gb&d Issue 69: Winter 2023 by Green Building & Design

Sense of Place G R E E N B U I L D I N G I S S U E 69

D E S I G N

DESIGNING NEW COWORKING EXPERIENCES, PG. 43

UP FRONT

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Photo: alanblakely.com

Crisp Smooth Color

H I G H L I N E S 1 + F L U S H WA L L PA N E L S

Explore the PAC-CLAD Color Palette “The metal panels gave us a crisp, smooth surface and edge that offset and contrasted with the randomness of the stone. They also provided an opportunity for additional color in the façade.” -Dwayne Mollard, AIA, principal, Collaborate Architects

< View Video + Case Study

LSC - East Aldine Center, Houston, TX Contractor: PRC Roofing & Sheet Metal Architects: IBI Group, Collaborate Architects Profiles: Highline S1, Flush wall panels Colors: Copper Penny, Cardinal Red

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PAC -CLAD.COM | 800 PAC CLAD

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VO L U M E 14

PG 94

The Evolution of Sustainable Interior Design In-depth with NYSID, exploring how the meaning of sustainable interior design is changing

PG 100

Why Choose Precast? Precast concrete is sustainable and makes jobs run smoother, according to the experts at Gensler.

PG 108

Design Strategies for the Modern Office Perkins & Will shares their insights into workplace design, from flooring to flexible spaces.

PG 118

Designing Sustainable Health Care Environments Rethinking health care design and sustainability with Microban

ON THE COVER Center of Developing Entrepreneurs, designed by Wolf Ackerman and EskewDumezRipple.

PHOTO COURTESY OF GENSLER

Photo by Alan Karchmer

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UP FRONT s content

Products

Projects

Practice

PG 14

PG 43

PG 127

These coworking spaces feel like home while celebrating green living.

Corgan’s Matt McDonald on designing a net-positive energy development for Wells Fargo

PG 56

PG 132

Inside the first netpositive energy public school in New England

Gensler’s impressive Baton Rouge office to residential conversion

PG 64

PG 136

BuildingWork and a local tribe collaborate to design this LEED Silver library.

Austin’s smartest building achieved incredible environmental and sustainability goals.

PG 70

PG 140

This LEED Platinum project was designed by STUDIOS Architecture and emphasizes outdoor spaces.

JZA’s Jeff Zbikowski on the benefits of walkable design

Editors’ Picks

New colorful interior designs

PG 24

Carbon Neutral Acoustic Solutions

Autex Acoustics’ products raise the bar for sustainability.

PG 28

Clear Vision

Architectural and specialty glass from GGI is making facades more fantastic than ever.

PG 34

Concrete Changes

The concrete industry is going green with ECOPact.

Designing for Entrepreneurs

Net-Positive Nature

Modern Maritime

Limitless at LinkedIn

In Conversation

Residential Redo

RiverSouth

Architect to Watch

PG 78

Sustainably Sleek

This passive house retreat in the New England woods was designed to be a respite. FROM TOP: PHOTO BY LEONARDO DUGGENTO; KYLE JEFFERS; RYAN GOBUTY

PG 84

Park House

How architects complete a striking modern home on a narrow urban lot using CLT

fall 2020

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LEARNING FURNITURE FOR EVERY AGE Jonti-Craft is your complete solution to creating learning spaces for any age—from nursery through highshcool and beyond.

Editor-in-Chief Christopher Howe Associate Publisher Laura Howe Managing Editor Laura Rote Art Director Madison Wisse Content Marketing Director Julie Veternick Content Marketing Manager Colette Conway Contributors Sara Freund, Zack Harold, Ian P. Murphy, Myah Taylor, Matt Watson, Yuyan Zhang, Jessica Zuniga

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Printed in the USA. © 2023 by Green Advocacy Partners, LLC. All rights reserved. Green Building & Design (gb&d) is printed in the United States using only soy-based inks. Please recycle this magazine. The contents of this publication may not be reproduced in whole or in part without the consent of the publisher. The publisher is not responsible for product claims and representations. The Green Building & Design logo is a registered trademark of Green Advocacy Partners, LLC.

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BRINGING YOUR CREATIVE VISIONS TO LIFE. From building facades to stunning interiors and public art displays, GGI offers specialty glass solutions, custom fabrication and oversized capabilities designed to enhance the modern built environment. Glass that is functional, decorative and environmentally friendly, combined with precision workmanship and five generations of glass industry expertise. This is what you can count on from GGI.

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public library reflects and honors the many contributions of the tribe and demonstrates BuildingWork’s vision of architecture as an opportunity to layer use and meaning in its surroundings. Modern Maritime, pg. 64 3

Where picking out carpet used to be a burden of office projects, it’s now much more fun, according to Ariel Lumry of Perkins&Will. “Now carpet is something that enhances the design. There’s more of this organic form and seamlessness to the patterning. It’s more timeless and more sustainable too because it stays in the space. It doesn’t get dated quickly,” she says. Design Strategies for the Modern Office, pg. 108 4

The Harvard Business School Library has digitally printed large Alice glass panels fabricated by GGI using a custom wood grain design and custom color to match the exotic natural wood finish used in the interior. Large “knockout” areas or narrow vertical slotted spaces within the fully opaque glazing support the need for vision areas and daylighting. Clear Vision, pg. 28 2

5 Things We Learned Behind-the-scenes extras and fun facts discovered making this issue.

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The La Conner Swinomish Library in the historic maritime town of La Conner, about 70 miles north of Seattle, was constructed using cross laminated timber (CLT). The LEED Silver–certified project is one of the first publicly funded buildings to utilize CLT for the entire building structure. The project was designed by the Seattle-based architecture firm BuildingWork in collaboration with the neighboring Swinomish Indian Tribal Community. The

The Center for Developing Entrepreneurs completed in 2022 is so popular it’s 100% leased, according to the architects at EskewDumezRipple who worked on the project. The coworking space has a waiting list, and the plaza space is constantly activated by community events and pedestrian mall gatherings. “It is exciting to see the benefits that the project has brought to Charlottesville Downtown and how the power of design can bring a sense of place to a community,” says Jose Alvarez, principal architect at EskewDumezRipple. Designing for Entrepreneurs, pg. 43

PHOTO COURTESY OF GGI

MacKay-Lyons-Sweetapple Architects designed the Queen’s Marque development in Halifax to be LEED Platinum. A U-shaped, three-part composition abstractly reflects marine forms inspired by the historic ships that once sailed the Atlantic. The design also includes a sunken hull as a metaphor for how the culture can reinvent itself. The configuration of the complex preserves views to the historic citadel, extends the civic grid to the water, repairs and completes the pedestrian boardwalk along the shoreline, establishes a protected microclimate, and gives Halifax its first public gathering place along the harbor. Queen’s Marque, pg. 146

company index

Your Source for Daylighting Systems + Natural Ventilation Solutions

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company index

directory ISSUE 69

aeroseal pg. 126 aeroseal.com 877.349.3828

GCP pg. 23 gcpat.com 866.333.3726

Jonti-Craft pg. 8 jonti-craft.com 507.342.5169

New York School of Interior Design pg. 93, 94 nysid.edu 212.472.1500

Armstrong pg. 148 armstrongceilings.com/commercial 877.276.7876

GGI (General Glass International) pg. 9, 28 generalglass.com 201.553.1850

Kingspan Light + Air pg. 13 kingspan.com 800.759.6985

PAC-CLAD | Petersen pg. 5 pac-clad.com 800.PAC.CLAD

Autex Acoustics pg. 7, 24 autexacoustics.com 424.203.1813

G Wood Products pg. 2 gwoodpro.com

Malarkey Roofing Products pg. 147 malarkeyroofing.com 800.545.1191

Sensera Systems pg. 42 senserasystems.com 800.657.0437

Bentley Mills pg. 21, 108 bentleymills.com 800.423.4709

Holcim pg. 34 holcim.us 888.646.5246

Mean Green Products pg. 19 meangreenproducts.com 513.738.4736

Solatube International pg. 11 solatube.com 888.765.2882

Fabcon pg. 100 fabconprecast.com 714.881.2000

Hörmann pg. 15 hormann.us 877.OK.HORMANN

Microban International pg. 118 microban.com 704.875.0806

Zip Water pg. 17 na.zipwater.com 833.233.2358

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Have a commercial project requiring daylighting design? Call 888.765.2882 and learn how Solatube can help. www.solatube.com/commercial

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Pheaby by Patricia Urquiola for Moroso

PHEABY IS PART OF THE ROWS COLLECTION BY PATRICIA URQUIOLA. ITS GEOMETRICAL AND MINIMALIST DESIGN EXPRESSES A REFINED ARTISTIC CONCEPT.

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chair structure in ash or oak. The seat is lacquered in the five colors chosen for the Rows collection—Honey, Cinnamon, Forest Green, Taupe, and Coal Grey. The seat and back are upholstered with polyurethane foam in varied densities. Pheaby is flame retardant-free. MOROSO.IT

Bright Interiors Unexpected, colorful furniture choices for inspiring interior design

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PHOTO BY LEONARDO DUGGENTO

Artisanal meets industrial in this Patricia Urquiola–designed upholstered chair for Moroso. Called Pheaby, its legs have feet more reminiscent of a carpenter’s trestle than a typical chair, supporting a softly rounded seat with no sharp edges. Pheaby comes with a solid wooden base; choose a

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The Luva Modular Sofa by Gabriel Tan for Herman Miller

PHOTOS COURTESY OF HERMAN MILLER

This organic, modular design from Portugalbased Singaporean designer Gabriel Tan is all about options. Portuguese for “glove,” Luva was designed at Tan’s studio in Porto. Its shape was inspired by the soft grip and padded support of boxing gloves and the delicate rolled tops of Japanese futons or Shikibuton. Luva can expand into an open back, so you can lounge, or it can be situated as a more supportive seat. Luva is available in armchair, chaise, sofa, and sectional configurations. A hidden bar near the bottom of the seat allows you to combine or separate pieces easily. HERMANMILLER.COM

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Experience a new Wave in workplace hydration. The multi-award winning HydroTap® by Zip Water is already the standard in hydration for hundreds of thousands for workplaces around the globe. And now, we are making it even safer with the HydroTap Touch-Free Wave. Simply wave your hand over the sensors to get instant filtered boiling, chilled or sparkling water all from a single tap! Ditch the single-use cans andbottles. Upgrade your workplace hydration with water at its best. Learn more at us.zipwater.com/wave

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Electric by Bendtsen Design Associates for Keilhauer

PHOTOS COURTESY OF KEILHAUER

The red-hot Electric sofa is equally at home in the modern workplace and private offices. Electric meets the demand for both beautiful furniture and, quite literally, a place to recharge, as it comes with an optional integrated power source. Designer Niels Bendtsen said its form is meant to create a classic silhouette that’s also quite dynamic. The piece is Keilhauer’s first freestanding sofa to offer a built-in power source option. You’ll find one standard outlet and two USB ports at the center of the sofa, discreetly installed underneath the seat. KEILHAUER.COM

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MEAN GREEN® ELECTRIC ZERO-TURN MOWERS

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Artes Round Rug from Sit-In with ECONYL

PHOTOS COURTESY OF ECONYL BY AQUAFIL

This rug is part of the Artes collection from Sit-In. Winding, pop-influenced lines bring life to the fabric, as the Artes rugs collection expresses all the character of a modern home with people on the move. The Artes collection is hypoallergenic, with innovative Virex treatment that reduces the viral load up to 99.9%. ECONYL itself is made entirely from waste, is 100% recyclable, and offers up to a 90% reduction in global warming potential compared to standard nylon. Designers are increasingly turning to it to create incredible new designs—from carpet to chairs to handbags. SHOP.ECONYL.COM

