CENTER FOR MATH AND SCIENCE LOCATION S ylmar, CA Size 95,000 ft2 Completed 2012 Program Classrooms, instructional labs, computer labs, administrative and support spaces, student and faculty lounge areas, lecture hall, food service and café areas Awards San Fernando Valley Business Journal 2013 Sustainable Project of the Year; 2013 Design Build Institute of America Awards, Design Excellence Award and Project of the Year Award

TEAM ARCHITECT Quatro Design Group Client L os Angeles Community College District General Contractor Pankow

GREEN

PHOTO: LAWRENCE ANDERSON

CERTIFICATION LEED Platinum Site Building shades large courtyard from intense solar exposures Materials High-performance rainscreen, low-VOC and rapidly renewable materials, recycled content Water Waterless urinals, low-flow toilets, storm-water detention and retention systems Energy PV canopy Landscape High-albedo paving, drought-tolerant landscaping, efficient irrigation

LEFT Javier Molina designed the LEED Platinum academic building as two wings connected by a central atrium courtyard. A solar canopy generates energy and shades it from the intense Southern California sun, and a water feature and vining plants further cool the space.

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FEATURES Quatro Design Group

whose household income is less than half the national poverty threshold (roughly $22,000 for a family of four).

It is estimated that about 1,000 homeless children live on Skid Row, an area where drug addicts and those suffering from extreme mental health issues and chronic homelessness fall through the cracks. “I was raised by a single mother who struggled to make ends meet,” Molina says. “The kids at Ninth Street Elementary could easily have been me.”

Despite the fact that it is in areas like Skid Row where sustainable design can be the most beneficial, especially as far as classrooms are concerned, green schools are often found in affluent areas, reinforcing the common belief that green design is for the well-to-do. Molina and his firm actively push against that misconception, knowing that students living below the poverty line desperately need healthy educational environments outfitted with services that will make their lives easier.

During the planning phase, Quatro Design spent a great deal of time consulting with school officials, trying to develop a better understanding of what Ninth Street students needed. It was this effort and understanding that led to a school that goes beyond environmental sustainability. The school’s 33 new classrooms, computer lab, and library feature low-VOC, low-maintenance, rapidly renewable or 100 percent

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“Green building shouldn’t be seen as a luxury or something that’s only for the wealthy. Low-income families like mine were green by default.

We walked and took public transportation because we had to.

We recycled because we needed the extra money.”

Javier Molina, Quatro Design Group

NINTH STREET ELEMENTARY 

GREEN

LOCATION Los Angeles Size 122,300 ft2 Completed 2013 Program Classrooms, computer lab and library, community wellness center, gym

CERTIFICATION LEED (expected), 40 CHPS (expected) Site Courtyards with natural light and ventilation, covered exterior walkways and dining Materials Low-VOC and rapidly renewable materials, 100% recyclable and low-maintenance zinc panel system Water Waterless urinals and low-flow toilets, storm-water detention and retention systems Energy 19% below Title 24, tankless water heaters, light sensors Landscape Mature trees, vertical gardens, efficient irrigation

TEAM ARCHITECT Quatro Design Group Client L os Angeles Unified School District General Contractor Suffolk Construction

gbdmagazine.com

FEATURES

PHOTOS: LAWRENCE ANDERSON (MISSION COLLEGE)

LEFT The math and science center’s rainscreen façade is animated by its colored fiber-cement panels. Outside, concrete benches provide gathering spaces.

recyclable materials, low-flow fixtures, tankless water heaters, and a storm-water retention system, but it also offers a health clinic and laundry facilities, two things that have proven to be life-changing for homeless children. The original school was dark and dank, and so it was important to Molina to introduce sunlight and fresh air. All classrooms feature views of both the interior courtyard and the street.

The school officially opened its doors in August 2013, and thus far Molina has received nothing but positive feedback.

It’s been a good couple of years for Quatro Design as far as educational projects are concerned. In addition to the Ninth Street Elementary project, the firm completed a project for the Los Angeles Community College District in August 2012. The recipient of numerous awards, the Center for Math and Science at Mission College in Sylmar, California, provides 95,000 square feet of LEED Platigb&d

GUEST EDITOR LARRY KEARNS In many ways, Javier Molina’s journey to becoming an architect parallels mine. I had a similar realization that I was in the right place in my first design class.

Quatro Design Group’s desire to bring considerable thought and thoroughness to projects in underserved neighborhoods resonates with me. The project’s interest in supporting the creation of human capital is by far its most impactful endeavor.

num-certified lecture classrooms, instructional labs, and computer labs, as well as new administrative, student services, and support spaces; lounge areas; and an outdoor amphitheater.

The building has many of the same green features as Ninth Street Elementary, including low-VOC and rapidly renewable materials, lowflow fixtures, and multiple storm-water retention, detention, and mitigation measures. The math and science building also has a high-performance rainscreen building envelope that minimizes heat transfer, a new central utility plan that increases the building’s energy and utility efficiency, and a photovoltaic canopy that shades a central courtyard and produces 260,000 kilowatt-hours of energy annually.

“In our own way, we’re trying to change how people see sustainability,” Molina says. “Green building and environmentalism shouldn’t be

ABOVE The interior of the Mission College building provides LA students a healthful and efficient learning environment.

OPPOSITE The design of Ninth Street Elementary near Skid Row pays homage to the industrial area with metal and masonry on its exterior.

seen as a luxury or something that’s only for the wealthy.

Low-income families like mine were green by default.

We walked and took public transportation because we had to. We recycled because we needed the extra money.

Schools that serve low-income and homeless children need to be sustainable out of necessity to provide their students with the healthy environment they need to learn.” gb&d march–april 2014

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

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84 Foam, Glass, and Wood

Innovative insulation and barn wood bring the Schuler Residence to life

90 Ancient Wisdom, Modern

Magic

Archaeo Architects designs an Anasazi-inspired desert home

94 Going with the Grain

The future of wood is tested at the University of British Columbia

100 Dining in Style

The first LEED Platinum dining hall features an edible wall full of herbs

102 Perfect Pitch

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106 Spotlight: Louisiana State

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S PAC E S L I V E

SPACES

Digsau combines ultra-efficient Foamglas insulation with century-old barn wood for an award-winning home Story by Tina Vasquez Photos by Todd Mason

The Schuler Residence, designed

by Philadelphia architectural studio Digsau, features 100-year-old barn wood on top of cellular-glass insulation by Foamglas. It was Digsau’s first time using the product.

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SPACES LIVE LEARN PLAY

The area surrounding the home of Krystina and Steven Schuler is difficult to characterize. It’s both rural and suburban. Set six miles outside Wilmington, Delaware, the residence is surrounded by both farms and cookie-cutter subdivisions. From a distance, the beautiful, highly sustainable home looks nondescript. It is so innocuous that some neighbors assumed it was a barn, and upon moving in two years ago, Steven would often accidentally drive by his own house. But the home, a perfect square covered in 100-year-old barn wood, is more dynamic than its façade lets on.

The Schulers say they hated their previous home, located in the kind of indistinguishable development that dots the landscape near their new place. That house was poorly built and unattractive but what they could afford at the time. Once they were able to save enough money to move, they decided to start from scratch. They fortuitously stumbled upon a family selling the back two acres of its four-acre property. The young couple bought the undeveloped piece of land, knowing they wanted to build a sustainable home, and hired Philadelphia-based architecture firm Digsau to help them get the most for their money.

Digsau principal Mark Sanderson originally worked with the couple to narrow their focus.

“Like many people, the Schulers had a lot of ideas about what they wanted and how they wanted the house to look, but they were open to letting the process inform the final product,” Sanderson says.

“We were working with a very modest budget, so everything that was chosen had to be as sustainable as we could afford, and it

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had to function in multiple ways.

This required making choices and trade-offs, but in the end everything fell into place.”

Two unique elements—one invisible, the other highly visible— set the Schuler residence apart.

The home’s exterior wood siding was taken from a local 100-yearold barn slated for demolition.

The siding was used to construct a rainscreen with open joints circulating air around the planks.

Beneath the wood is the other unique characteristic. For the home’s insulation, Digsau used Foamglas, an innovative material composed of a cellular glass that is impervious to wood-boring insects, has high compressive strength and excellent moisture resistance, and is completely fire-resistant.

The Schuler residence is actually the first residential property in the United States to use Foamglas, which Pittsburgh Corning Corporation manufactures from sand and other natural materials to produce molten glass; when the powdered glass passes through a cellulating oven and is heated, it results in insulating blocks that can be trimmed and used as roof or wall insulation or fabricated into other shapes to fit around pipes. The lightweight, rigid insulation is also free of CFCs, HFCs, and HCFCs. Howard Patrick, Foamglas’s technical manager, says the insulation is almost exclusively used in industrial spaces here in the United States while the opposite is true in Europe, where many homes and buildings have been outfitted with Foamglas. “Foamglas was used quite a bit in roofing in the 1980s and ’90s, but as other insulation products emerged, it was used less and less,” Patrick says. Because of

“[Foamglas] was key for the aesthetics, energy efficiency, and sustainability we wanted to achieve.”

Mark Sanderson, Digsau

ABOVE The 2,800-square-foot home sits on a two-acre lot in Delaware, yet its windows and open floor plan make it seem far more spacious than it is.

the product’s success in Europe and more people embracing sustainability in the United States, it’s experiencing a revival and being marketed toward residential buildings. “We predict it will become very popular in the housing market,” Patrick adds.

