Design for community and public service
Selected Projects
Newark Civic Center
Newark, California
Client: City of Newark
Size: 64,130 square feet
Completion Date: 2021
Sustainability: LEED Silver ®
The Civic Center, which includes the David W. Smith City Hall, the Newark Police Station, and the Alan L. Nagy library, is the largest project ever undertaken in Newark. The process was streamlined by the architects, builders, and engineers through the Design-Build delivery method, allowing it to be completed on time and on budget.
The three different buildings are centered by a plaza that serves as a multi-function public event space, evoking a distinct town center feel and creating a sense of community for Newark residents.
The team used bridging and schematic documents developed by Heller Manus Architects, in collaboration with Safdie Rabines Architects and McClaren Wilson & Lowrie, Inc as a starting point for the project. Perkins&Will, as the Executive Architect/Architect of Record, further developed and refined the design and completed the project with our Design-Build partner, Webcor Builders.
― WHAT IT IS
The new Civic Center is more than a place to do the City’s business; it is a source of pride and community identification.
― WHAT MAKES IT COOL
The design team reclaimed and reused an original stained glass mural that celebrated the history of Newark.
City Hall council chambers.
Light-filled lobby spaces invite the public inside.
Locating the buildings around a public plaza inspires a positive relationship between the public and their civic agencies.
Newark Civic Center
Contra Costa County Administration Building
Martinez, California
Client: Contra Costa County
Size: 65,000 square feet
Completion Date: 2024
Sustainability: LEED Platinum ® , TRUE Zero Waste Gold
Ground-up construction of a new office administration building and civic plaza for Contra Costa County in downtown Martinez. The new building replaced a programmatically obsolete and contextually out of scale office tower. Program included a new public law library, ground floor retail space, a parking garage, and office space for multiple County administrative departments including the Office of Racial Equity and Social Justice, Child Support Services, and County Sheriff.
The new building was sited among existing historic buildings to anchor a new public plaza formed by the vacation of a city street within the County administration campus.
The all-electric building employed a number of innovative sustainable features, including high performance energy use with on-site photovoltaics, responsibly sourced finishes, and low embodied carbon cast-in-place concrete. The plaza included street improvements and innovative storm water system that responded to the site’s challenging groundwater table and topography.
New office administration building and civic plaza in downtown Martinez.
― WHAT MAKES IT COOL
The first government building to receive TRUE Zero Waste gold certification.
Contra Costa County Administration Building
Clockwise from Top Right: Office space, public plaza, lobby.
Essential Services Building
South
San Francisco, California
Client: Confidential
Size: 19,727 square feet
Completion Date: 2024
Sustainability: Targeting LEED Platinum, Fitwel V2.1, and ILFI Zero Carbon Certification
The net-zero energy, mass timber building is a state-of-the-art security and emergency response center. The single-story building contains offices and an apparatus bay for parking and maintenance of emergency vehicles.
The interior is designed with the psychological wellbeing of employees and visitors in mind, recognizing the high stress environments many are faced with when called to the field. Allowing the natural beauty of its materials to shine, this facility will elevate the everyday experience of its users, which complement the variety of workspace environments and the full kitchen and amenities deck with bbq grill. Modern, high-contrast materials and rich earthy tones will complement biophilic elements such as a structural wood ceiling that adds visual warmth to the offices and public spaces.
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A highly sustainable mass timber building that welcomes employees and visitors to the campus.
A 72% reduction in whole-life carbon is achieved through its mass timber structure, low-carbon concrete, insulation, and finishes.
Clockwise from Top Right: Apparatus Bay, Lobby, Office Space.
LAPD Metropolitan Division Facility Renovation
Los Angeles, California
Client: City of Los Angeles
Size: 25,320 square feet
Completion Date: 2016
Sustainability: LEED Platinum ®
Policing in Los Angeles was a vastly different affair in 1966 than in 2016. In 1966, the original LAPD Rampart Station was designed as a heavily-fortified community police station. It was a walled-off 2-story concrete bunker in a residential neighborhood – a necessary design response in a time of riots, Proposition 14, and social upheaval in a rapidly-growing city.
Fifty years later, our design team worked with the LAPD to reconfigure the old station to house the elite LAPD Metro division that includes SWAT, the K-9 unit, an administrative platoon and five field platoons.
Together, we developed tactical interventions that respect the original architecture while communicating a welcome fresh image to the community. As the “physical embodiment of neighborhood safety,” a police station sets the tone of how the force interface and relate with their communities.
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A comprehensive transformation of an elite LAPD Metro division.
― WHAT MAKES IT COOL
Layered degrees of security were produced through carefully understated and invisibly integrated strategies.