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on the block, serve it up, and from scratch

The Culinary Collection™ On The Block

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Prima Vista by Bentley Mills

PHOTO COURTESY OF BENTLEY MILLS

Bentley Mills’ new area rug program takes interior design options to the next level with customizable wool area rugs. Prima Vista is the debut pattern collection of hand-tufted, hand-loomed, and hand-knotted rugs made by Bentley’s expert artisans using ancient rug-making techniques. The collection features a library of 50 patterns—choose one, change one to suit your vision, or start from scratch. The rugs are made with 100% New Zealand wool and fully customizable by size, shape, and edge detail. All Bentley carpet products are Cradle to Cradle–certified and produced in a carbon neutral, LEED Gold– certified manufacturing facility. Learn more about the sustainable flooring manufacturer on page 108. BENTLEYMILLS.COM

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Carbon Neutral Acoustic Solutions Autex Acoustics offers innovative solutions that are also pleasant on the eyes. BY MYAH TAYLOR

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n the great migration back to the office, some employees are feeling a bit more sensitive to sounds around them after months or even years of remote work. Autex Acoustics is innovating acoustic solutions that both make the workplace more beautiful and make it easier to get work done. Founded in New Zealand with an office in southern California, Autex is a leading designer and supplier of innovative acoustic products, including everything from ceiling to wall solutions, and they know how much sound can impact a space and its occupants. “We’ve started to see a renaissance of focus on acoustic treatment because noise after the pandemic is a little more audible to everybody,” says Antonio Holguin, business development and sustainability lead for Autex Acoustics North America. “You don’t have to be an expert to understand that.” Designing environments that foster health and wellness is just one aspect of the company’s commitment to sustainability. Autex’s sustainability strategy aligns with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, with five pillars that include monitoring carbon emissions, ensuring products are sustainable throughout their lifetime, and creating a sustainable and ethical supply chain. All of Autex’s products are carbon neutral. PHOTO COURTESY OF AUTEX ACOUSTICS

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Estimates show buildings directly and indirectly cause approximately 40% of greenhouse gas emissions. Autex says it’s the first PET acoustic manufacturer to be carbon neutral. Their journey started in 2017 with their first published Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) and GHG emission measurements. “This was before there was a huge push in the industry, much less the acoustics industry, to be looking at these figures and be mindful of the way we operate and how we make our own products,” Holguin says. The company engages in product optimization by evaluating its product and creating ways to use less virgin material and less material altogether—all while ensuring it has the same high-performing qualities. These are some of the top benefits of their carbon neutral acoustic solutions.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF G WOOD PRODUCTS

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1. LESS RAW MATERIAL In 2020 Autex’s dematerialization project reduced raw material use by 30% for the core product. By 2021 the company balanced all emissions from its acoustic products to zero. By 2022 this included emissions from global operations in New Zealand, Australia, the United States, and the United Kingdom. Autex’s current GHG emission profile is equivalent to the annual emissions of 1,767 passenger vehicles, according to the EPA GHG Calculator.

2. RECYCLED CONTENT Autex’s products include a minimum of 60% recycled PET and post-consumer plastic. “That means we’re taking plastic water bottles and recycling them into our panels,” Holguin says. “As an industry we’re really starting to look at circularity and the conversation around ‘how do we create products that are working or functioning in this closed loop versus ending up in the landfill?’” Autex starts by taking waste, in this case used plastic bottles, and turning them into something innovative and useful. Part of that process includes partnering with architects and designers when installing or specifying Autex products to ensure they’re using the acoustic product in a way that is easy to take apart at the end of a project’s life.

3. LONGER LIFE “We’ve got a 10-year warranty on our product, and for the most part we’ll see most interiors change within that time frame,” Holguin says. “So it’s working with our designers to make sure that instead of gluing down a panel they’re attaching it in a way where they can come in and remove it so we can build out a take-back program or so it can be reused in some way, shape, or form instead of getting damaged and thrown away.”

PHOTO COURTESY PHOTOS COURTESYOF OFPOLYCOR AUTEX ACOUSTICS

4. OCCUPANT WELL-BEING How does that reusability and overall mission of sustainability impact building occupants? “For so long we’ve talked about the building component in the industry. What does it mean to have a healthy building? Are we running efficiently? Are we looking at those kinds of things? How do we save energy?” Holguin says. “Now we’re really starting to look at the human component of wellness. How do we make sure the building we’re creating is benefiting the people who are going to be operating there?” That starts with using materials that help absorb sound and provide comfort throughout the day. Autex also considers how materials are sourced and the wellness of the people who create the designs in manufacturing supply chains. “We have certifications throughout New Zealand for our factories ensuring that everyone is paid properly and that they’re all working in the safest conditions,” Holguin says. “We’re beginning to look at how we as an operating organization also have an impact on the communities around us and the communities that we operate and work in.” g

At left, Horizon panels are clippable shapes used to create unique feature walls and suspended ceiling designs.

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MONUMENTAL

ARCHITECTURAL & SPECIALTY GLASS

Clear Vision GGI has been leading the industry with architectural and specialty glass since 1900. BY LAURA ROTE

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For more than a century General Glass International, or GGI, has been a pillar of the glass industry. The company is family-owned and operated (started in 1900 by Max Balik) and specializes in architectural and specialty glass products—from ceramic inks and textures to bird-friendly glass and more. The first company to bring the technology to the US in 2008, GGI remains at the forefront of digital direct to glass printing in North America. Stephen Balik, vice president of business development, represents

PHOTO COURTESY OF GGI

More than 400 low-e laminated, insulated, digitally printed pieces of glass combine in this 13,000-square-foot design that pays homage to historic murals at Harlem Hospital Center.

ts an ex per produc t ’s guide

the fifth generation of the family and leads a team focused on innovation through expansion of product offerings and solutions.

Sustainability Glass contributes to more sustainable buildings in many ways—from daylight maximation to nature views and thermal comfort, Balik says. Glass in buildings allows natural

light to penetrate deeper into interiors, reducing the need for artificial lighting and positively impacting the occupants’ well-being by providing a connection to the outside. Properly designed glass facades can harness solar heat gain, reducing the need for heating during colder months and contributing to energy efficiency and climate control. Using glass to allow sunlight to passively heat the interior spaces can also lead to reduced energy consumption and a more comfortable indoor environment.

YEAR LIMITED WARRANTY AGAINST FADING FOR ALICE. PLUS, REDUCE SOLAR HEAT GAIN AND UV EXPOSURE WITH STUNNING AESTHETICS.

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Did You Know?

ALICE DIRECT TO GLASS PRINTING CAN BE USED FOR INTERIOR DESIGN, ARCHITECTURAL, AND INDUSTRIAL APPLICATIONS INSIDE AND OUT.

Of course, glass also means sight, and views of nature are in demand, Balik says. Transparent glass facades offer occupants access to outside views, which have been proven to improve productivity, reduce stress, and enhance the overall well-being of people. Incorporating glass elements in buildings can support biophilic design principles, fostering a sense of connection to nature and promoting a healthier and more satisfying living or working environment. Glass can also be more easily recycled than some other building materials, making it even more environmentally friendly.

With GGI’s Alice Direct to Glass Printing and opacity control you can have daylighting while incorporating imagery or decorative patterns for privacy and aesthetic benefit. The digital ceramic printing process allows architects, CASE STUDY artists, and designers to manipulate art, color, light, and opacity on glass Tata Hall at Harvard to bring life to any space. A texture Business or pattern on glass can give the efSchool includes fect of privacy while letting light a 7-foot tall, pass through into an office space or double-skinned curtain wall health facility, for example—spaces with vented where people often find themselves glass layers inside for long periods of time. that helped the Alice is among GGI’s most impresproject earn LEED Platinum. sive products. With it GGI provided a 37-foot tall, double-skinned curtain wall with vented glass layers set 36 inches apart at Tata Hall at Harvard Business School. The design functions as a thermal blanket in colder temperatures and creates a cooling convection in warm-

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PHOTO COURTESY OF GGI; OPPOSITE: CRAIG COLLINS

Innovation in Action

an ex per t ’s guide

themselves. While 390 Madison didn’t require knockouts, it did need to be backlit—a different type of lighting challenge solved by opacity control,” he says.

Growing Demand

DECORATIVE Alice directto-glass digital ceramic printing enables any design to be reproduced in glass.

GGI has seen an increase in consistent funding from cities supporting projects like these, Balik says, and more architects are interested in adopting the technology in their designs—especially as a new way to bring in public art to urban planning. “What once might have been a graffiti mural or a picture hanging on the wall can now be anything from a structural glass windscreen to a full glass curtain wall on a new hospital.” GGI often works with artists to transform and convert their original artwork to glass, using Alice direct-to-glass printing technology. “It’s exciting for us to take traditional styles of existing artwork and convert it into new forms and see installations in previously impossible places,” Balik says. “We know artists are very close to their work, and we do our best to protect that and their original aesthetic intent. Through our knowledge of the technology and dedication to the sampling process, we develop trusting relationships with the artists. We do our best to explain what’s possible with glass without telling the artist what to do. The possibilities are endless.” GGI was the first company to adopt such technology in the US more than 15 years ago and has spent years refining the process to get it to what it is today. “There are so many more places where decorative glass can be added to a space than before. It’s really about explaining what’s possible,” Balik says.

Bigger & Better

er weather. It helped the project earn LEED Platinum. GGI matched wood that the design team sourced from Africa for the project. “We were handed an actual piece of wood and they simply asked, ‘Can you match this?’ We had never created a replica of a custom material before, but we were ready for the challenge,” Balik says, adding that the success of that project helped GGI go on to launch other exciting faux materials. “We’d never done anything like that before, but we always try to take lessons

from past projects and apply them to future product developments.” A few years later GGI also used the Alice technology at 390 Madison Avenue, a Chase Bank project that involved re-massing a building built in 1955. Balik says it’s another job that uses faux wood materials they could manipulate with light and opacity in a way you couldn’t with real wood. “The Harvard job required some knockouts in the print to allow for natural light to come in, and that also provided some shading in the rooms

Decorative glass is not as expensive as some folks may expect either, says Spencer Raymond, director of business development at GGI. “I think people look at some of these projects and expect the price for the decorative portion to be much more than it is. The actual production has become much more efficient to utilize different processes and different colors on the same piece of glass, where silk screening wouldn’t have allowed that. There’s a lot more flexibility.” For the Harlem Hospital GGI converted existing artwork that was hanging in the lobby of the building using digital pho-

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FUTUREPROOF

PHOTOS COURTESY OF GGI

390 Madison Avenue involved the re-massing of the building originally constructed in 1955.

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tography and produced the design at a reduced opacity so the facade looked backlit at night. From the interior each floor running along the facade looks like abstract art, providing privacy as well as light. The architecture firm HOK had narrowed the choice between GGI or a hand-painted option in Germany for the project. “Instead of hand-painting in Europe we were able to take high-resolution photos of the artwork and use those files to digitally print the full-scale art. Using a digital process gave us a technical advantage in controlling opacity versus the hand-painted option,” Balik says. “We digitally printed these huge panels and laid them out flat on our factory floor to make sure everything aligned from panel to panel. This project was by far the most ambitious of its kind, leading to a nomination for facade of the year among five finalists.” He says it’s ambitious projects like these that align with their mentality to keep pushing the envelope to produce groundbreaking work. It was one of the largest projects in North America of its type. “Our foundation and competitive edge is

our knowledge of the technology and our ability to communicate with artists,” Balik says. “We’re helping bring ideas to glass and to life.”