Foamglas was the perfect solution for the Schuler residence.

Sanderson knew that using the wood from the old barn on the exterior of the house was a risky move because of the damage moisture could cause over time, so finding the right insulation was crucial. “It’s a weather barrier and insulation in one,” Sanderson says. “It’s lightweight but also has a really high compressive strength that allows you to secure furring strips right over the insulation. It was key for the aesthetics, energy efficiency, and sustainability we wanted to achieve.” gbdmagazine.com

Intelligently placed high-efficiency windows punctuate the rustic faÇade, providing views of the semirural property and allowing daylight into the home.

SPACES LIVE LEARN PLAY

Inside, the ranch-style, single-level home has an open floor plan that also can be converted to a more typical residential layout through a series of hidden pocket doors and surface-mounted barn doors. “Krys and I are anti-McMansion, both from an economic standpoint and from an environmental standpoint,” Steven says.

“So while our new home is only 400 square feet larger than our old house, we use every bit of the space we have, unlike in our old house. It feels so much larger than it is.” Perhaps one of its most intelligent design elements is the use of sliding glass doors, which were installed as windows in order to maximize the connection to the exterior. Because of all the glass, portions of the house feel like a giant, screened-in porch, and on most days the home is soaked with natural daylight.

The team packed the house with as many affordable green features as possible: cork flooring, low-VOC paints, and low-flow fixtures, which included outfitting two of their home’s three bathrooms with urinals, a request from Steven. Aside from being a quirky and unexpected addition, urinals are exceptional at conserving water; while the average toilet may use six or seven gallons per flush, the urinals installed in the Schuler

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PROJECT

GREEN

LOCATION Middletown, DE Size 2,800 ft2 living, 750 ft2 garage, 2,300 ft2 unfinished basement Completed 2011 Program Private residence Awards Philadelphia American Institute of Architecture Merit Award

CERTIFICATION Not applicable Materials Reclaimed wood siding, cork flooring, low-VOC paints, Foamglas insulation, TPO heat-reflective roof Water Low-flow fixtures, micro-drip septic system Energy Tight building envelope with dual-zone climate control system, natural daylighting Landscape Native, drought-tolerant plantings

TEAM ARCHITECT Digsau Client S teven and Krystina Schuler General Contractor GT Designs Insulation F oamglas by Pittsburgh Corning Corporation

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home use just half a gallon per flush. The house also has a reflective thermoplastic-polyolefin (TPO) white roof to insulate and prevent solar heat gain and a dual-zone climate control system that allows the homeowners to turn off the HVAC system in the living area in order to only heat or cool the bedrooms at night.

The Schulers say they couldn’t be happier with the results. The couple celebrated their two-year anniversary in the home in October 2013, and Krystina says this will be one of many milestones. “This is the house we’re going to live in forever. It … suits us well, and our son loves running around in it—that’s all you can ask for.” gb&d gb&d

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SPACES LIVE LEARN PLAY

A N C I E N T W I S D O M

M O D E R N M A G I C

SPACES

The reverent Galisteo Basin Preserve Residence in New Mexico honors historic high desert traditions and contemporary sustainable design

PHOTO: ROBERT RECK

By Alan Oakes

This 6,000-square-foot home, by Archaeo Architects, is intentionally contemporary and simple to accentuate the organic landscape of New Mexico’s Galisteo Basin.

A ground-mounted solar array completely powers the residence.

In New Mexico’s high desert, 13 miles south of Santa Fe on 160 acres of vast, rolling hills dotted with piñon brush and prairie grass is architect Jon Dick’s latest masterful creation: a stunning residence with a pinwheel layout of rectangular forms abstractly recalling the pueblo ruins of the tribes that once inhabited the Galisteo Basin.

The recently completed Galisteo Basin Preserve Residence is one of the first constructions in a new development within the basin, a 13,522-acre expanse of land operated by the nonprofit Commonweal Conservancy. The goal of the conservancy is to develop the land in a sustainable way, setting aside more than 96 percent of the property as permanently protected space.

With the simple mandate from his clients to create a contemporary home using sustainable design, Dick came upon the pinwheel layout as a practical response to a site having virtually 360-degree views.

Dick’s solution created four different viewing angles, three of which were great, he says. “I placed the entry on that less attractive northwest quadrant and shut down the façade to add a sense of mystery to the entry sequence and also buffer the predominant northwest winter winds,” says Dick, who served as the lead architect at his firm, Archaeo Architects.

Two sets of parallel walls crisscross one another at a center point, almost like a pound sign, and make up the basic scheme of the home. The walls expand out past the living spaces, extending into arid landscape and framing the views from interior perspectives. “A panoramic view can become boring, whereas a framed view rarely does,” Dick says. “I wanted to engage the landscape with those four primary walls so the house seemed to slide out into nature, drawing your eye. Even with that bold, functionally unnecessary move, the landscape still dominates.”

Various elements reference the architecture and spirituality of the ancient people who once inhabited the basin. Dick says he designed the house to have wall-dominated march–april 2014

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SPACES LIVE LEARN PLAY

PROJECT LOCATION Galisteo Basin, NM Size 6,505 ft2, 11,092 ft2 roofed Completed 2013 Program Private residence

TEAM ARCHITECT Archaeo Architects Contractor Hurlocker Homes Landscape Architect Wilder Landscaping

GREEN CERTIFICATION Not applicable Energy Ground-mounted solar array, geothermal heating and cooling, passive solar Materials N ative building materials, reclaimed lumber and other recycled materials Water R ooftop rain and snow harvesting provides for exterior irrigation Technology Motorized louvered roof, high-efficiency appliances

FLOOR PLAN 1 Garage 2 Artist Studio 3 Entry Courtyard 4 Kitchen 5 Dining 6 Main Entry 7 Living Room 8 Guest Bedroom 9 Exercise Room 10 Study 11 Master Bedroom 12 Garden

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architecture with few openings, which is a building trait of the Anasazi. He intentionally set the pinwheel scheme into the geometric shape of a circle because of its mystical importance. “The circle is the only pure geometric form found in nature; the Earth is a circle and so is the iris of our eye,” he says, recalling mythologist Joseph Campbell and the tale of the Indian chief who said, “When we pitch camp, we pitch a camp in a circle. When we look at the horizon, the horizon is in a circle. When the eagle builds a nest, the nest is in a circle. ” Spaces for family gatherings are positioned around a hearth at the center of the pinwheel design with wings for bedrooms,

a studio, and a garage emanating outwards. Pathways guide the inhabitants past openings in walls exposing vistas and into rooms whose studied patterns of light change throughout the day and vary with the seasons. Dick was careful to temper the exposure to the open landscape by also creating more intimate spaces within the home. “Most clients start with the desire to capture all of the great views, which is understandable, but I advise them that they won’t always be in the mood for those big panoramas,” he says. “When feeling more introspective or meditative, the home should provide for that as well.”

With thoughtful consideration of the four elements of earth, water, fire, and sky, the Galisteo residence offers a variety of soul-satisfying living spaces.

With further consideration of the Earth and its resources, a 210-panel ground-mounted photovoltaic array—believed to be New Mexico’s largest array attached to a single home—completely powers the residence. Sunlight provides passive solar benefits, and the pinwheel design allows for cross breezes that cool the home. When supplemental heating and cooling is required, geothermal energy is called upon. Rain and snow runoff is harvested into cisterns to provide landscape irrigation, and a motorized louvered roof on the south living room portal permits the owners to easily adjust the amount of light and shadow.

Integrating human activity into the Earth’s rhythms is essential to Dick’s gbdmagazine.com

PHOTOS: ROBERT RECK, CORIE PHOTOGRAPHY (OPPOSITE)

Massive walls draw the eye toward the landscape and hint at the home’s pinwheel shape. The home uses modern technology such as a motorized louvered roof and traditional American Indian building methods.

Galisteo Basin Preserve Residence SPACES

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S A N TA F E , N E W M E X IC O

design philosophy. He references the ancient Greek goddess of Earth, Gaia, when explaining why sustainable architecture is important. “We’re an integral part of the planet—a planet that is here to nurture us whenever we have the need,” he says. “Our actions impact Gaia, both positively and negatively.” The Galisteo Basin Preserve Residence is dramatic proof that the architect understands and appreciates the power he wields in the relationship. gb&d

Contact Katherine & Edgar Diaz for more information at 505.690.9549

PROJECT GEOGRAPHY GALISTEO BASIN The Galisteo Basin covers almost half a million acres of north-central New Mexico. The high desert basin is semiarid, receiving only 12 to 14 inches of rain annually, most of which occurs during the monsoon season in July and August. Twenty-four threatened or endangered species, including golden eagles, Gunnison’s prairie dogs, and pronghorn antelope, reside in the rugged expanse. As an important trade route, the basin has hosted human inhabitants for thousands of years. Ancient Anasazi and Tewa tribes called the basin home; at first they seasonally migrated to the area before eventually settling in pueblo communities whose ruins are still being excavated. In the 1600s, Spanish settlers mined the region for silver, the land was later used for ranching starting in the 1700s, and today, portions of the basin are being considered for oil and gas development.

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University of British Columbia Earth Sciences Building

220-21320 Gordon Way, Richmond, BC V6W 1J8 Tel. 604-271-4600

www.bird.ca st. john’s ▪ halifax ▪ saint john ▪ wabush ▪ montreal ▪ toronto ▪ winnipeg ▪ calgary ▪ edmonton ▪ st. albert ▪ vancouver

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GOING WITH THE GRAIN

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Perkins+Will’s innovative use of wood at the University of British Columbia’s Earth Sciences Building heralds a new era of carbon-sinking structures

By Christopher James Palafox

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GUEST EDITOR LARRY KEARNS This building makes two advances with technology—one that was on our radar and one that was not. We have specified cross-laminated solid wood panels on our projects in the recent past but still have yet to have them survive the value-engineering phase. Acceptance of new building technology seems, at times, to move at a glacial pace. As one of the few building materials created primarily from the atmosphere, wood’s place in the sequestration of carbon dioxide is meaningful. Demonstration projects like this will hopefully raise industry awareness.

The Thermenex HVAC system was completely new to me. While the conceptual idea of merely moving thermal energy within the building envelope seems ideal, I’m left wanting to know more about how the thermally stratified water header actually works in practice.

EXCLUSIVE EXTRAS Go behind the scenes with our iPad edition or at gbdmagazine.com.

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I

t’s only fitting that the University of British Columbia’s (UBC) Earth Sciences Building is educational—not just because of its role in higher education and the institution’s commitment to the campus as a “living lab,” but because the wood and concrete structure is deployed as a demonstration project by the Canadian Wood Council. The extensive use of wood combats the high energy demands of research labs by sequestering carbon and leading to a reduced carbon footprint, and the research conducted for the structure is being made available online.

At the time of completion, the five-story building was the largest panelized wood structure in North America, even though the material only makes up half of the building’s construction. Although new larger mass-timber projects are under construction, the hybrid nature of this building has acted as an integral stepping-stone for wood’s acceptance as a viable interior structure material, on a level with concrete or steel.

Flashback to 1995, when architect Peter Busby won a design competition to design a new Earth Sciences Building

for UBC that pushed sustainable ideals.

Due to a lack of funding, that initial project fell apart. Fourteen years later, Busby, now with Perkins+Will, brought the UBC project to the firm. “Bringing back this player,” says UBC architect Gerry McGeough, “was a main foundation for the project.”

Much the way this project had been stuck in time, so was UBC’s lab.

“It was like going to the 1970s,” says Perkin+Wills’ Jana Foit, the project architect. “It didn’t live up to the type of modern research the school was conducting.” Pragmatically, the university wanted to modernize operations and to consolidate Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences (EOAS); the Pacific Institute for the Mathematical Sciences (PIMS); and Faculty of Science’s offices of the dean. The idea of employing wood owes no small part to the 2009 Wood First Act that requires provincially funded endeavors to be built with wood as a primary construction material.

The legislation acknowledges both the economic advantage of using a local product and the environmental benefits of using a naturally occurring renewable resource. The act, however, is notoriously

PROJECT LOCATION Vancouver, BC Size 170,005 ft² Completed 2012 Program Classrooms, laboratories, lecture halls, offices, café Awards Forest Products Society 2012 Wood Engineering Award, Institutional Wood Design 2013 – Large, Wood WORKS! BC Wood Design Awards

TEAM ARCHITECT Perkins+Will Client U niversity of British Columbia Project Manager UBC Properties Trust Construction Manager Bird Construction Mechanical Consultant Stantec Structural Engineer Equilibrium Consulting HVAC System IMEC Mechanical

GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Gold (expected) Site Reused previous site materials Materials Sustainable, local mass timber Energy Thermenex HVAC system, solar shading, daylight in high-use areas Water Low-flow plumbing fixtures Envelope R-20 envelope, R-30 roofs

PHOTO: DEE MARTIN (OPPOSITE)

The Earth Sciences Building uses native timber and other natural materials to create a striking, highperformance exterior. Inside, the drywall used was manufactured just down the street.

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UBC’s Earth Sciences Building uses wood as its main structural element and for its dramatic cantilevered stair, seen here from below. To avoid potentially disruptive vibrations, concrete was still used in lab spaces.

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SUPERLATIVES EARTH SCIENCES BUILDING Most Innovative Solution A trium stairs cantilevered 20 feet from the support with a seamless folding ribbon of glulam plates—a first of its kind in the world.

Biggest Saver T hermenex HVAC system earned eight LEED points.

Most Obscure Reuse Stone for the building’s façade teaching element was taken from imperfect countertops.

Closest Material Source Drywall manufactured down the street. The old CMU building was crushed up and used partly as backfill and drain rock.

Biggest Hurdle Doing the research and getting the backing to do timber at this level.

Lasting Industry Impact According to Foit: “Looking at wood as something that can replace concrete or steel—you can form it in exactly the same way.”

non-prescriptive, and because it relies on projects being consistent with the objectives of the British Columbia Building Code, the amount of the wood used is subjective.

Perkins+Will originally conceptualized an all-wood facility, but as it designed the structure, building users became concerned about vibration, loading, and acoustics in the labs. Wood was an unproved player in the North American marketplace; there was limited research completed, and there were no active examples to sell the idea, so the firm compromised. It created a hybrid design that incorporated concrete into the lab spaces; the rest of the structure,

as food. That carbon remains inside the wood during the tree’s life, and if managed properly, a forest can act as a large carbon reservoir. When that tree is transformed into a building material, that carbon remains in the wood until it rots or burns, theoretically holding the carbon indefinitely. Effectively removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere on a sustainable basis requires the periodic harvesting and milling of mature trees so they may be used in products that will last for decades, thus sequestering carbon and creating a carbon sink.

“It’s safe to say that one cubic meter of dry wood can sequester between 1.2 and 1.8 tonnes of carbon dioxide,

depending on the species,” Foit says. This attribute helped shrink the footprint of the Earth Sciences building, which contained roughly 6,169 tonnes of embodied energy. With 1,094 tonnes of structural carbon stored in the wood in the facility, that figure was offset and reduced to 5,075 tonnes. Additionally, much of the wood, including the glulams used for columns and beams and the cross-laminated timber for the roof and canopy were created from Douglas fir, trees native to British Columbia.

Just as the wood makes up only half of the building, the wood is only half of the project’s story. Although the structure’s siting and how it deals with the public realm is not a green feature, Foit argues that it is “a social sustainability feature” that welcomes people into the building, putting research literally on display to the greater campus.

The university’s Beux-Arts-inspired campus always was envisioned to have two major commons—both large squares.

The grounds had been designed symmetrically but lacked a square to the south.

“It’s safe to say that one cubic meter of dry wood can sequester between 1.2 and 1.8 tonnes of carbon dioxide, depending on the species.”

Jana Foit, Perkins+Will

including classrooms, lecture halls, and offices, would still use wood.

Paradoxically, wood wasn’t a necessity—the building could have been all steel or concrete, and little would have changed from a process standpoint. “The building was designed like precast—for speed of erection and because it is very pragmatic and rational,” Foit says. “That speaks to the future of wood construction.” That future places wood as major competitor to steel and concrete from a structural perspective. Wood can be formed exactly in the same way as those materials but has obvious benefits—it’s lighter, can be easily prefabricated, has a faster on-site construction time, and has better quality control, which leads to less costly labor for erection and refinishing.

Most importantly, it sequesters carbon.

When trees grow, they use carbon from the atmosphere’s carbon dioxide

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When the proposal for an Earth Sciences building in the southern portion came, university officials quickly asked for its second commons. A new site was established, and today the building frames the oak tree-lined pedestrian mall, the south side’s reciprocal square and a new connection for the campus.

The site had another interesting feature: it was adjacent to the Pacific Museum of the Earth, and across the main mall, the campus’s primary axis, was the newly completed Beaty Biodiversity Museum. Serendipitously, the team had an opportunity to foster a museum precinct that reinforced the public realm and allowed glimpses into the sciences without ever stepping foot into a building. The façade of the Beaty Museum, for instance, is a glass box, and although the building is almost all below grade, passersby glimpse a massive blue whale skeleton hanging in the entrance. So when some of the research labs in the Earth Sciences Building required double-height ceilings, rather than excavate to achieve this height—which was cost prohibitive—the labs pop up through the ground floor of the building. The research taking place inside becomes yet another display.

Matching the column spacing and canopy gb&d

height continued the dialogue between the two buildings and acted as an entrance to the science campus.

To integrate a teaching element into the Earth Sciences Building, ten different types of stone, with imperfections to maximize their teaching potential, were integrated into the façade, and the high-albedo roof contains spaces dedicated to weather and wind data collection.

Wood alone won’t lead any building to LEED Gold—in fact, LEED does not recognize non-FSC wood or the sequestering of carbon in its ratings. The Earth Sciences Building does the latter and contains none of the former. But it does employ solar shading, double-glazed windows with low-E coating, and a high-performance envelope that helped it earn eight points in the energy category. Accounting for most of the energy savings is the building’s Thermenex HVAC system. which uses the same principle as refrigeration technology. A water-filled pipe with hot and cold ends and no pumps or controls functions as a hub for thermal exchange. The loop of the piping shares the warm water through the building and sends it to where it is needed, controlling temperature efficiently with zero thermal waste.

ABOVE Double-height lab spaces with large glass walls allow passersby a glimpse into the Earth Sciences research being done and mimic the design of the nearby Beaty Biodiversity Museum.