The Evolution of Glass Glass and glazing options have evolved over the years, says Raymond, who’s also grown up in the industry. “Through improvements in hardware and engineered systems, the application choices for glass have grown significantly. Factoring in the durability and nature of ceramic frit, new possibilities of adding decorative components have emerged. You can incorporate design in places you once weren’t able to without sacrificing natural light or building performance.” Once the digital process was developed for applying ceramic frits the architectural industry recognized it allows for remarkable control of the materials and more flexibility than the silk screening of the past. “What we’re doing is really pushing the

hardware and the software side of the process. A lot of it comes down to the software and the programming. It’s the instructions we give when we’re dealing with image files and color layers. It becomes a very complicated process to tell the machine how to lay these pigments and deal with the layering and the glass material.”

Looking Ahead Balik expects larger glass projects with more complex makeups to continue to be among popular and emerging glass demands. He says glass with more visible light transmission and lower heat gain coefficients are also in demand, as are products that are bird-friendly and easily incorporate daylighting and public art. GGI offers all of these solutions and more, with more innovations on the way. “Architects should reach out to fabricators, manufacturers, or installers as early as possible to understand what is possible or what solutions exist for their issues,” he says. g

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GREEN CONCRETE

Concrete Changes How the industry is going green with ECOPact—a low-carbon solution BY MATT WATSON

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One of the megatrends of the 21st century is the unprecedented urbanization of the world’s population. According to the United Nations, more than half of the global population currently live in urban areas, and that number is projected to rise to around twothirds by 2050. “In 2050 we’ll have 10 billion people on the planet, and to be able to accommodate that we’ll have to build the equivalent of

ts an ex per produc t ’s guide

PHOTO COURTESY OF HOLCIM US

Eleven on the River in Minneapolis was designed by Robert A.M. Stern Architects (RAMSA) and completed in 2022.

New York City every month,” says Michael LeMonds, chief sustainability officer for Holcim US, a leading producer of building materials. “The pace is staggering.” The scope of the physical infrastructure— housing, roads, schools, places of work and worship—that will be needed will place additional stress on the planet’s resources and climate, driving the need for sustainable construction solutions.

1.7

One of the biggest challenges is that the world’s most popular building material is also a major contributor to climate change— with some studies suggesting the production of concrete is responsible for 4 to 8% of CO2 emissions alone. “Globally concrete is the most used material for construction because it can be made just about anywhere for relatively little cost with mostly local materials and low-skill la-

THE MILLIONS OF TONS OF WASTE FROM LANDFILLS THAT HOLCIM US’S ALTERNATIVE FUEL PROGRAM DIVERTED IN 2022

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Did You Know?

ECOPACT IS A LOW-CARBON CONCRETE PRODUCT RANGE THAT CAN REDUCE THE EMBODIED CARBON OF BUILDINGS, INFRASTRUCTURE, AND HOMES BY AT LEAST 30% WITHOUT OFFSETS.

bor,” says Dan Getz, structures global practice director at HKS, a leading international architecture and engineering firm. He said concrete’s popularity with architects, developers, and contractors is also derived from the fact that it is a durable, flexible, inherently fireproof, and resilient building material option. Given that concrete offers such a comprehensive solution for builders, how can the industry drive dramatic reductions in CO2 emissions without lowering the performance of our built environment?

The Move Toward Sustainable Concrete Fortunately the last two decades have seen a marked increase not only in the construction industry’s awareness of climate change but also its awareness of the carbon footprint of traditional concrete. This has led to a growing push for green concrete solutions, both from industry players and from governGREATNESS ment administrations across the US and the globe. “The concrete The Center for Computing & mix of 20 years ago is not the Data Sciences concrete mix of today,” LeMonds at Boston says. “The low carbon concrete University was space has had significant uptake designed by architecture since the 2000s.” firm KPMB Across the market there are using a wide variety of sustainable concrete. concrete solutions. Many innovations include the replacement of traditional Portland cement, which emits large amounts of CO2 in the cement production process, with cementitious materials and the incorporation of recycled aggregates. “Sustainable concrete often replaces a portion of Portland cement with alternative materials like fly ash, slag, or natural pozzolans,”

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SUSTAINABLE

FROM OPPOSITE: PHOTO BY JJ JETEL; COURTESY OF HOLCIM US

ECOPact contributes to a circular economy by diverting waste from landfill and closing material cycles.

“The low carbon concrete space has had significant uptake since the 2000s.”

LeMonds says. “These substitutes reduce CO2 emissions and resource consumption.” Portland-limestone cement is a popular alternative that is blended with a higher limestone content than traditional cement, reducing CO2 emissions by 5 to 10% on average. The concrete mix of 20 years ago is not the concrete mix of today. “It’s kind of like baking bread,” says Erin Winston, structural project manager for HKS. “You use the same materials, but with various ratios you get very different results.” Rather than dictate the exact mix it uses on projects, HKS provides performance benchmarks and lets local producers—who often closely guard their proprietary mixes—decide how to achieve them. Holcim’s OneCem Portland limestone cement, for instance, is manufactured with 10% finely ground high-quality limestone, resulting in a 10% lower embodied carbon. It has been rigorously tested and can be used in virtually any application—from residential construction to large-scale infrastructure. Much of the embodied carbon in cement comes from the heating process in manufacturing, “because a lot of those kilns don’t use

high-quality energy sources; they’re using coal or dirty coke that create the most emissions,” Getz says. Concrete producers are beginning to take action on this front. By the end of the year Holcim will be sourcing 40% of its energy needs at its 350 US facilities from renewable sources like wind and solar. “The goal is to drive transformative change,” LeMonds says. “You can end up with extremely low carbon concrete if you add low carbon electricity into the mix.”

Taking Green Concrete to the Next Level There may be an abundance of options for sustainable concrete in the market today, but not all are created equal. One of the industry’s leading solutions is Holcim’s ECOPact low-carbon concrete, which provides a minimum of 30% lower CO2 output—though many applications offer greater reductions. “The primary motivation [for developing ECOPact] was the urgent need to reduce our CO2 emissions,” LeMonds says. “We now ISSUE 69

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have the capacity to deliver that change.” Holcim launched ECOPact in the DC and Boston regions in July 2020 and has since expanded to other major markets like the Minneapolis area, Denver, and Dallas. Developed at the company’s R&D center in Lyon, France, researchers started with small-scale lab experiments to understand the properties and the aggregate mix before applying them to real world conditions. “While many sustainable concrete solutions aim to reduce carbon footprints, the difference between them lies in the proprietary mix designs, performance attributes, and the extent of carbon reduction,” LeMonds says. “The uniqueness of ECOPact lies in its optimized blend of performance, durability, and sustainability.” Holcim has demonstrated these attributes with projects like the newly built Georgetown University residence hall at 55 H Street in Washington, DC. The client had a deep commitment to sustainability but also a specified requirement for a 28-day strength design of 5,000 psi while reaching a high-early strength of 3,000 psi within two to three days. ECOPact Prime met all of those requirements while reducing CO2 emissions by 40% when compared to standard concrete. Holcim can demonstrate these benefits to clients utilizing a number of digital tools that enhance performance by, for example, offering real-time monitoring as the concrete is placed, ensuring consistent quality.

Measuring Performance Measuring concrete performance, setting standards, and separating the marketing material from the real data remains one of the biggest challenges with improving sustainable practices in the concrete industry.

DURABILITY At the time of its construction in 2013, Cuomo Bridge was the single largest bridge project in New York’s history.

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“The big trend in the market is transparency,” LeMonds says. “Transparency is critical to good decision-making. And really, the driver for transparency in concrete is the use of Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs).” EPDs are a key third-party validation tool that allows industry players—from designers and engineers to developers and manufacturers—to uniformly use data to make credible decisions on what “low carbon” concrete really means. Though EPDs are currently voluntary, they are becoming increasingly popular as the threats from climate change become increasingly clear. Within the last three years Holcim has begun providing EPDs for all products that the company produces in the US. And design and engineering firms like HKS are beginning to require them on any project that bills itself as sustainable. “There’s really there’s no substitute for that, that uniformly presented document,” Getz says. “It’s great to see the industry coalesce around a standardized methodology.”

Government Initiatives Drive Innovation Though the industry is pushing itself in the right direction and standardized sustainability tools are becoming commonplace, LeMonds argues “we need radical collabo-

STRENGTH Concrete provides a strong foundation for UAB Health Medical West in Alabama, designed by HKS.

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ration in the US to reach net zero.” Public procurement and other government policies play a key role. The Biden administration’s Buy Clean Initiative, which sets requirements for the purchase of lower carbon construction materials like sustainable concrete, is leveraging the federal government’s enormous procurement power to move the industry in the right direction. “The federal Buy Clean Initiative is going to drive massive transformative change,” LeMonds says. The federal government’s scale can help set green standards across the construction industry, and its efforts are being complemented by states from California to Maryland. Furthermore, these sustainability requirements are being set at a time of massive federal investments in infrastructure, manufacturing, and green energy production. Recent legislation, including the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill and the Inflation Reduction Act, include requirements for the use of sustainable materials like concrete that will be used to build new roads, bridges, factories, and wind turbines. “As Robin Carnahan at the General Services Administration says, using lower carbon domestic materials is a triple win: it creates good-paying American jobs, tackles climate change, and reduces energy costs,” LeMonds says. g

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INNOVATION ECOPact has a range of mixes of strengths and applications. Place, pump, and finish like conventional concrete.

WHY CHOOSE CONCRETE? • SUSTAINABLE CONCRETE IS IN DEMAND AS DESIGNERS AND DEVELOPERS PRIORITIZE LOW CARBON SOLUTIONS. • PERFORMANCE STANDARDS AND GOVERNMENT INITIATIVES ARE PUSHING THE INDUSTRY TOWARD GREENER CONCRETE OPTIONS.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF HKS, HOLCIM US

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THE LEED PLATINUM– CERTIFIED CENTER OF DEVELOPING ENTREPRENEURS (CODE) IS A NEW MIXED-USE PROJECT IN DOWNTOWN CHARLOTTESVILLE THAT CREATIVELY COMBINES COWORKING, OFFICE, AND RETAIL SPACES.

Designing for Entrepreneurs Coworking spaces that feel like home while celebrating green living WORDS BY L AURA ROTE

PHOTOS BY ALAN KARCHMER

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commercial CODE was designed to employ systems and technologies beyond even LEED standards. More than 30% of the site is covered in native plants.

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The lobby area features an articulated wood wall that hides acoustical materials between the vertical wood elements. The team says this technique provides sound absorption and appropriate acoustical performance in the busy space.

When the design team at EskewDumezRipple got to work on a new mixed-use project in Charlottesville, Virginia, they knew it needed to serve as an inviting front door to the downtown mall. “CODE was designed to act as a highly visible beacon to the Charlottesville community,” says Jose Alvarez, principal architect at EskewDumezRipple. The Center for Developing Entrepreneurs, or CODE, was designed to be a place where locally grown innovations in information technology and clean energy could grow into locally based businesses rather than relocate. The project’s design is warm and walkable, with nods to nature at every turn. The building itself traverses a steep surrounding incline, and the design team carried this notion through to the interiors—carving away at materials or revealing them as the building is similarly carved into and extruded from the earth. “Various program elements celebrate these different layers, like the layers of earth and stone that build up over time and are revealed through excavation,” Alvarez says.