OPPOSITE In addition to the building’s structural wood, the interiors feature Douglas fir, a tree native to British Columbia.

“In North America, this building demonstrates the beginnings of new construction techniques and new technologies using a centuries-old material,” Foit says. Wood may become the material of the future. The university, which now has three buildings with mass timber structural systems, has begun pursuing initiatives to erect the tallest wood building in the province. Wood is bringing new life into socially conscious design.

The university can breathe better knowing that it is furthering innovations in structural design, and because of it, all of us can, literally, breathe better. gb&d march–april 2014

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DINING IN STYLE Kent Denver, a day school for grades six through twelve, is now home to the world’s first LEED Platinum dining hall. Bryan Schmidt, who led the project team at Denver’s Semple Brown Design, shares the challenges and triumphs of the project.

Interview by Julie Schaeffer

DETAILS LOCATION Englewood, CO Completed 2 011 Size 20,000 ft2 (8,000 ft2 renovation, 12,000 ft2 new construction) Program Dining hall Architect Semple Brown Design Structural Engineer K L&A Civil Engineer V3 Companies MEP Engineer M E Engineers Landscape Architect Christopher Hoy Design Group General Contractor C MC Group Sustainability Consultant E nermodal Engineering Kitchen Equipment D uray Food Service Provider S odexo

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gb&d: What inspired this project?

gb&d: What was the site like?

Bryan Schmidt: Kent Denver had a very tiny dining hall. It only sat about 200 people when the campus population is 800. As a consequence, some kids were starting to eat lunch as early as 10:30 while others didn’t finish until 2 p.m. That was putting a crimp in the academic day, and Kent Denver wanted to make the lunch period shorter. That required a larger dining hall.

Schmidt: Big, 210 agrarian acres, and we wanted to ensure we were being sensitive to that, so there are numerous indigenous plantings, as well as an orchard that produces fruit used in the kitchen.

gb&d: Was sustainability a requirement from the beginning?

Schmidt: Sustainability, yes; LEED Platinum, no. The first question was, should we save the existing dining hall? As a firm, we do a lot of building rehabilitation, so my off-the-cuff reaction was to say, “Sure!” From there, we decided to pursue LEED certification because the school’s trustees wanted an accounting of how sustainable we were going to be. Then, when we got to looking at it, we went with the “go-big-orgo-home” philosophy. It was a leap because there weren’t any other LEED Platinum facilities like this for us to model our project on.

gb&d: What are some of the more notable green elements?

Schmidt: The roof is this funky, sculptural thing, but it does an awful lot. It channels rainwater in very visible ways, from high points to a low shading edge, where it falls down a drip chain into some grassy landscape elements in a plaza, then into the natural landscape.

So everyone sees the path of the water. Although the seating plaza is well shaded, clerestory windows below the roof provide ample, even daylighting to the 7,000-square-foot floor plate of the dining area, so the lights are rarely on during the day.

We also used evaporative cooling and a 27-kilowatt, roof-mounted solar photovoltaic array, the latter of which has a live feed to monitors in the dining hall so people can track energy usage on a live basis. And,

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we have an indoor green wall that produces herbs that are used in the school’s kitchen—although we didn’t get any LEED points for it, it’s like a fireplace in that it’s the focal point of the room. gb&d: What part of the project are you most proud of?

Schmidt: Beyond the facility’s success as a dining hall, it has also been a huge hit as a special event venue for the school and the surrounding community of Cherry Hills Village. gb&d: I understand that you’re already working on another project for Kent Denver?

PHOTOS: DAVID LAUER (EXTERIOR)

Schmidt: Yes, and the motivation for it is similar to the motivation for the dining hall. The school has a mandatory sports requirement and not enough gym space. So, some kids start practice at 5 a.m., and other kids end practice at 10 p.m. So, in the 16,500-square-foot Yates Pavilion, we’re providing two full-size practice courts and one new competition court as well as some new lockers and concessions. We’re shooting for LEED Gold, and it will incorporate many of the successful elements of the dining hall. gb&d

“The roof is this funky, sculptural thing, but it does an awful lot.”

Bryan Schmidt, Semple Brown Design

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ABOVE The roof shape creates large clerestories that maximize interior daylighting. The ceiling has wooden slats that help diffuse and absorb sound in the noisy dining hall.

OPPOSITE The butterfly roof channels water to the building’s indigenous plantings. Its brickand-copper façade references the materials used for existing buildings on campus.

Providing sustainable design of lighting, power and communications systems

Architectural Engineering Design Group, Inc. Denver. 303.296.3034 • Chicago. 773.755.6140 www.aedesign-inc.com

Architecture

EXCLUSIVES See even more photos in the iPad edition or at gbdmagazine.com.

Designing buildings… Building partnerships. contact@cpaarchitecture.com www.cpaarchitecture.com march–april 2014

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Populous’s BBVA Compass Stadium, professional soccer’s new home in Houston, breathes through its geometric metal mesh skin Story by Christopher James Palafox Photos by Geoffery Lyons

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In Texas, football is king, and a soccer stadium won’t get a lot of traction—unless it happens to feature outstanding architecture. The sports experts at Populous were hired by the ICON Venue Group in conjunction with the City of Houston and the Dynamo Soccer Team to make the BBVA Compass Stadium an icon that serves as the east side anchor of Houston’s Downtown Redevelopment Plan.

If the pressure to produce an architecturally significant building wasn’t enough, Populous was gb&d

limited to a $95 million budget.

That’s tight for a stadium—New Jersey’s Red Bull Arena cost $200 million. Bringing three decades of experience to the project, Populous succeeded in creating a sports facility that pleases the eye and also achieved LEED Silver certification.

Jeff Spear, a senior architect at Populous and the principal in charge of this project, is the firm’s major league soccer (MLS) stadium expert, having been a part of every MLS facility the firm

The BBVA Compass Stadium achieved LEED Silver certification in part for its location in Houston’s urban core and near public transit.

has worked on. Besides the soccer connection, Spear has designed numerous projects in Houston— his first being for the University of Houston in 1991—and the firm has completed additional stadiums in the city including Minute Maid Park and Alliance Stadium. Spear says that the BBVA Compass Stadium’s brownfield site and nearby light-rail stop were important.

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“The addition of BBVA Compass Stadium is reflective of where soccer is in the US. It’s an emerging sport that’s growing exponentially.”

Jeff Spear, Populous

growing the business loop in Houston while appealing to the young soccer-fan demographic.

Today, an area that recently consisted of abandoned warehouses is sprouting new residential units.

In its quest for icon status, the stadium’s design employs an eye-catching muscular-looking skin. The tessellated exterior and its triangles are meant to echo the physical nature of the players on the field. The exterior transforms throughout the day;

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With experience in both European soccer stadiums and Houston sports facilities, Populous opted for a continuous exterior that makes the interior feel enclosed and intimate.

during daylight hours, the sun shines through the skin and gives the exposed field a shimmering, reflective quality, and at night, the light comes from the inside, causing the skin to “disappear.” The building goes from glowing from the outside in, to the inside out.

To reflect the area’s history as an industrial hub, the design uses concrete block side walls and an aluminum mesh skin, which is breathable, recyclable, and calls back to the site’s history

as a metal warehouse. The mesh provides necessary sunshading and protection from the blistering Houston heat while allowing cool breezes to flow through the stadium instead of being, as Spear puts it, “a closed metal oven.”

“It’s very tough for stadiums to become LEED certified because of their infrequent use,” Spear says.

However, BBVA Compass Stadium has leapt past basic LEED certification to Silver with a budget that hardly lent itself to introducing

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PROJECT LOCATION Houston Size 340,000 ft2 Completed 2 012 Program Stadium a nd event space

TEAM ARCHITECT Populous Client ICON Venue Group, Houston Dynamo General Contractor Manhattan Construction Landscape Architect Clark Condon Associates Structural Engineer W alter P Moore Civil Engineer Ward, Getz & Associates

expensive systems. Populous reduced water consumption by 41 percent with low-flow fixtures, and the project used recycled and local materials and FSC-certified wood, yet many of its credits were earned from simply being located in Houston’s urban core and adjacent to transit.

“It’s different from any other sports facility in Houston,” Spear says. “The addition of BBVA Compass Stadium is reflective of where soccer is in the US. It’s an emerging sport that’s growing

exponentially, which is leading to a lot of unique stadiums being built across the country.” In a state primarily associated with American football, Texas’s largest city now has an architectural landmark that reflects changing times, expanding tastes, and increasing interest in sustainable design.

Hopefully, soccer will one day inspire Friday Night Lights levels of devotion, but for now, with structures like BBVA Compass Stadium, the sport is standing fine on its own. gb&d

The 22,000seat stadium is wrapped in a metal mesh that shades the sun but allows air movement. It primarily hosts soccer matches but can accommodate rugby, lacrosse, and concerts.

GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Silver Site Transit oriented, redeveloped brownfield Materials D iverted 87% construction waste, used 98% FSC-certified wood, aluminum exterior skin Water Low-flow toilets reduce water by 41% Energy Efficient roof, LED lighting

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LOUISIANA STATE MUSEUM AND SPORTS HALL OF FAME TRAHAN ARCHITECTS NATCHITOCHES, LOUISIANA

Transitioning from the Louisiana State Museum and Sports Hall of Fame’s sleek, patinated exterior to its flowing interior feels like entering a rupture in the space-time continuum. Made of 1,100 seamless digitally milled cast stone panels, Trahan Architects creates a beautifully surreal space meant to evoke the meandering of the neighboring riverfront. Combining collections that once were housed separately, the museum merges sports and regional history by interpreting athletics as a component of culture. The pathways connect to the space’s roots, meeting at a veranda that overlooks the town square, the site of the oldest settlement in the Louisiana Purchase. gb&d

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PHOTOS: TIMOTHY HURSLEY

The design of the interior space is meant to mimic the nearby river, creating a fluid, fluvial feeling within the building.

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LONG LIVE QUEENS! How Hunter’s Point Park is engineered to protect New York City’s inner core from devastating storms

PHOTO: ALBERT VEČERKA / ESTO

By Alan Oakes

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PROJECT

GREEN

LOCATION New York City Size 30 acres (master plan) Completed 2013 Cost $66 million Program Park and pavilion space

CERTIFICATION Not applicable Site Access to public transportation Landscape Public park, acts as resilient barrier for urban core Energy Roof-mounted photovoltaic panels Water Rainwater collection valleys on roof of pavilion

TEAM ARCHITECTS Thomas Balsley Associates, Weiss/Manfredi Client N ew York City Economic Development Corporation Infrastructure Designer ARUP

The park’s “green oval” anchors its north end and acts as a lookout point across the river to Manhattan.

Such vegetated areas are vital near waterways because they defend the city against flood damage.

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cant design and engineering challenges.

“The waterfront site is both a place of recreation and relief from the urban core and a critical, hard-working, resilient perimeter,” explains Marion Weiss, the other founder of Weiss/Manfredi. “[It] is highly engineered to be the first line of defense for the surrounding community should severe flood conditions occur on the waterfront.”

Two years ago, the park’s engineering was put to the test as Hurricane Sandy wreaked havoc on the city. Smart streets with bioswales and a 760-foot partially submerged gabion wall along the shoreline worked to slow, capture, retain, and clean storm water, which reduced the load on the sewer system. Unlike other sections of the boroughs, the park fared well in the storm and suffered no significant damage.

Not only is the park virtually indestructible, but it also uses its abundant space for energy generation. More than 60 photovoltaic panels atop the on-site pavilion will generate upwards of 36,500

“This powerful curving promenade seems to unfurl from the green and spring toward the dramatic cantilevered overlook at the site’s highest promontory, where the views of the skyline are unmatched.”

Thomas Balsley, Thomas Balsley Associates

PHOTOS: ALBERT VEČERKA / ESTO (TOP), WADE ZIMMERMAN

When New York City’s Hunter’s Point South Waterfront Park opened along the banks of the East River in summer 2013, it was an instant hit with nearby residents hungering for green space.

With spectacular views of the Manhattan skyline across the river, the park was the first phase of a massive plan to revitalize the western-most portion of Queens, creating a community of five thousand moderate income apartments, a middle school and high school, and retail and office space. “The success of this waterfront park or any other is its two-way relationship with its urban context and more specifically, its community,” says Thomas Balsley, a landscape architect and founder of Thomas Balsley Associates, who designed the park and open space in collaboration with Weiss/Manfredi.

Surrounded on three sides by water, Hunter’s Point wraps around the western tip of Queens providing a “green charm bracelet” for the emerging high-density urban area. The winding nature of the park made the most sense for the designers. “The shoreline could have been navigated in any number of ways,” Balsley says, “but this powerful curving promenade seems to unfurl from the green and spring toward the dramatic cantilevered overlook at the site’s highest promontory, where the views of the skyline are unmatched.”

“Activity vignettes”—basketball courts, a dog run, and an interpretive rail garden—are placed along the promenade based on proximity, size, and adjacent relationships. The largest of the spaces is the multiuse green oval that defines the site and offers iconic views directly across the river to Manhattan. “This green anchors the park’s north precinct and in turn is framed by pathways and a park pavilion that follows the curve of the oval,” says Michael Manfredi, cofounder of Weiss/Manfredi.

The park, needing to serve as a protective barrier from the ravages of devastating storms, posed a number of signifi-

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The pavilion comprises two buildings underneath one continuous, pleated canopy, which supports 64 PV panels.

OPPOSITE The master plan for Hunter’s Point includes mixed-use development farther inland from the park.

RIGHT The interpretive rail garden is composed of native grasses planted between old freight rails, giving the plants a visually interesting context in which to grow.

EXCLUSIVE EXTRAS See even more photos of Hunter’s Point Park in our iPad edition and at gbdmagazine.com.

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LEFT The paths in the park lead to a 30-foot-high cantilevered lookout area that has views of the East River and the Manhattan skyline.

BELOW The park was constructed not only as a recreational area but also to protect inland Queens from severe weather, such as a storm like Hurricane Sandy.

“The waterfront site is both a place of recreation … and a critical, hard-working, resilient perimeter.”

Marion Weiss, Weiss/Manfredi

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PHOTOS: ALBERT VEČERKA / ESTO

kilowatt-hours per year, powering 60 percent of the projected park demand. The pavilion canopy is designed to accommodate 64 additional solar panels, which would provide 100 percent of the park’s power requirements.

The park itself is meant to be a laboratory for sustainable, innovative thinking.

This is particularly true of the plant material chosen for the project. Native trees along with shrubs, grasses, and perennials enrich the park’s planted areas, and most of the plants, selected for their hardiness in a brackish waterway environment, require little water.

The key to Hunter’s Point Park’s success is how it relates to the diverse community it serves, and its program makes a definitive statement in ecological design. In Balsley’s words: “The result is a park experience enriched with cultural and ecological narratives—robust sustainability expressions of infrastructure, landscape, and architecture.” 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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114 Wharton Expands Westward

Inside the Penn business school’s LEED-CI campus in San Francisco

Dallas goes belowground for a LEED Platinum, carbon-neutral fire station

118 Vertical Integration

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TOUGH BUILDS

WESTWARD EXPANSION BUSINESS ON THE BAY

WHARTON SCHOOL OF BUSINESS–SAN FRANCISCO UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA

By Russ Klettke

TOUGH BUILDS

BELOW Large windows provide views of the Bay Bridge and natural light.

The light-colored ceiling panels are designed to reflect that daylight, further brightening the room.

RIGHT Wharton–San Francisco is located on the sixth floor of the historic Hills Brothers Coffee building, a location it shares with Gensler, the interior architect.

PHOTOS: DAVID JOSEPH PHOTOGRAPHY

WESTWARD

Once upon a time, business in the United States was all east of the Mississippi. When the industries and investment dollars that built America were concentrated in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Chicago, the most prominent of business schools were there as well: Wharton (University of Pennsylvania), Booth (University of Chicago), Stern (New York University), Columbia University, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology were the top choices of aspiring students. MBA schools at highly ranked California institutions such as Stanford University and the University of California–Berkeley were for “Left Coasters.”

But business has shifted to the West dramatically in the past few decades—as has the money. The rise of Silicon Valley went hand-inhand with globalization, including trans-Pacific shipping and the digitization of the entertainment industry. Naturally, many forward-looking MBA candidates were faced with a choice: go with the ivy-covered institutions they revered, or head west to enroll in a California school. But in 2001, Wharton established a campus in San Francisco, a decision that has proved fortuitous for the school and its students.

“Due to the Internet boom, we’ve seen so many companies and so much venture capital now centered on the West Coast,” says Bernadette Birt, executive director and chief operating officer at Wharton School of Business–San Francisco. Wharton already had 12,000 alumni living on the West Coast, and there was an extra need for executive education and entrepreneurial programs. Enmarch–april 2014

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TOUGH BUILDS Wharton–San Francisco

“You see [sustainability] in everything. Students are keenly aware that this is what their competition is doing.”

Bernadette Birt, Wharton School of Business–San Francisco

PROJECT LOCATION San Francisco Size 37,000 ft² Completed 2 012 Program Lecture spaces, classrooms, offices, cafeteria

TEAM CLIENT Wharton School of Business–San Francisco Architect Gensler Project Manager Jones Lang LaSalle Construction Manager BCCI Electrical Engineer C BF Electric Consulting Engineer F lack & Kurtz

GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED-CI Gold Site Adaptive reuse of existing building, transit oriented Air Quality Low-VOC carpets, flooring, paint, sealants, adhesives Lighting Ceiling tiles reflect natural light, motion sensors Materials R ecycled 80% from teardown, furniture has recycled content, steel has recycled content, EnergyStar service appliances Programs Green cleaning products, on-site recycling and composting, locally grown produce for cafeteria

EXCLUSIVE EXTRAS Go inside Gensler’s design for Wharton at gbdmagazine.com.

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hancing its existing program back east, the school offers a visiting semester program that allows all MBA students at least a foothold in the West even if they’re primarily studying at the original Wharton in Philadelphia.

Make no mistake—this was not a matter of simply setting up classrooms 3,000 miles away.

Wharton–San Francisco had to excel technologically and academically, and that meant establishing a sustainable home.

EVOLUTION

Wharton–San Francisco is not your father’s business school campus. For the first ten years of its existence, it occupied 20,000 square feet in a historic office structure (the Folger Building, named for the coffee brand) in the city’s financial district. With its move to the Hills Brothers Plaza (coincidentally named for another coffee empire that built the original structure as a manufacturing facility), it took on 37,000 square feet to accommodate a growing academic program. The new location is at the base of the Bay Bridge in the Embarcadero district.