The color palette is also inspired by the earthy tones and metals found on the ground, with bronze metal colors, charcoal textures, and warm wood tones. Challenges Walkability was among the project’s biggest challenges, Alvarez says, as the team wanted to locate CODE on the pedestrian mall. The team decided to stair-step up from the mall toward the intersection of Main and Water streets, spiral up further to meet the scale of Water Street, then design a cascade of occupiable terraces and green roofs. Throughout the design they performed simulations not just for their impact on energy consumption but also to examine the impact of shadows that would be cast. “The spiraling form also generates a courtyard that is simultaneously inviting for pedestrians and yet provides a feeling of enclosure with a water feature at its center.” The next challenge was to make the extremely topographical site universally accessible. “The solution was to include a sizable public plaza space with low sloping

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planes to accommodate ADA accessibility throughout the plaza and provide accessible connections between different site elevations,” Alvarez says. Sustainability Throughout the project the design team assessed carbon emissions associated with the materials used for construction, helping the team lower the carbon footprint of the project even before the building opened. CODE was designed to deliver an indoor working environment informed by the latest research results on how air quality, daylight, and views impact human cognitive function. They achieved this with an energy use intensity about one-third that of typical office buildings, helping the building achieve LEED Platinum. “Green building decisions often prove to be the healthiest decisions for those who will use the building the most,” Alvarez says. “The sustainable intentions of the project were important for the project to provide both performance-enhancing features for the environment and the workers it hosts.” The building envelope design draws from the brick cladding and punched window

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openings of the historic context but is implemented with a modern rainscreen to achieve high levels of insulation and thermal comfort while protecting against water intrusion. “The story of this project illustrates the way our team works,” Alvarez says. “Draw from the vernacular, reinterpret to modern needs and methods, test design concepts with simulation against goals based on the latest in research, and deliver a result that bridges from past to future with a superior environment for occupants and superior environmental performance.” The team chose materials with low emissions throughout, and the building ventilation system provides more than twice the standard flow of fresh air—and in ways that still achieves energy use that is one-third that of the benchmark office building. “We also love the self-shading feature of the inset windows and the articulation of the facade materials as the building negotiates the site slopes and historic context.” Coworking & Community The design team researched coworking spaces extensively, visiting various facilities to find the best balance, especially as coworking

The project was designed to increase the fresh air exchange and provide fine-tuned environmental controls for natural ventilation and daylighting.

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The design team wanted to make the interiors feel like home – cozy and welcoming. This informed warm color choices, with no stark whites or finishes that would feel too austere.

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continues to experience rapid development and innovation, Alvarez says. “The design team worked with a client representative in pursuing a vision to uphold the changing nature of work, straddling a line between the formal and informal, instilling a unique blend of clean commercial space with a more relaxed residential feel,” he says. “All interior elements, from furniture and textiles to fixtures and artwork, were handpicked by the team in fostering a warm, welcoming space.” The office’s communal elements were designed to stand out from each other, while private offices were more standardized—furthering the notion that most people would gravitate to the communal spaces they found most pleasing, Alvarez says. “Early on the layout and circulation were planned to encourage crosses between the public, the coworking tenants, and the private office users, facilitating conversation and connection between different users and working to balance the vibrance and fun of a coworking space with the formality and professionalism of world-class office and auditorium space.” That feeling of community continues outside, with an “outdoor workplace” experience among green roofs. The cascading green roofs cover eight garden roofs—an amenity to tenants and visitors but also a benefit to visiting birds, insects, and pollinators of all kinds, Alvarez says. The rooftop terraces and gardens support more than 90 distinct species, including more than 7,000 perennials and grasses, 100 shrubs, and 75 large trees, many of which are native. The roof also captures rainwater that is then stored in two underground cisterns and used to irrigate the plants. Today the project is 100% leased and the coworking space has a waiting list. “The plaza space is being constantly activated by community events and pedestrian mall gatherings,” Alvarez says. “It is exciting to see the benefits that the project has brought to downtown Charlottesville—and how the power of design can bring a sense of place to a community.” g

Ceiling designs include product from Arktura and Hunter Douglas. Carpets by Bentley (read more about Bentley on page 108).

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“The project captured the subtleties and textures of the immediate context,” Alvarez says. “Brick is the main material in the downtown mall, and by utilizing metal fins and brick paneling we reproduced the familiar rhythm found in the mall architecture.”

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PROJECT DETAILS

PROJECT: Center of Developing Entrepreneurs (CODE) ARCHITECT: WOLF ACKERMAN ASSOCIATE ARCHITECT: ESKEWDUMEZRIPPLE LOCATION: Charlottesville, VA Completion: 2022 Size: 215,000 square feet Structural Engineer: Fox & Associates Civil Engineer: Timmons Group MEP Engineer: 2RW Interior Design: EskewDumezRipple General Contractor: Hourigan Lighting Design: DKT Lighting Landscape Architect: Gregg Bleam Landscape Architect Sustainability: STRUCTR Advisors Energy Modeling: Thornton Tomasetti Certifications & Awards: LEED Platinum, 2023 AIA National Architecture Award

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Net-Positive Nature The first net-positive energy public school in New England, Fales Elementary teaches students to respect the environment.

Architects were mindful of the building’s scale. In a neighborhood surrounded by houses, Fales Elementary is two stories. A giant, three-story school did not fit in with Westborough’s vision. Because Fales serves students in kindergarten through third grade, HMFH made sure the building fit smaller children.

WORDS BY MYAH TAYLOR PHOTOS BY ED WONSEK

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HMFH kept the palette simple for the exterior. Exterior materials included concrete block from Jolley Concrete, phenolic paneling with a wood texture roofing material, uPVC windows by Intus, and aluminum curtain wall.

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In the middle of a forested area in Westborough, Massachusetts you’ll find a surprisingly sustainable school. Annie E. Fales Elementary School is reported to be New England’s first net-positive energy public school—with a sawtooth roof to maximize surface area for south-facing PV panels and north facing skylights, plus 40 geothermal wells supplying heating, cooling, and hot water. Fales boasts a predicted Energy Use Intensity (EUI) of 24.7 and can generate 11.6% more—yes, more—energy than required to power the all-electric facility. Serving around 400 kindergarten through third grade students, the school celebrates its environment and shows off the wondrous possibilities of renewable energy. Westborough itself hopes to be carbon emissions–free by 2035. “We had goals for the actual built environment of the school that inherently lent itself to be such a robust, sustainable school,” says Caitlin Osepchuk, an associate at HMFH Architects and project architect for Fales Elementary School. However, achieving net-zero was not part of the original feasibility study. Rather, it came up in schematic design. “We

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were always looking for ways to limit the energy use and find healthier materials that weren’t going to off-gas as much with low VOCs for these small students,” Osepchuk says. “As we finished out feasibility and got into schematic design it was clear we could achieve net-zero energy. The town and the chair of the school building committee said, ‘As a town of Westborough, we want to push the sustainable goals. We’re designing and paying for this new school. Let’s really push the envelope and let’s make it net-zero.’” As the design progressed efforts to limit energy use and maximize the amount of PV panels that could fit on the roof continued. The exterior incorporates CMU (concrete block), phenolic paneling—which has a wood texture and design to match the wooded landscape—roofing material, uPVC windows, and aluminum curtain wall. A neutral gray and brown face with warm flecks in it, the CMU brings out the wood coloring in the phenolic paneling. “We kept the palette pretty simple,” Osepchuk says. Interior materials include linoleum flooring, paint, and phenolic paneling. Inside the two-story school, learning ar-

Natural light filtering through the clerestory windows helped Fales achieve net-positive energy status. While the school didn’t require as much electricity, HMFH worked with LAM Partners for indoor lighting. LAM Partners wanted to keep the light power density low while still creating and maintaining well-lit spaces.

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PROJECT DETAILS

PROJECT: F. Fales Elementary School ARCHITECT: HMFH Architects LOCATION: Westborough, MA

DRAWING COURTESY OF HMFH ARCHITECTS

Completion: November 2021 Cost: $56.8 million Electrical, Plumbing, and Fire Protection: R.W. Sullivan Civil Engineer: Samiotes Consultants Lighting & HVAC Consulting: LAM Partners Contractor: Gilbane Building Co. Interior Designer: HMFH Architects Landscape Architect: Crosby Schlessinger Smallridge Specifications: Kalin Associates

As design progressed HMFH looked for ways to limit energy use. The sawtooth roof helped maximize the surface area for south-facing PV panels and northfacing skylights. All of the glazing on the facade is tripleglazed to add more thermal insulation.

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eas are organized into four project areas representing various landscapes: forest, meadow, marshland, and pond. They each correspond with a color palette and grade levels at the school. “Kids like a lot of color, and we like to make sure we include that in all of our school designs,” Osepchuk says. “Old school design was very stark and blank because everyone thought that was the way to keep kids engaged in what the teacher was lecturing about. Thankfully times have changed.” Designed in-house, storybook-style graphics on the walls depict Fales mascot— Annie the Hedgehog—adventuring through the four local ecosystems. Throughout the day students can connect with nature by peering through clerestory windows that allow natural light into the space. “The murals help get the students excited about where they live, wanting to get out and explore as well,” Osepchuk says. “And foster that love of the environment so they’ll continue to make positive sustainable choices in the future to help maintain the ecosystems they live in.” While Fales’ scenic setting provides an intentional and aesthetic space for students to learn more about the world around them and appreciate the environment, building the school into a hill proved difficult. “It’s hard enough to build on a flat site. Now add in a pretty steep hill,” Osepchuk says. “It was challenging, but we used it as an opportunity to push the design and find opportunities to have a two-level school that’s accessible from the site on both the second and first floor.” Pip Lewis, principal at HMFH Architects and project director for Fales Elementary School, says the slope impacted outdoor play areas. “One of the challenges because of the hillside was that each of these play fields needed to be made handicap accessible from the school and from the working area,” he says. “Long curving paths that connected the play areas.” HMFH also had to be mindful of the nearby pond—a designated wetland. “One of the struggles during construction was keeping the pond clean,” Lewis says. Completed in November 2021, the design team expects the school to stand the test of time. “We always have to choose durable materials, not only from a maintenance standpoint,” Osepchuk says. “We want to design schools that last at least 50 years.” g

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The project incorporates every color in the rainbow. Fales’ school color is blue, so HMFH added blue trim to all of the exterior windows to bring a pop of color to

the outside. Within the school different grade levels each have their own color to make it fun and special for the kids but also to help them in locating their designated area.

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Inside, carpet manufactured by Mohawk is included in spaces like the media center—where kids might want to sit on the floor and read— and the four project areas. Each classroom has a throw carpet for storytime or other class activities.

HMFH projects tend to include wall graphics to depict historical references of the towns or that function as other learning opportunities. For the Fales project colorful murals designed in-house depict school mascot Annie the Hedgehog traveling through local ecosystems. The graphics help students connect to the nature around them.

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Modern Maritime BuildingWork and a local tribe collaborate to design this LEED Silver library.

WORDS BY JESSICA ZUNIGA PHOTOS BY DOUG SCOT T

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The library utilizes high efficiency heating and cooling systems, provided by Daiken and Mitsubishi, to achieve LEED.