The school’s identity is stronger in its new location. It shares the 1920s Romanesque Revival facility with other tenants, including Gensler, the architecture firm responsible for the Wharton buildout, but ground-level signage gives the school marquee status. Just as important, students are studying in a technologically advanced building that is LEED-CI Gold certified, because green is more than an expectation in San Francisco.

“It’s a high priority in California,” Birt says, adding that it’s also a mission at the main university in Philadelphia to move buildings

BELOW Wharton– San Francisco classrooms are equipped with both the latest technologies and the most ecofriendly materials.

toward reducing Penn’s environmental footprint.

Wharton–San Francisco accomplished its environmental goals on multiple fronts. Its location is near public transit stations (Caltrain, BART, and Muni lines) with easy access to airports to accommodate visiting faculty, guest lecturers, and students from outside the area. This is critical because the MBA for Executives program is largely conducted on alternating weekends, and midweek the school hosts non-degree executive education courses.

Within the building, recycling and composting diverts 78 percent of waste from landfills, and a green cleaning program minimizes the use of chemicals and disposable supplies by switching to reusable, Earth-friendly equipment. The food-service program uses a vendor that sources food and beverages within 100 miles as much as possible. The school also ensures that the food is hormoneand antibiotic-free, humanely grown, and prepared daily.

gbdmagazine.com

PHOTOS: DAVID JOSEPH PHOTOGRAPHY

TOUGH BUILDS

The build-out itself had to meet the needs of a 21st-century business school. Three lecture halls, 15 small-group study rooms, three teleconference rooms, plus flexible open spaces are necessary to facilitate instructional and collaboration experiences. Eighty percent of waste from the teardown and renovation, completed in 2011, was recycled. The steel in the tiered classrooms is made of 50 to 80 percent post-consumer recycled content, and the gypsum and studs have 20 percent or more recycled content. Flooring materials are certified as RFCI FloorScore or CRI Green Label Plus, furniture is certified by GreenGuard, and food service operations incorporate Energy Star appliances and low-flow kitchen faucets.

The ceiling materials maximize natural light reflection for the interior of the building, and task lighting substitutes for overhead lights when practical. Additionally, motion sensors provide lighting as needed and reduce unnecessary energy use. gb&d

FOCUS

The new Wharton–San Francisco space is crisp both in appearance and its efficiencies. But it’s also designed to accommodate the fluid needs of modern business education.

“Everything is interactive,” Birt says. “We have video cameras to capture classes and lectures from guest speakers. We use Skype cameras for the global consulting practicum, and Cisco partners with us to conduct workshops that are shared between San Francisco and Philadelphia.” Birt describes the San Francisco facility as Version 3.1 of what was originally built on the Penn campus back in Philadelphia.

To understand the importance of technology in learning, it helps to understand the students. In the MBA for Executives program, interactivity through electronics and face-to-face is an essential part of business-leader training.

“Students are in teams from intentionally diverse backgrounds,” Birt says. “Small group interaction is a critically important part of their

ABOVE Gensler used materials with high recycled content for the campus, which offers various learning and study spaces.

education.” These technologies added costs and logistical challenges in the build-out, including extensive collaboration between IT designers and product vendors, but, as Birt explains, all are essential components of education in a technology-based economy.

So too are the green initiatives found throughout Wharton–San Francisco. “You see [sustainability] in everything, including the transition from print to electronic textbooks,” Birt says. “Students are keenly aware that this is what their competition is doing as well.”

Keeping up is something Wharton has done for decades. The school is America’s oldest collegiate school of business, having been established in 1881, and survival over these many years—and recently these many miles—could only have happened as the result of a distinctive choice to evolve. gb&d

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TOUGH BUILDS

URBAN INFILL VERTICAL INTEGRATION

FIRE STATION 27 DALLAS CITY OF DALLAS

By Russ Klettke

Zaida Basora, assistant director of public works for the City of Dallas, had a problem. The old Fire Station 27 in the city’s growing Midtown section needed to be replaced because high-rises were being constructed all around it, which, in the business of fire protection, requires bigger trucks with a higher capacity for carrying and pumping water. At the same time, all that growth meant there was no appropriate land available on which to build. “We looked at

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other sites, but none had the service area that would accommodate trucks that leave and return in a hurry without disrupting traffic,” Basora says. In other words, the existing site would have to do.

Basora, a trained architect, had additional requirements to meet.

Dallas subscribes to the Architecture 2030 Challenge, which strives to halve energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions and achieve carbon neutrality by the year 2030. The city also adopt-

ABOVE Because the site was too small to accommodate the new building’s layout and a parking lot, Perkins+Will placed parking below the building.

ed the LEED system as a benchmark for new buildings in 2003.

After several years of extended drought conditions, municipal buildings in the city already were prioritizing landscaping with native plants and installing rainwater catchment systems to reduce potable water demand.

New firehouses also optimally include fitness rooms to keep first-responders in fighting condition and gender-specific accommodations—all of which gbdmagazine.com

TOUGH BUILDS

60%

Overall energy use reduction compared to similar fire stations in Dallas

PROJECT LOCATION Dallas Size 22,000 ft² Completed 2 014 (expected) Program M unicipal fire station

TEAM OWNER City of Dallas Architect Perkins+Will Civil Engineer P acheco Koch Structural Engineer J Q Engineering Mechanical/Electrical Engineer B&H Engineers General Contractor Bartlett Cocke General Contractors

GREEN CERTIFICATION LEED Platinum (expected) Exterior C ast-in-place concrete and metal panels, high R-value insulation Windows High-performance with thermal breaks Lighting LED lighting, deep interior daylighting via clerestory windows Energy PV array, solar-water heating, VRF HVAC system, targeting carbon neutral Water Rainwater collection

Fire Station 27 will be the first LEED Platinum fire station in Dallas as well as the city’s first carbon-neutral building.

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84

Rooftop solar panels, expected to collect 28,216 kBtu annually

10 in.

Thickness of the 34-foottall, self-consolidating concrete wall

require additional square footage.

With this list of mandates, Basora turned to her team of engineers and architects to devise solutions.

Architects at Perkins+Will determined the new fire station would have to go vertical, and not just aboveground. They placed an 18-car parking area underground atop a rainwater cistern with a “pull-through” two-bay apparatus configuration at grade to accommodate four vehicles. Kent Pontious, Perkins+Will’s senior project manager for Fire Station 27, says sleeping quarters were then placed on the second story, similar to the way they might be in a typical home. Adjacent to the quarters is the fitness facility, which can be seen through glass walls both for safety and to motivate the firefighters.

Building underground was no small task. The basement excavation meant cutting through 12 feet of limestone. “It was the only option in order to place the

ABOVE The north-facing glass curtainwall lets daylight into hallways and staircases, reducing the need for artificial lighting and letting the 84 PV modules power the rest of the building.

7,500

Gallons of rainwater held in the station’s underground cistern

station where it was needed,” says Stephen Lucy, a principal at JQ Engineering, the structural engineering firm on the project.

Belowground, the cistern uses a polypropylene honeycomb void system, which supports the structural slab and parked cars. Above, castin-place concrete walls were a key architectural and energy-efficiency feature of the project—the most challenging aspect was creating “a uniform architectural appearance on the exterior face for the full 34foot height of the exterior walls,” Lucy says.

Inside, shafts of daylight enter through a north-facing glass curtainwall and clerestory windows, and solar energy is captured with 84 photovoltaic modules on the roof and six solar water-heating collectors. With all of these features, the building is applying for LEED Platinum certification, an achievement that Basora believes is consistent with what Dallas residents want. “The perception that Texans don’t care about resource conservation is changing,” she says. “We have a mix of people in the city who bring a progressive mentality.” gb&d march–april 2014

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

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

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122 Person of Interest

Interface VP of sustainability George Bandy Jr. talks company culture

124 On the Boards

Goettsch Partners plans a unique riverfront office tower in Chicago

126 Material World

Metal mesh offers an array of possibilities—and LEED points

127 Discussion Board

Architects discuss their most influential authors

128 On the Spot

Guest editor Larry Kearns answers our questionnaire

march–april 2014

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Person of Interest George Bandy Jr.

When Ray Anderson died in 2011, the Interface founder was described as the “greenest CEO in America.” His spirit lives on, says George Bandy Jr., a vice president of sustainability at Interface, as Bandy discusses his company’s Mission Zero, the cost of raw petroleum, and meeting the world’s leading environmentalists.

Interview by Russ Klettke

gb&d: From your perspective, can you tell us how Ray Anderson established an enduring culture of sustainability?

George Bandy Jr.: Ray instilled in all of us the leadership skills to execute his vision and mission. He gave us a compass, which encompasses several fronts of sustainability. They are to eliminate waste, to eliminate benign emissions, to value renewable energy, to close the loop on technical and natural resources, and to be resourceful in transportation. gb&d: What about customers?

Bandy: We sensitize all stakeholders, including customers, to our comprehensive approach on becoming a sustainable company that just happens to be the world’s largest manufacturer of carpet tiles. A big part of this journey is about recycling old carpets when replacing them. The old model was to buy, use, and dispose. The new model is to buy, use, and then recycle. gb&d: You are on a campaign called Mission Zero, which means zero waste, zero emissions, and even zero use of petroleum products. How will you achieve that?

Bandy: We use ecometrics as a means of calculating how we move the needle on waste and impact. Since 1996, we have reduced our contributions to landfills by 91 percent. We’ve made good gains on water and energy use, and we offer climate-neutral products by purchasing certified offsets that sequester carbon. In addition, we engage our employees through our

LEFT Interface launched its Net Effect line as a tribute to the ocean both in its colors and composition. The collection repurposes spent fishing nets that have washed up on shore in the Phillipines.

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PUNCH LIST

gb&d: So recycled material from various sources is pretty significant.

internal programs like Cool CO2mmute, Trees for Travel, and Environmental Education Grants.

Bandy: About 75 percent of our product is now made with post-consumer recycled material.

gb&d: Zero use of petroleum—your primary raw material ingredient? How is that possible?

Bandy: There are 40 years worth of carpet out there waiting to be repurposed, recycled, and reused, which amounts to approximately five billion pounds of carpet that is pulled up annually. We have an opportunity to reduce the cost of disposal fees for our customers and reduce the amount of commercial construction debris in our landfill by using this product for new carpet tiles. This is carpet that would otherwise take 50 years to decompose in a landfill. gb&d: Which is cheaper, recycled carpet or raw petroleum?

Bandy: The price of oil affects everything.

But getting raw materials from the Earth is always a higher cost in many ways.

What people don’t always understand is the difference between cost and price. gb&d: Is there a reason you don’t just use natural materials?

Bandy: We get asked this question a lot.

People want to know why we don’t use wool or jute. The fact of the matter is that things designed by nature are also designed to break down. Natural materials wouldn’t last long in commercial applications, and things that last longer tend to be more sustainable. Note, synthetic carpeting is now made in low-VOC selections. gb&d: But recycling still requires active participation by customers. How do you make that happen?

Bandy: Customers and architects visit our mills almost every week, and we gb&d

gb&d: Let’s talk about you and your job.

How did you get into this?

“What people don’t always understand is the difference between cost and price.”

George Bandy Jr., Interface

bring in people from various industries to our showrooms all the time. We also participate in organizations—USGBC, GreenBiz, NeoCon—where we connect with the industry and customers in multiple ways. With all these audiences, we get easier cooperation on post-consumer recycling when stakeholders understand its importance. gb&d: How do you involve the supply chain?

Bandy: All trends in the industry are toward sustainability, so any company that is not moving in this direction is a dinosaur. But our social sustainability goals come together with our environmental objectives in our Net-Works project. NetWorks provides a source of income for small fishing villages in the Philippines while cleaning up discarded fishing nets from their beaches and waters. [The] nets are collected and sold to our trusted yarn supplier and partner, Aquafil.

Bandy: As an undergraduate I was always very interested in this. When I worked for the University of Texas–Houston after college in the 1990s, we used The Natural Step program [a framework for organizational involvement in sustainability, also embraced by Interface], where I met the leaders of the movement: Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins, Janine Benyus, Brian Yeoman, and Ray Anderson among them. That’s when the lightbulb went on for me. gb&d: From your perspective, what are the biggest opportunities in the near future?

Bandy: We are excited about the innovations, new technologies, and green chemistry. Ray Anderson’s vision has encouraged our exploration into biobased renewable materials like castor beans that we used in some regional global flooring solutions. Maybe the most exciting things are the innovations that we have not seen yet. gb&d: And that gets back to having a compass to guide present and future employees toward sustainability?

Bandy: Yes. And we have a process. The Gallup StrengthsFinder helps us identify where people’s talents are and where they would be happiest. Ray said the goal was to take waste out of the organization—one of the most wasteful things is for intelligent people not to be in a position to deliver meaningful work at Interface. gb&d march–april 2014

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On the Boards Slimming Down

Goettsch Partners’ LEED Gold office tower on the Chicago River turns the traditional skyscraper on its head Chicago’s riverfront soon will be graced by a lithe, LEED Gold, 51-story office tower that upends expectations by tapering inward from the eighth floor down. Goettsch Partners proposed the daring design in the summer of 2013 with a 2016 completion date for the 1.1 million-square-foot 150 North Riverside, which will add another distinctive entry to the skyline. Much more than a gimmick, the decreased footprint takes up only a third of the parcel’s space, allowing the city’s riverwalk to remain open and the surrounding railroad tracks to run undisturbed. An amphitheater to the east and cultivated space to the west combine with pathways to increase foot traffic and humanize the site. gb&d —Christopher James Palafox

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A series of rippling, six- to sixteen-inch aluminum fins rise with the building, echoing the Chicago River.

ABOVE Riverfront park space was increased by reducing parking spaces to a mere 76, all of which are sited below the park.

RIGHT Because of the lack of perimeter columns, the building’s weight is directed to its steelreinforced concrete foundation.

Goettsch likens the strategy to sinking a fence post three feet below concrete.

PUNCH LIST

IN CONVERSATION with Larry Kearns Continued from p. 18

gb&d: That’s a funny thing about parks— once they are there, it would take a lot for someone to want to get rid of it, like the old Prentice Hospital—once, no one would’ve thought about tearing it down. But it’s hard to imagine that anyone would ever propose bulldozing this park.

PART 3: A GANGLAND ASSASSINATION gb&d: You’re a working architect, so I don’t want to not ask you about your recent work.

The Exelon Gym. Pretty close to here, right?

Kearns. Yep. Just over the tracks. gb&d: Which is what? West Humboldt Park?

Kearns: Right. You know, the neighborhood lines, which I think were drawn by the University of Chicago in the ’30s, are immutable.

When we started [Inspiration Kitchens], we were also working on the Exelon Gym, so we had talked to the Garfield Park Conservatory Alliance about [putting] in an urban garden, but the reality is that it was on the wrong side of the tracks. It is extremely close physically and worlds apart politically.

RENDERINGS: GOETTSCH PARTNERS

“During the course of working on that building, it was hit four times by vehicles, once by a city bus that actually entered the façade. It’s the wild, wild west.”

150 North Riverside’s tapered structure is similar to Seattle’s Rainier Tower, which has been dubbed “the wine glass” by locals.

The projects share a structural engineer, Magnusson Klemencic Associates.

During the course of working on that building, it was hit four times by vehicles, once by a city bus that actually entered the façade. The superintendent was outside when somebody was gangland assassinated, shot in the head on the sidewalk.

To build that gym, they came to a détente among the drug dealers in the area. They had agreements about where they were going to conduct business because we were disrupting one of their areas of commerce.

It’s a neighborhood that is contested gang [territory]. Organized crime when it’s organized is actually not that disruptive, but when you get on the boundaries is when you get a lot of problems. It’s the wild, wild west.

[The school] really struggled for students, which is a lot of the reason why the gym was The conversation continues on p. 127

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Material World Tailor-Made Metal

GKD’s metal mesh adds flourish and views while controlling solar gain Sometimes you need to be a little brash. When HOK Architects designed an academic building at the University of Florida, it used 8,000 square feet of Escale 7 x 1 architectural mesh by GKD Metal Fabrics to make a strong aesthetic statement and reduce solar gain while allowing light to shine through. Manufactured primarily from stainless steel that

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contains post-industrial and post-consumer content, metal fabrics such as the kind used at the University of Florida can be reused and contribute to LEED points in multiple categories. Besides metal’s visual qualities, the material is corrosion resistant, versatile, conducive to ventilation, and sustainable. The mesh’s versatility—it can be used for railings, walls, column covers, or just about anything else—also extends to the creation of low-maintenance media screens that are transparent when not in use but can project images and communicate when needed. gb&d —Christopher James Palafox

Permeable metal fabrics allow occupants natural daylighting without the solar gain but also can add an architectural element to a building’s exterior.

gbdmagazine.com

PHOTO: NEW YORK FOCUS

GKD assesses which metal fabric is best for every project based on direction, climate, and location.

PUNCH LIST

Discussion Board Which author has most influenced you?

IN CONVERSATION with Larry Kearns Continued from p. 125

pivotal in helping them attract [new students] and not being thought of as a poor cousin among the Noble campuses. They’re not near good public transportation lines. But it’s really righted the ship for them; they’ve had a lot of good results recruiting since the gym. gb&d: And here I was going to just ask about the skylights.

“Martin Handford (creator of Where’s Waldo) isn’t really much of an author, but his elaborate urban environments and whimsical plays on the interaction with people and space were early influencers bringing me to architecture. My search for Waldo was always more than met the eye.”

Dave Swetz, Butler Armsden Architects, p. 21

“I read Albert Camus’s The Plague many years ago, and the message for me remains loud and clear: We are on an island—Earth. There are multiple existential problems which sometimes seem overwhelming—climate change, our plague.

But we can lead a satisfying life attempting solutions—creating sustainable buildings.”

Arthur Klipfel, Oaktree Development, p. 40

“The Turning Point by physicist Fritjof Capra. It envisaged how as more human understanding expands, so does the recognition of the interconnectedness of all parts—both scientific and cultural. Stressing the understanding of the web-like structure of all systems has profound implications for all professions, especially architecture.”

Kevin Tyrrell, Quatro Design Group, p. 76

“About the time that I was seriously considering becoming an architect, I was also reading Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. This story inspired me to become an architect and also instilled in me the sense of the persistence that would be required to realize buildings of enduring quality.”

Horst Noppenberger, Horst Architects, p. 16

PHOTO: SAMANTHA SIMMONS (KEARNS)

“Roberto Burle Marx is still a part of my daily life, in thought and physically by the plants he gave me and by his paintings, which grace the spaces of my studio and home. He knew plants’ cultural preferences and always created plant communities based on ecology. I have never met anyone with as much knowledge and passion for plants as Roberto.”