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The small maritime town of La Conner, Washington is known for its rich historic district. Buildings built as early as the mid1800s line the streets between dark evergreen trees. Among them, the La Conner Swinomish Public Library blends in beautifully, even though it’s entirely modern. The BuildingWork architect team, led by founder and principal architect Matt Aalfs, didn’t shy away from the challenges this project faced. Working under strict historic guidelines with a fixed budget, the team found creative ways to complete the vision without compromise. The result is one of the first publicly funded buildings to use almost entirely cross laminated timber—a prefabricated engineered wood product with a low carbon footprint—and earn a LEED Silver certification. The building is also special for its collaboration with the local Swinomish Indian Tribal Community. While La Conner and the Swinomish reservation are neighbors, the two groups have long been separated by a complex history. When the town chose to upgrade its original 1,500-square-foot, oneroom library, the Tribal Community became one of its largest benefactors. The new space is an asset to both communities, and the design reflects the Swinomish’s strong involvement as a key partner.

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“We’re proud of how it came out from a design standpoint,” Aalfs says. “It was a wonderful opportunity to figure out how the architecture could reflect native culture in a really authentic way and present a public space that is welcoming to everyone.” The Design Details When you approach the library entrance an 18-foot cedar story pole captures your attention. The pole was designed by Swinomish elder and master carver Kevin Paul and is an important cultural expression. At the base of the pole a traditional Salish person is seen with outstretched hands. Two salmon then represent resources, and an eagle rests on top as a symbol of wisdom. The story pole reflects the purpose of the library—to be a place where everyone can join together and learn more. Aalfs says the design team wanted the story pole to be a key element of the design. The front of the building was redesigned to be a neutral backdrop behind the pole, while the piece’s primary colors became the color palette of the building’s facade. The facade also recognizes the town’s history. A photographic survey provided an idea of some key historic characteristics that reflect La Conner architecture. Wood cladding and detailing, vertically proportioned

The 18-foot tall cedar story pole was hand-carved with traditional iconography from Coast Salish culture. BuildingWork used leftover timber from the carving process in collaboration with local woodworker Stuart Welch to build interior pieces like the library’s circulation desk.

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Interior walls were left exposed initially in an effort to reduce material costs; the end result is a warm and inviting space that highlights one of Washington’s greatest resources. The Douglas fir lumber was provided as cross laminated timber panels by Vaagen Timbers, and the dimension lumber used came from Sierra Pacific.

Large and round light fixtures from Louis Poulsen hang like spotlights over the reading areas.

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PROJECT DETAILS

PROJECT: La Conner Swinomish Public Library ARCHITECT & INTERIOR DESIGNER: BuildingWork LOCATION: La Conner, WA Completion: July 2022 Size: 5,400 square feet Civil & Structural Engineer: KPFF Mechanical Engineer: The Greenbusch Group Electrical Engineer: TFWB Engineers Envelope Consultant: RDH Building Science Lighting Design: Blanca Lighting Design LEED Consultant: ArchEcology Specifications: Applied Building Information General Contractor: Tiger Construction Landscape Architect: Karen Kiest Landscape Architecture Awards: LEED Silver

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windows, and decorative cornices all come together to mimic a typical 19th century building in a subtle way. A massive corner bay window, with tall glass panels framed in steel, is another example. It’s a contemporary element that harkens back to the broad shop windows of local historic buildings. It also looks out on a main intersection, inviting people into the cozy reading nook. The design team utilized daylighting throughout this project to create the ideal soft lighting libraries desire. Bright and harsh lighting can create contrasts that make it hard to read. The bay window brings in a lot of natural light and is on the east side of the building so lighting is indirect throughout the day. Tall vertical windows bring light deep into the space. And skylights overhead have a diffused layer of glass and brighten the reading room with a soft glow. For the electrical lighting the building does use, solar panels provide a good amount of onsite power generation. Sustainability Aalfs says it was important to the team to find ways to advance sustainability across the project. Their use of cross-laminated timber as the structural element was a great achievement in that direction. CLT is a lightweight, solid wood panel made from layering boards in alternating directions that are bonded together with structural adhesive. It’s often used as an alternative to conventional building blocks like concrete or steel,

and it produces a much smaller carbon footprint with virtually no waste. Because this project had to be as cost-efficient as possible, the team had to find creative ways to use CLT and to show funders that the higher cost was not only worth it but could be done without compromising in other ways. Leaving the CLT exposed on the inside of the building and eliminating costs of drywall and paint helped to keep the project within budget. “We let the mass timber be what it is— the structural element of the whole building and also the interior finish,” Aalfs says. “It’s a good example of how you can use it on a small budget. Really it’s proof it can be done.” The CLT in this project was manufactured in Washington from locally sourced Douglas fir. Another advantage of this material is that it is prefabricated offsite, so it can be installed in a much shorter time than if the team were to use other materials. After the product was brought onsite, the entire building was up in just three days. The new space is a great asset to the community with dedicated reading areas, public access computers, and a large meeting room. Staff also have new areas to work in, and overall the library can host and provide for more children, teens, and adults. All of this was accomplished with an innovative, forward-thinking design team and a collaboration between the native and non-native communities that Aalfs hope will grow with this space for years to come. g

Exterior metal panels come from AEP Span, windows and doors from Andersen, Milgard, and Kawneer.

Left: Designed by the BuildingWork team, the children’s area features a 24-footlong tugboat as an homage to La Conner’s maritime history. The tugboat functions as a bookshelf and reading area, with extra seating built around the portholes.

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Limitless at LinkedIn STUDIOS Architecture pushes the envelope at this new headquarters in California.

The new LinkedIn campus is surrounded by native tree canopies, while gardens across the site collect and treat stormwater. The landscaping and irrigation systems of the project reduced potable water consumption for irrigation by 90%.

WORDS BY YUYAN ZHANG PHOTOS BY K YLE JEFFERS

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The parking structure features an illuminated orange staircase. Perforated metal panels are folded in three ways and have slightly different colors to mimic tree bark. “When light hits it from the side, the material really shines. The various colors and folds really amplified the character of the parking structure,” Choi says.

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More than 20% of the total annual energy cost of the project is offset by renewable site-generated energy when the building is running at its full capacity.

Arrive at Building One of LinkedIn’s Middlefield campus in Mountain View, California and you’ll be greeted by orange stairs. You can walk through the lobby and take them all the way up to the sixth floor, but if you don’t want to go inside, you can also take the outside stairs to the third floor terrace deck. From the onset the team behind the project was interested in creating connections between indoor and outdoor spaces. “Early on we didn’t really have the ins and outs of everything, but we had this idea of creating a meaningful outdoor space and physically connecting them,” says Jeong Choi, a principal at STUDIOS Architecture. To accentuate this they used orange blocks to represent the stairs in a physical model. As they communicated with city officials and others about the project, they also fell in love with the character of the stairs. “We talked about how nice it is to have features that differentiate the building rather than having random glass boxes everywhere.” It set the expectation for the design quality for the rest of the campus—and for the city as a whole. STUDIOS has been working on various projects with LinkedIn since 2013. This recent long journey to find LinkedIn a new home included a land swap with Google and

a global pandemic. LinkedIn inherited three 1980s-era buildings from Google. After some deliberation they decided to not tear them down, but that limited their buildable land drastically. “The limits gave us the opportunity to be more creative. It became our driving force to create a better performing building that blend well with the existing buildings,” Choi says. In the end the team added three new buildings and two new parking structures to the three existing buildings to create a onemillion-square-foot campus earning LEED Platinum certification. Massing Working within the confines of the site, a typical 120-by-300-foot office building was out of the question. In contrast, the new buildings on the LinkedIn campus are as narrow as 65 feet. “As a result we worked with the structural engineer to be more efficient about the structural layout and without sacrificing usable space,” Choi says. The design team optimized load paths to reduce the number of columns and create more open space. They also pushed the stairs outside and created the overhangs that ultimately became distinctive features of the project.

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The campus pavilion is a popular spot, hosting a coffee bar, happy hours, farmers’ markets, and other community events. At the center of the site STUDIOS and their client added a

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mass timber and steel structure to bring more energy to the space. At night bifold doors slide down and light shines through the perforated metal, creating a glowing lantern effect.

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Performance “The design of the building is really performance-driven. By designing a better performing building, it uses less energy to maintain,” Choi says. The long and narrow buildings can bring in a lot of natural light, but too much light can lead to heat gain. Putting the information into physical and energy models, the team fine-tuned ways to optimize performance. They tweaked angles and directions, experimented with ways of breaking into the massing, and calculated the ratio of vision glass to opaque glass for each face of the building. “Those kinds of percentages are very carefully designed based on analysis that we have in a computer model.” Low-Carbon Concrete When choosing building materials the design team wanted to ensure they wouldn’t alienate the existing buildings. As a result, they chose precast concrete (read more about precast concrete on page 100). Traditional concrete is often associated with high carbon emissions, and with LinkedIn’s goal to be carbon neutral by 2030, the team wanted to push the envelope for what could be done sustainably. Partnering with CarbonCure—a Canadian company working to reduce embodied carbon in concrete—the LinkedIn campus is one of the first developments to use a new technology. The project used two strategies to reduce carbon—replacing the cement in concrete with fly ash and slag (byproducts of coal and steel production, respectively), and using Carbon Cure technology that injects CO2 captured from large emitters into concrete during mixing. The combined strategy is estimated to reduce carbon emissions by 2,400 tons, a 30% reduction over business as usual, according to CarbonCure. “Technology keeps evolving,” Choi says. The solution they thought was best five years ago is no longer the latest and greatest. Today the industry is working on carbon-negative concrete. “It’s a crazy concept. Building a new building could be more sustainable than not building.” g

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Right: The third-floor terrace deck provides a secure outdoor space that maintains its connection with the ground level.

People on the upper floors almost always have immediate access to outdoor decks designed to support many activities.

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PROJECT DETAILS PROJECT: LinkedIn ARCHITECT: STUDIOS Architecture LOCATION: Mountain View, CA Size: 700,000 square feet Structural Engineer: Forell/Elsesser Civil Engineer: BKF Engineers General Contractor: Devcon Construction Curtain Wall: Walters & Wolf Landscape Architect: PWP Landscape Architecture Awards: LEED Platinum

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LINKEDIN MIDDLEFIELD CAMPUS

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Sustainably Sleek

The Acton Passive House is tucked into a clearing in the woods. On one side of the property is a former shipping container transformed into a permanent storage shed that mimics the design of the home.

WORDS BY SAR A FREUND PHOTOS BY NAT REA

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A passive house retreat in the New England woods

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The exterior walls are mostly made of colored fiber cement by Cement Board Manufacturers. The roof is by Drexel Metals and features wood accents along with eaves. At night sconces on either side of the front door light up for wayfinding.

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Hanging circular lights in the living room were custom-designed by the client. The windows were manufactured by Schuco via European Architectural Solutions.

Set in a clearing of evergreens is a sleek, modest home. A low profile, strong horizontal lines, and modern style put the Acton Passive House in stark contrast to its natural surroundings. As a passive house it meets rigorous standards for energy efficiency. It’s incredibly well insulated, has high-performance windows, and includes solar panels that produce more energy than the home needs. The project was designed by Boston-based architecture firm ZeroEnergy Design (ZED) for a client who wanted respite from hectic city life. “It’s a simple object placed within the landscape,” says Stephanie Horowitz, lead architect and managing director of ZED. The firm’s design philosophy embodies the idea that buildings must have a positive impact on the built environment. The client wanted minimal energy consumption, efficient appliances and lighting, water-saving strategies, and more. From the first conversation about Acton Passive House Horowitz knew it would be a project well aligned with her firm’s mission.

vision. “The direction was clear. It didn’t evolve too much throughout the design process, which is somewhat atypical,” Horowitz says. A modest primary residence with two bedrooms and two bathrooms was the goal. It had to be simple and modern, it had to operate efficiently, and it needed to feel like a true retreat into nature. The result is a beautiful house with a simple shed roof. Its rectangular footprint includes an open living/kitchen/dining space, office, and a mechanical/laundry room. The interior is functional but modern, with polished concrete floors, minimalist fixtures, and plentiful natural light. While the design itself was straightforward, the client provided more input in some more technical areas. The interior glass doors used in the project are office doors with much better acoustical properties than the kind typically used in homes. The client also took particular care in researching the driveway, landing on a gravel grid system that avoids asphalt and allows for easy upkeep.