Raymond Jungles, Raymond Jungles, Inc., p. 28

EXCLUSIVE EXTRAS Read more responses to Larry’s question at gbdmagazine.com.

gb&d

Larry Kearns’s answer? John McPhee. Learn why in the Q&A that begins on p. 11.

Kearns: (Laughs) But socially, it’s interesting too because you have some of the wealthiest corporate titans—one black, one Anglo—on that project. John Rowe and Frank Clark, both of Exelon ComEd fame, are the name donors. And they’re not like, “Here’s my cash, send me the pictures.” They and their wives are mentoring students there, and they’re not like, “What’s your name again?” They really know the kids. That project, though it’s known as a gymnasium, is really there to host both the athletic events and the culture-building events; they call them Town Halls, but they’re pep rallies for academics and leadership, where students are recognized not for their athletic achievements but for their achievements either in the classroom or in some sort of leadership situation.

PART 4: MONEY-MAKING MACHINES gb&d: 1611 W. Division pretty much transformed that corner (at Division and Ashland streets). One of the things people are talking about is that there’s no parking. That was the point: you’ve got the train right there, you should be able to navigate Chicago pretty well from here. What were some of the other green features?

Kearns: You know, just to be frank, we don’t usually do for-profit buildings, or buildings as money-making machines, as I say. In this case, the developer was a client many times over. He’s also a client who’s active in a lot of not-for-profit work that we do. He’s a rare bird in that way. But I would say [the transit orientation] is way out in front as the biggest benefit, and what I can feel good about, with an alderman who’s sort of the cool, hipster alderman who wants to do something sensible.

It is still a high-performing building in terms of its exterior wall; it doesn’t go nuts on the amount of glass. It’s also a mixed-use building. It’s got quite a number of things going on in that urban setting, with the retail and the office and the living space.

The conversation continues on p. 129

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PUNCH LIST

On the Spot Larry Kearns

IN CONVERSATION with Larry Kearns Continued from p. 127

When I see a building like Aqua (Tower, by Studio Gang)—and I totally get the aesthetic excitement around that building, but you couldn’t come up with a better way to radiate the heat that you’re supposed to keep in that building. It’s built like a radiator, like a fin tube. The people on the tech side get that and make jokes about it.

This issue’s guest editor sounds off in favor of new nuclear power generation and against the notion of the “starchitect,” but his most compelling idea may be the way he’d explain sustainability to a kindergartner.

gb&d: Don’t tell Jeanne (laughs).

Kearns: And I don’t need to spend my time being critical— gb&d: No, it’s a good point.

AN ARTICLE YOU RECENTLY SHARED “Ditching CPS for the Suburbs,” Chicago Reader,

MOST COMPELLING ARGUMENT FOR ENVIRONMENTAL STEWARDSHIP

September 24, 2013.

Survival.

THE PERFECT CITY WOULD HAVE

YOUR PERSONAL DEFINITION OF SUSTAINABILITY

Robust intercity, regional, and local mass transit

Investing human capital, natural capital, and

connecting dense urban cores and “necklaces” of green space.

monetary capital wisely.

ONE TECHNOLOGY ON THE HORIZON THAT CAN CHANGE THE WORLD

WHAT YOU’D TELL THE GREEN MOVEMENT IF IT WAS YOUR CHILD The upcoming adolescent years are going to be

Large-scale interstate DC power transmission.

the toughest.

THE NEXT BIG IDEA WILL COME FROM

SADDEST CUTTING-ROOM FLOOR CASUALTY

Battery research, both grid-scale storage and

New nuclear power generation.

portable storage.

CURRENT PROJECT YOU’RE MOST EXCITED ABOUT

The Pantheon.

a 100-year-old lumberyard for a grades 7–12 charter school seeking to leverage blended learning.

A CENTURY FROM NOW HUMANITY WILL

MOST IMPACTFUL EXPERIENCE IN NATURE

Have curtailed global warming.

Fort Jefferson, Dry Tortugas. After the seaplanes

BUILDING YOU WOULD SAVE IF THE WORLD WAS GOING TO END

HARSHEST CRITICISM YOU’VE EVER RECEIVED Ralph Lerner, a visiting juror to University of

Miami in my fourth year of a five-year program.

I made a comparison of my project to another well-known building, and he ripped me a new one. Comparisons to famous buildings are unnecessary. I never made that mistake again.

GREATEST PROFESSIONAL PET PEEVE

PHOTO: SAMANTHA SIMMONS

The “starchitect” phenomenon, attributing

The Intrinsic School, an adaptive reuse of

and hovercraft leave the island around 4 p.m., it becomes a tranquil embrace of architecture and nature. I slept on the beach and kayaked around the island.

YOUR FIELD’S BIGGEST HURDLE TO IMPROVING ITS PRACTICES Ignorance—right-brain and left-brain divide.

HOW YOU WOULD EXPLAIN “GREEN” TO A KINDERGARTNER

buildings to individuals rather than teams.

Living in cooperation instead of

GLOBAL TOPIC THAT NEEDS MORE ATTENTION

NEWS SOURCE YOU HOPE WILL NEVER DIE

Carbon emissions. Yes, even more attention.

CSPAN. Unfiltered.

HOW TO MAKE THE ENVIRONMENT A NON-PARTISAN ISSUE

THE THOUGHT OR IDEA THAT CENTERS YOU

Enhance incentives to innovation so that more

one thing: how many times we choose to step up to the plate. gb&d

clean-energy businesses will succeed in an unsubsidized market.

gb&d

Kearns: When buildings are money-making machines, you don’t want to put that mindset away. You still want it to be a building that’s not going to hemorrhage energy. Most people don’t give a shit if somebody else is paying for the energy. That’s just the reality.

“It’s not coming out of my wallet, I don’t care.

What’s in it for me?” Just like your dad in soil conservation in the middle of Kansas.

So even though we’re not obligated to wear that hat in a lot of ways, we still tried to [make 1611 W. Division] socially a redeemable building, just doing smart stuff like protecting the streetscape, providing a modicum of social space, making the roof occupiable, that sort of thing.

competition.

“You still want it to be a building that’s not going to hemorrhage energy.

Most people don’t give a shit if somebody else is paying for the energy.”

Generally speaking, our firm tries to do really difficult projects. The easy ones don’t require much intellectual input. We like projects with a lot of constraints and a lot of ambitious goals. I think [sustainability] has added something to our playbook and our knowledge base and a reason to pursue triple-bottom-line projects. We have two bona fide, triple-bottom-line projects completed—hopefully with more on the way—with [clients] who are focused on more than just a magazine cover. (Laughs) Sorry! gb&d

In the probabilistic haze, we remain in control of

EXCLUSIVE EXTRAS Read the full conversation with Larry and go behind the scenes at gbdmagazine.com.

march–april 2014

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GREEN BUILDING & DESIGN

Index Advertisers

A Able Services, 36 ableserve.com 800.461.9033

CPA Architecture, 101 cpaarchitecture.com 201.868.0701

LeClairRyan, 55 leclairryan.com 434.245.3423

Spring Valley Construction Company, 22 svcc.biz 214.340.9800

ABM, 36 abm.com 800.874.0780

D Dagher Engineering, 75 dagherengineering.com 212.480.2591

Live Roof, 89 liveroof.com 616.842.1392

American Band of Texas, 22 abtexas.com 214.706.3800

E Eastern Bank, 53 hereyourefirst.com 800.327.8376

Live Wall, 89 livewall.com 877.554.4013

Steelscape, 2 steelscape.com 888.285.7717

Sustainable Energy Analytics, 41 sea.us.com 781.652.8282

American Campus Communities, 75 americancampus.com 512.732.1000

F Foamglas, 131 foamglas.us/building 800.327.6100

G GE Appliances, 75 geospring.com 800.626.2005

Lightfair, 132 lightfair.com 404.220.2220

H Hunter Tile, 93 505.690.9549

O Oaktree Development, 41 oakdev.com 617.491.9100 ext. 101

Architectural Engineering Design Group, 101 aedesign-inc.com 303.296.3034

B Bird, 93 bird.ca 604.271.4600 C Cailis Mechanical, 33 cailismechanical.com 954.252.0263 CBRE, 55 cbre.com/charlottesville 434.974.7377 Certainteed, 36 certainteed.com 800.233.8990

J J. Calnan & Associates, 53 jcalnan.com 617.801.0200 JQ Engineering, 120 jqeng.com 214.752.9098 L Laschober + Sovich, 82 laschobersovich.com 818.713.9011

M Martin Harris Construction, 26 martinharris.com 702.385.5257

P Permaloc, 82 permaloc.com 800.356.9660 PurRain Watertanks, 58 purrain.com 800.808.6465

Sustainable Growth Technologies, 120 908.334.2397 T The Gordian Group, 24 thegordiangroup.com 800.874.2291 TMR Engineering, 58 tmrengineering.com 703.525.6268 U Unilux, 22 unilux.com 201.712.1266 W Webster Window & Door, 36 websterwindowanddoor.com 314.699.9872 Wharton School of Business—San Francisco, 58 sf.wharton.upenn.edu 866.942.7866

S Shore Point Architecture, 64 shorepointarch.com 732.774.6900

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