The Design The design process was methodical; the client was an engineer with an unwavering

The Build ZED moved through the design process smoothly, but when it came time for con-

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struction they faced a couple of challenges. The project started during the pandemic, for one, so delays were a concern. “We knew lead times on materials we were ordering would be a problem, so the client secured a shipping container we put onsite to store materials ordered well in advance of when we’d need them,” Horowitz says. “We were able to design the container into a permanent shed that mimics the design of the house. It was a necessity turned into a fun feature.” The team also struggled to get power to the site during the build. The utility company had a huge backlog as well as a labor shortage. Instead of waiting, the contractor brought in a generator and battery-powered tools to get everything moving. Green Features The project is designed and certified to the Passive House standard and is also Source Zero-certified—meaning the home can produce all the energy it needs. Air leakage is common in traditional buildings—hot and cool air go out the window literally. But this house has essentially no draft, no leakage. Horowitz says it’s an extremely comfortable and healthy living environment because of that. The insulation allows the house to passively heat itself and retain the temperature at night. There are plenty of sustainable tools and tactics designed into the house, too. On the energy side you’ll find a rooftop solar array, a right-sized heat pump, and a backup battery that allows the house to operate without any carbon emissions. The walls and roof are filled with dense packed cellulose, containing very low embodied carbon, then wrapped with wood fiberboard insulation, eliminating the need for petroleum-based, high embodied carbon foam insulation. Not only is wood fiberboard 100% compostable or recyclable at the end of its life, but it also has negative embodied carbon, meaning the trees it was derived from sequestered more carbon than the product consumed from its manufacturing. “What we were able to do on this project was rely on a wood structure and minimize the concrete, which typically has the highest carbon impact. Through the process we wanted to make sure we weren’t just looking at operational carbon but also considering the embodied carbon—the carbon that goes into the construction,” Horowitz says. g

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The light fixture in the kitchen was also custom-designed by the client, along with the stainless steel kitchen countertop. It and the shelving and

baseboards are sleek, durable, and easy to clean. Minimalist cabinetry is from Ikea and kitchen appliances are from Miele and GE.

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PROJECT: The Acton Passive House ARCHITECT: ZeroEnergy Design LOCATION: Acton, MA

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Park Place Architects completed this striking modern home on a narrow urban lot using cross laminated timber.

The firm maintained an existing facade while rebuilding an entirely new structure behind it.

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A veteran of residential and commercial projects of varying sizes, architect Paolo Martins, the principal of Paulo Martins Arquitectura & Design in Aveiro, Portugal, approaches each project to meet the demands of its environmental context and client expectations, incorporating new design solutions as needed. Completed in 2022, the Casa do Parque (Park House) project required careful planning and innovative construction methods to meet a strict timeline and the constraints of a congested neighborhood in Aveiro—a prosperous seaside town known as “the Venice of Portugal.” In addition, the existing building had “historical and emotional” significance in the area, so its facade needed to be preserved even as the firm gutted the rest of the structure. The client came to Martins because they had seen examples of the firm’s past work and trusted his vision for the project. “It was conceived to meet various demands—

those of the client, the climate, and the terrain,” he says. “It gave us some difficulties. We couldn’t demolish the building completely. In construction there are many problems with that.”

The rear of the house features a wall of glass doors that open onto the back patio.

How They Did It Integrating sustainable design and construction practices required planning and coordination, but the firm was able to select sustainable materials, manage waste, and implement energy-efficient systems effectively. From the poured concrete floor up, all structural elements were constructed using cross-laminated timber (CLT). It was a sustainable choice “that would allow us to build cleanly and quickly without the need for a large construction site,” Martins says. CLT is an engineered wood product that includes multiple layers of solid-sawn lumber, each layer glued perpendicular to the others to enhance structural rigidity. It’s a popular choice for housing construction in

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PROJECT DETAILS

PROJECT: Park House ARCHITECT: Paulo Martins Arquitectura & Design LOCATION: Aveiro, Portugal Completion: 2022 Size: 5,575 square feet Engineer: R5e Consulting Engineers Lighting Design: Paulo Martins Arquitectura & Design Builder: Cimave Acoustic Design: R5e Consulting Engineers Fluids Engineer: R5e Consulting Engineers Thermal Engineer: R5e Consulting Engineers S-01

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prac t ice Living spaces are open and bright, often spanning the entire width of the structure. Lighting throughout the house is by Karizma, Davide Groppi, and Vibia.

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Modern fixtures appoint an ensuite bathroom and walk-in closet.

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the Scandinavian countries for its strength and sustainability, since the wood is typically grown in managed forests. Imported from Austria, the CLT arrived at the site pre-cut to reduce the quantity of materials needing storage, construction waste, and environmental impact while streamlining assembly. “You design all of the house from the beginning,” Martins says. “The company produces the CLT and sends it to you in the perfect dimensions; you just have to put it together like Legos. “With normal construction you have tons of waste,” he adds. “It’s a much cleaner way of making houses. It uses less space because as the wood arrives at the building you mount it immediately. You don’t have to store the materials. You can reduce the number of trucks going out and coming in [and their] carbon emissions.” Using CLT also sped the time to completion and helped prevent avert traffic bottlenecks on the busy street outside. The design of the single-family residence is split into multiple levels, affording occupants what Martins calls “a gradient of privacy” from bottom to top. The ground floor features large panes of glass and doors that open onto a concrete terrace, while balconies on the upper floors overlook the public park just beyond the site’s back wall. Inside whitewashed wood lends the house a bright, spacious feel in spite of its narrow city lot. An open floor plan creates effortless flow between spaces. Sustainable design elements include energy-efficient appliances and ecofriendly materials. The house has solar panels to heat water, and automated systems monitor and optimize energy usage. The Park House was the first in which Martins specified CLT, but he says it won’t be the last; several of his current projects are using the material. “It’s not a new way of building, but in Portugal it’s very innovative,” he says. “The Park House was an experiment—not the first, but maybe one of the first—experiments with CLT in Portugal.” g

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Rooftop solar panels heat water, while skylights bring natural light to the upper floors.

The Park House design creates multiple levels of privacy for occupants while closely abutting the neighboring buildings.

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Earn a Master of Professional Studies in Sustainable Interior Environments Ready to grow your portfolio and expand your marketable skills? Industries everywhere are in search of interior designers and architects who know how to create beautiful, sustainable spaces in an economically viable way. Fill that need with the New York School of Interior Design’s one-year graduate program in sustainable design. Study onsite or online

Choose the full-time or part-time track

Take courses in the evenings and on weekends

Explore topics ranging from residential design to materials and finishes

GET DETAILS AT LEARNMORE.NYSID.EDU

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The Ev

lution of Sustainable Interior Design

Inside the New York School of Interior Design (NYSID)’s Master of Professional Studies in Sustainable Interior Environments program BY LAURA ROTE

➜ NYSID’s Master of Professional Studies in Sustainable Interior Environments program is one of the leading educational programs in the industry when it comes to integrating design with sustainability.

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We recently talked to Bergman—who’s also on the executive board of the NYC 2030 District and the Designers Lighting Forum of New York—about how he’s seen the industry change over the years. He shared some of his experience and insight about today’s demands and how NYSID is preparing the next generation of design professionals to provide more sustainable interiors. What does sustainable interior design mean to you?

Let’s start by asking what it is we’re trying to sustain in sustainable design. I dislike when people say they’re trying to save the planet, because it’s a cliche, and really the planet will do just fine—maybe better—without us. What we’re really trying to do is to sustain a planet that we can survive on, or better yet, where we can flourish. Then when we ask what sustainable interior design means, we can approach this even more selfishly, which, by the way, I don’t think is a problem because that’s often what appeals to people. It’s not just the universal

➜ NYSID student Phuong Huynh’s work in the MPSS program

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avid Bergman has always been interested in the environment—all the way back to when he ran his high school’s ecology club. “We called it ecology back then,” he laughs. “We did paper recycling drives, stuff like that.” The founder of David Bergman Eco and author of Sustainable Design: A Critical Guide, Bergman is an “eco optimist” who founded the blog EcoOptimism—dedicated to the belief that positive, often symbiotic, solutions exist to our environmental and economic issues. Today Bergman is the director of sustainability at the New York School of Interior Design (NYSID), where he oversees much of the programming, including teaching for NYSID’s Master of Professional Studies in Sustainable Interior Environments (MPSS) program. Professional students from all over the world study at NYSID—some in person, some remotely. The program is one of the leading educational programs in the industry when it comes to integrating design with sustainability.

or local ecosystem we’re concerned about; it’s also the number of indoor mini ecosystems we spend most of our lives in. Essentially what we’re doing is adding concerns about human health to planetary health. How is the practice of sustainable interior design changing?

How do you address that high turnover rate in interior design?

That statistic came around a couple of years ago, and we’ve taken it very much to heart. I don’t think any of us really had numbers in front of us that showed the dramatic difference in the longevity of a building of 50 to 100 years versus an interior. You can’t point to very many interiors, except perhaps in landmark ones, that last that long. Look how frequently restaurants change over and how big the dumpsters are going out. How can that be addressed in current training?

One of the big tools we’re starting to use is something called design for deconstruction; we’re designing for disassembly. The materials are put in knowing they may not stay there that long. How do we take that into

account? How do we make that not a total loss? At the same time, by designing with that near future in mind, it may save the client money. What are NYSID students looking for?

The students who are in the program already have professional degrees in interior design or architecture. Some of them have been working for a while. They’re looking now to focus on sustainability—to add that to their toolkit and be able to apply it in their work. Hopefully the degree opens doors for them. I tell students as they’re finishing the program that maybe they’ll go into a firm that is already practicing a fair amount of sustainable design and they’ll become an asset to the team. Or maybe they’ll go into a firm that isn’t really there yet, and they can push the firm along.

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We’ve known for a long time that buildings are responsible for 40% of global energy consumption through their lifetimes. What wasn’t widely acknowledged until more recently is that the interiors of our buildings are responsible for a much larger chunk of that than was thought. That has to do with the relatively short life of many interiors versus the longer life of buildings— especially in areas like the hospitality industry, where an interior might get replaced every seven or 10 years. That’s a lot of material churn, a lot of embodied energy, and a lot of landfills. We’ve gotten a reasonable start on improving energy efficiency of the operations of buildings, which means we now have to shift our attention to the materials, specifically interior materials, and bring those into scrutiny. We need to start thinking in terms of their embodied energy and in terms of the circular economy.

Biophilic design and natural light are among the sustainable interior design elements seen in students’ work.

What is the MPSS program providing the industry?

It’s literally filling a void. I haven’t heard of any other degree programs where the sole focus is on sustainable interior environments. You’ll find a course or two in sustainability in most any architecture and interiors program, but this is designed for people who already have those earlier degrees. We do nothing but sustainable interiors. And it’s in-person and remote?

Yes. That’s a big draw for the program. A student can participate from the classrooms here or from anywhere else in the world with a laptop simultaneously. They get exactly the same education. And that was not a Covid development; we’ve always offered this. What are architects and designers demanding in projects these days?

Almost any design team now is looking to incorporate sustainability at some level into their projects, whether it’s because a client wants them to or because the team

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brings it into the picture. It’s almost a given that there’ll be some level of sustainability in any project. I think that’s very significant because it’s not only the designers promoting it; it’s the market demanding it. With more focus on sustainability, are you seeing more sustainability-focused roles?

There are some firms that do have exactly that title—director of sustainability. It’s a specialty. For those of us in the earlier generations of this, we had to figure things out on our own. The people who are now becoming directors of sustainability or starting with a degree like this are still going to have to figure out a lot on their own, but they’ve got a big head start. There’s a lot more knowledge out there and a lot more technical expertise than there was, say, 30 years ago. That leads itself to be more easily embedded in an office. How has that conversation changed since you were in school?

When I got out of college and grad school it was after the oil embargo. Energy prices got low and cheap again, and people suddenly didn’t care so much about sustainability, though we didn’t call it sustainability then. The firms I was working in didn’t do much about it. In the early ’90s I started seeing really cool materials that were sustainable in varying degrees, things like wheat board that I would enjoy putting in my projects. I saw this possibility of merging good design with sustainable design that really hadn’t been that possible before. For instance, I had a secondary related company where I designed and produced light fixtures. I did that because I found these cool materials we could make fixtures out of and because compact fluorescent lighting hadn’t become any better at that point. This was long before LEDs. I saw a way to do energy-efficient lighting that looked cool. That was my stepping stone in the early mid-’90s into sustainability. What do today’s sustainable projects look like?

The field of sustainable interior design is maturing. This is something I’ve been saying about the program and the field for a couple of years now. Not long ago a sustainable design might have meant energy efficien-

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How is sustainable design changing commercial projects?

If we’re talking about offices, mostly that brings in a whole additional aspect of employee productivity and efficiency. We’ve found things like daylighting and whether you have local control over the air temperature around your workstation, whether you have a good view

RENDERINGS COURTESY OF NYSID

➜ This work comes from NYSID students Grace Spiezia and Samantha Berlanga.

cy or avoiding paints with VOCs. It’s now much more developed, especially in material health and how materials affect us. It’s so critical because we spend 90% of our lives indoors. All those chemicals are around us. It’s become even more critical in energy-efficient buildings because, ironically, they’re more airtight, so the cocktail of toxic chemicals in interior furnishings and materials stays inside unless the space gets mechanically ventilated. It’s great that our buildings are more insulated. It’s wonderful for energy consumption. But it’s created a secondary problem in the process. The other thing is that now we’re getting this flood of information and data. It’s hard to understand what it means and how to apply it. When, as a designer, you’re presented with an LCA or EPD, you have to know how to interpret it, how to make comparative judgments, and how to arrive at your own decisions. That’s a big thing I emphasize in the materials course at NYSID. I tell students they have to understand what all the information is because then they’re going to make their own decisions.

of nature, those things can have a tremendous impact on sick days, productivity, and even employee happiness. That becomes a big value proposition to clients. If a company has poor productivity or high turnover and they have to retrain new people, that’s a huge expense. Investing in sustainable design has a great ROI. What do NYSID MPSS students learn?

We tackle sustainable design throughout all our BFA and MFA programs, but we really drill down into it in the MPSS because it’s the focus of our courses. We look at both the impacts and tools at our disposal in materials and lighting, mechanical systems, hard and soft goods, and the design, construction, and operation process. Once we’ve gone through and investigated all of these we ask what’s next. We’re looking at not just what sustainable design is and how we do it, but what we need to be doing moving forward. It’s our hope that the graduates from the MPSS will become the next leaders in the field. We’re seeing that now. Back to that idea of sustainable design allowing us to flourish—I like talking about that because people sometimes talk about sustainable design as this compromise or things we have to give up. It’s exactly the opposite in most situations. When we practice sustainable design, when we live in sustainably designed places, we live better and we can flourish as people. What’s changing now is that we have to simultaneously understand both the big picture and the small picture. It’s not just about specifying low-VOC paints and non-PVC flooring. We now need to be experts in so much more. We used to practice sustainable design by a gut feeling or, in aviation lingo, flying by the seat of our pants. Now we have modern tools—something more akin to a digital cockpit, but we don’t have autopilot yet. This may be where AI comes in and helps, but who knows at this point? How are students changing?

I’ve been teaching sustainable design at NYSID and other places for a while. One of the things I’ve noticed is the students coming into these programs—whether it’s a sustainability program or just a design program—know a lot more about sustainability now than they did 10 or 20 years ago. I teach not just in the MPSS program but sometimes I teach first-year students, and I don’t really have to explain anymore what the greenhouse effect is. They know what fossil fuels are. They see what is happening; they’ve seen it in the news, and maybe they’ve experienced it. So we can start at a higher level. g

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Why to Choose

A tried and true construction material shows its true potential.

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Precast Concrete

By Laura Rote

The Hyundai Motors building base, completed in 2015, is all precast.

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➟ Tall, high-end retail buildings, office headquarters, public schools—more builders across markets are turning to precast to get their projects up fast and sustainably.

Gensler’s EPIC project in LA used precast to result in a beautiful vertically stacked and terraced office

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space with views to the Hollywood hills. The project’s entire punched opening envelope is precast.

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“There is a lot of design opportunity with precast, and you still get the benefit of building out of concrete, even when it includes brick or high-end finishes,” says Jackson Metcalf, who co-leads the Critical Facilities Practice at Gensler, responsible for designing many data centers. Data centers used to be what many architects thought of when they heard “precast concrete,” but today they’re designing so much more. Producing a concrete structure off-site in a controlled factory setting before shipping it in panels to the jobsite is nothing new, but more sectors are considering precast now than ever. For more than 50 years

Fabcon has been helping these projects go up quickly, efficiently, and precisely. Fabcon leads the industry in producing precast concrete buildings ranging from very large industrial buildings with heights well over 60 feet to high-end retail and more. “We’re seeing increased adoption in schools and retail stores. For data centers precast has long been the way to go, but there’s also growth in office buildings and mixed-use development, and we’re seeing a lot of growth in community and public buildings,” says Tim Anderson, vice president of sales and marketing at Fabcon. Metcalf has also been part of teams de-

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signing high-end retail stores using precast, including shopping in Chicago’s Gold Coast, where the material was used to mimic Indiana limestone. In Los Angeles Gensler’s EPIC project used precast to result in a beautiful vertically stacked and terraced office space with views to the Hollywood hills. Completed in 2019, EPIC’s entire punched opening envelope is precast. The building is LEED Gold–certified and is one of the most environmentally friendly office buildings in LA. We recently talked to experts at Gensler as well as Fabcon about the benefits of using precast concrete today.

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Design Flexibility Beyond its popular use on data centers, Metcalf has worked with precast to build many corporate headquarters—often using it as a horizontal spandrel between sections of glazing, as an accent material, and more. Some projects include an inlay of stone and different types of finishes with precast. “We’ve used it in higher end architecture, and we’ve used it for a long time,” he says. Precast has long been used in Gensler offices in the Midwest, as Chicago has a competitive precast market. “We have a lot of options. That also means there are a lot of people who really know what they’re doing. We get really good quality material.” Metcalf says it’s unfortunate that some people misunderstand precast as simply an industrial material or a low-end option because it’s commonly used for warehouses and data centers. “You can design parking garages with actual brick cast into it. You

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can do a data center and expose the natural material—both for low maintenance but also to be authentic to the material. We also apply aggregates, form liners, and other textures. There are a lot of design opportunities with precast. You can make it mimic things like limestone. It doesn’t have to look like a distribution center.” Anderson says design teams can easily paint the concrete or cast-in-brick so the finished project itself looks like a brick building. They can add high-end finishes like acid etching and sand-blasting, too. Precast concrete also comes with an inherent fire rating and durability to protect occupants from things like tough storms. A growing number of storm shelters are being built using precast, Anderson says. He says precast buildings are more likely to stand up to everything from hurricanes and tornadoes to blizzards and earthquakes. “Concrete buildings can be both beautiful and resilient,” Anderson says.

The Hyundai Motor America US Headquarters in Fountain Valley, California was designed by Gensler, built with precast concrete, and encased in a glass and metal curtain wall.

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The project was Hyundai Motor America’s largest undertaking— replacing a twostory building on its existing 18-acre campus.

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Save Time Beyond its aesthetics and strength, Metcalf says precast also tends to shrink the construction schedule, as projects go up faster and use a single subcontractor. “You can get an envelope and a whole roof up in a pretty short amount of time. It’s great.” Anderson says precast allows you to get a building occupied much quicker than with site cast or other construction methodologies. Reducing construction time has been a hot topic for many architects and the public alike, according to Anthony Brower, global climate action and sustainability leader at Gensler. He says many residents express that they don’t want big construction projects in or near their neighborhoods, as they don’t want their children breathing in construction materials for years at a time. “With precast you’re doing more offsite so you can shrink that construction window,” Brower says.

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➟ “There is a lot of design opportunity with precast, and you still get the benefit of building out of concrete, even when it includes brick or high-end finishes.”

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Sustainability

In the past concrete and cement were considered to be among some of the least sustainable materials for their carbon dioxide emissions and global warming potential (GWP), but that has changed. Anderson points to the recycled content in precast, for starters. “At Fabcon we use up to 58% post-consumer and post-industrial recycled content,” he says. And while everyone talks about the GWP of using concrete because making it is so energy-intensive, he says the life of the product also cannot be forgotten. Roughly 85% of a building’s GWP comes not from the actual building materials, Anderson says, but the building in use—what it takes to run the building versus the products used to build it. “One of the big benefits of using precast is that if you build a more energy-efficient building, you can reduce the life cycle usage of the energy of that building,” he says. And it’s no secret that the construction industry produces an enormous amount of waste. It’s expected to produce 2.2 billion tons of solid waste by 2025, Anderson says. He says precast reduces onsite waste by up to 50%. “We want to push people toward

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PHOTOS COURTESY OF FABCON

The Chaska Creek building combines precast concrete with color and clerestory windows.

using precast not only for the CO2 emissions or GWP but also from a solid waste reduction standpoint—offsite construction versus onsite, plus the reduction in need for onsite skilled labor,” he says. More end users are taking sustainability seriously, too, demanding proof that the processes and materials they choose for their projects are environmentally friendly. Anderson says many are asking for Environmental Protection Declarations, or EPDs. “It’s not just what buildings are being built out of but what are the insulation benefits and everything else?” he says. “You’re looking at all that energy use while the building is in operation as well because if the building envelope is more energy-efficient you have to take that into account.” Precast’s high strength to weight ratios also allow teams to design taller buildings while utilizing less material and increasing energy efficiency through the integral use of insulation. In many areas of the country buildings are being required to have higher R-values, and that’s driving people to more frequently consider precast, Anderson says. Metcalf says large format precast panels certainly help projects to be more energy-efficient. If precast concrete panels are being used as the primary cladding for

a data center, for example, he says that’s likely an insulated sandwich panel, so the building is going to be super well insulated. Using precast also means the building can live a longer life. When Metcalf started designing data centers Gensler was building them to be 50- or 100-year buildings. They were extremely robust buildings that could also be reused. “It’s well built, and it has the ability to give back with future uses. That’s one of the areas the precast can come into play,” he says. “If you’re building simple lightweight structures, there’s an element of them being disposable architecture. Building with heavier materials that will have a 50- or 100-plus year lifespan, like a precast or other heavier weight material, there’s a greater incentive to preserve those buildings for future use rather than tear them down when they’ve reached their end of first life.” Exciting innovations are also happening in concrete, Brower says, like CarbonCure—a new, sustainable concrete solution with carbon removal technologies. “This reduces the carbon impact because it reduces the amount of cement,” he says. “Some of our structural engineers say it’s also increasing the strength of the concrete as a byproduct.” That said, he noted that solutions like these are still relatively new, so their firm will see how they stand up over time.

Labor Benefits Precast concrete can also reduce labor costs by up to 25%, and Fabcon has its own team at their plant. “We use 25% less labor in our controlled environment than you’d use building a building onsite,” Anderson says. This continues to be important as the construction industry faced a consistent labor shortage in 2023, according to the Associated Builders and Contractors. “That lack of skilled labor onsite is driving the entire construction industry to offsite,” Anderson says. When you buy a precast building and work with Fabcon, he says you’re buying an erected finished product and get the benefits of working with their in-house engineering, project management, and construction teams. “You’re getting a turnkey solution, end to end.” g

Precast offers flexible design—from cast-in-brick to high-end finishes.

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Design Strategies

Modern Office

for the

Flexible spaces and innovative flooring are among the latest demands.

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Stuffy, corporate-feeling environments are becoming a workplace relic, as even large companies known for their strict professionalism strive to make their workplaces feel cozier. “The idea that an office space needs to feel corporate is changing, and that’s a good thing,” says Ariel Lumry, an interior project designer who’s been working with Perkins&Will for more than three years. “It’s scary for some people, but I think the challenge is exciting.” While some of the country’s biggest companies have long been enticing workers with amenities like foosball and free snacks, today’s design needs are focused more on wellness and comfort, Lumry says.

PHOTOS BY TK TK

Perkins&Will completed a custom floor design for Mohr Capital in Dallas using varied materials repeated strategically to indicate different areas.

PHOTO BY CASEY DUNN

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At Home in the Office Designs that feel equally at home, well, in your home or in a hotel are in demand in today’s workplace. “There used to be a rigid line between designs for health care and corporate and hospitality and residential. Now we’re all borrowing and learning from each other,” Lumry says. “Hospitality, particularly post-pandemic, touches every element of what we do. People want to feel comfortable in their workplace. We have to give them the services and amenities they had at home.” Lumry says a human-centric approach and emphasis on comfort that’s prevalent in hospitality design was missing in corporate interiors until recently. Today even law firms are more apt to incorporate flex spaces like mother’s rooms or areas where other services—say, massage therapy or a place to get your nails done—can be brought in so an attorney doesn’t have to leave the building.

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Perkins&Will says the design for Mohr Capital includes a carbon neutral surface solution that mimics the look of natural stone alongside wood flooring and carpet to soften the space.

PHOTOS BY CASEY DUNN

Architects today are looking for flooring options that make even the most professional spaces feel more like home.

Organic Approach

“I’m excited about this more organic approach to the design of carpet ... from the physical design of it to the colorways.”

Color and style are part of what makes spaces more comfortable, Lumry says. Many offices also want more access to fresh air and nature views, and they want their interiors to feel light and airy. Perkins&Will is seeing a demand for more neutral tones that are easy to mix and match alongside biophilic designs. The notion of biophilia, too, is changing. It’s not just about greenery. “Now you’re seeing these shapes and forms be extracted from nature and applied in innovative ways to things like flooring to truly have an impactful psychological effect on how you experience the space,” Lumry says. “It’s the softness and the curves and repetition of patterns that are natural in origin. We automatically relate to it without even realizing it.” Architects and designers are loving the organic approach to flooring, too.

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“Now carpet is something that enhances the design. There’s more of this organic form and seamlessness to the patterning. It’s more timeless and more sustainable too because it stays in the space. It doesn’t get dated quickly,” says Ariel Lumry of Perkins&Will.

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PHOTOS BY TK TK

The Long Story Short collection is made of Bentley Premium Nylon and available with any of Bentley’s PVC-free backing systems.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF BENTLEY

Calm, Comfortable Carpet & More There used to be a type of carpet you’d see in an office—bland, one tone, and wall to wall. “It was a very different look than what you would see at home or in a restaurant or in a hotel,” Lumry says. “That’s changing. I’m excited about this more organic approach to the design of carpet—everything from the physical design of it to the colorways. Things are a lot softer, and there are a lot more neutral tones. Everything has a fluid feel, which is fantastic. It allows the designers to be a lot more creative.” When Perkins&Will looks for flooring, they’re looking just for that—a way to easily mix and match with complementary styles and colors. “I can go in and pull pieces out of a line and create something that looks very custom for my client,” Lumry says. “Part of our job is integrating the brand into a space in a really thoughtful way. When there’s more attention paid to a variety of colorways within different lines of carpet we can use

that as a tool to integrate the brand into the design of the space in an elegant way.” Bentley Mills, one of the country’s top sustainable flooring manufacturers, knows all about designing complementary styles. They recently launched their Culinary Collection alongside hits like Long Story Short and the addition of Classic Rock to their LVT library. The launches come after some big changes for the company, who’s long been committed to the highest environmental standards, having recently moved to use new, more sustainable partners. “We redesigned our whole library based on new yarn vendors, and that opened up a whole realm of possibilities,” says Victoria deVuono, vice president of product and marketing at Bentley Mills. Today Bentley works with leaders in sustainable fibers like Aquafil and Universal Fibers to develop the very best in carpeting. Bentley’s in-house three-person design team works together to approach collections holistically today more than ever before. “When we’re designing a color line, for example, we pull all of the colors of the other collections we’ve recently launched to ensure designers have a connected and cohesive Bentley library,” deVuono says. Their recent launches each stand on their own but work well together with complementary color lines if designers want to mix and match. That’s important, deVuono says, because it’s not often that a client comes in and wants to specify only one product. “It’s incumbent on us to create a series of products that fit well together, not only through patterns and through color but also through price points.”

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But Bentley’s designs aren’t just beautiful; they’re also high-performance. Bentley is committed to pushing both their equipment and the fibers to new heights. “We have an extraordinary product design team with not only the experience and skill to innovate within our tool kit, but also the passion,” deVuono says. That way of thinking and creating in new ways is built into their R&D process. Sustainably speaking Bentley already operates at a high level, given that they are based in California, where green standards far exceed requirements in most other places in the US. Bentley has been manufacturing 100% PVC-free carpet for more than 40 years, they meet the Red List requirements for the Living Building Challenge, and they operate from a LEED Gold–certified manufacturing mill. Bentley’s Culinary Collection includes three styles—On the Block, From Scratch, and Serve It Up, inspired by the scratch marks left behind in cooking. “Bentley has always been known to design for luxury, and dynamic patterns like these that are drawn from crafts across mediums and industries are very well-suited to the luxurious, hotel-like feel corporate spaces are taking,” deVuono says. She likens the process of designing architectural interiors to that of preparing a great meal; the designer and chef are both working their craft with the intended purpose of creating an exquisite experience for others, and the Culinary Collection serves up great options for any project. On the Block’s deep texture, reminiscent of the nicks and grooves of the butcher block, makes an impact, while From Scratch can spice up any space with a bold, largescale, multi-directional pattern. Serve It Up is more reserved, with an approachable style and simple elegance.

Bentley’s Culinary Collection comes in three signature styles—On the Block, From Scratch, and Serve It Up.

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PHOTOS COURTESY OF BENTLEY

High-Quality Flooring

Bentley’s Classic Rock collection of LVT is seen here in Folk Rock. Classic Rock was inspired by the timeless look of terrazzo. The raw yet refined pattern grounds the luxury vinyl tile offering, which features foundational wood, stone, and concrete finishes.

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Standout Designs

Endless Opportunity

Bentley is seeing a lot of demand for “peekaboo color,” a specific use of color in a space that captures the idea that something can be colorful without being in your face. “It’s a more muted, sophisticated color, tucked beneath the neutral surface of a carpet,” deVuono says. She says they’re also seeing continued demand for lighter tones that feel comforting and bring light into the space. “Everyone wants creamier and warmer colors right now,” deVuono says, noting that previously Bentley was known for its darker palettes. “It’s a big shift we’ve been seeing, and we’re taking the moody, edgy Bentley style and applying that level of depth to lighter tones.”

Today’s carpeting really does enhance design, Lumry says. It offers a chance to soften and delineate space as well as provide acoustic benefit. “I can use it creatively, and it’s not limiting in its design.” deVuono says more workplaces want different areas of their offices to feel bespoke, too. “Diversity across spaces and a layer of complexity in designs are drawing people in more.” But bright colors and harsh patterns have no place in today’s workplace design. Designers and clients alike are looking for styles that are timeless but exciting at the same time. “Coming out of the pandemic everybody wants to be embraced and feel comfortable. It may cycle back to brighter or bolder expressions. but right now it’s all about calming everything down a bit, which I think is interesting,” Lumry says. And good design doesn’t have to break the bank. The gap has narrowed between what looks expensive and what actually is expensive. “The industry has done a much better job of providing materials and designing products with an approachable, achievable price point that don’t look cheap,” Lumry says. “We don’t have to compromise on design to make it affordable and sustainable.” Bentley is currently working on expanding its Modern Curator collection, too, to include one style that uses a unique yarn process for a weathered look and another flooring option that looks almost painterly.

As part of Bentley’s Culinary Collection the reserved, accessible style and pattern of Serve It Up, seen at right, reminds us to savor simplicity.

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PHOTOS COURTESY OF BENTLEY

Continuing Color Trends

Perkins&Will completed a custom floor design for Mohr Capital in Dallas with designated zones using varied materials repeated strategically to indicate different areas. “We used transitions really thoughtfully to pull you into a different space. Nothing feels segregated, but everything has its own identity,” Lumry says. The design includes a carbon neutral surface solution that mimics the look of natural stone alongside wood flooring and carpet to soften the space. “It was a very restricted material palette and very strategically implemented,” Lumry says. Another project under construction now, Stonebriar Financial, also combines flooring materials like wood and carpet in organic patterns to create a comfortable but custom look that’s sustainable and easy to maintain. They’re also using concrete micro-topping. “I like to use different materials to set zones off and give a different feeling to each space. They still flow into each other,” Lumry says. That project is going after LEED Silver. Today’s flooring options are much more exciting than years past, and the top manufacturers are really taking a cradle to cradle approach, which is vitally important to firms like Perkins&Will, Lumry says. And that emphasis on well-being and commitment to human-centric design is one way their firm makes sustainability exciting to clients. “It’s about creating a better environment for your employees—one they want to be in and come back to, and one they ultimately are more productive in.” g

Long Story Short from Bentley is seen here in Lampoon. It’s Cradle to Cradle–certified and produced in a carbon neutral, LEED Gold-certified manufacturing facility.

PHOTOS BY TK TK

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DESIGNING SUSTAINABLE HEALTH CARE ENVIRONMENTS

RETHINKING HEALTH CARE DESIGN, CLEANLINESS, AND SUSTAINABILIT Y

PHOTO COURTESY OF MICROBAN

BY Z ACK HAROLD

The first two decades of the 21st century have presented the world’s health care industry with two catastrophes: a global pandemic that pushed care systems to the point of collapse and ever-worsening global climate change that is causing natural disasters, threatening communities, and making everything more difficult. Considering it’s an industry built on responding to emergencies, it should come as no surprise that the health care sector is finding new ways to respond to these challenges—right down to how their hospitals and clinics are built and maintained. Part of that effort includes using materials that are both environmentally friendly and help keep facilities cleaner.

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R E DE FI N I N G “ C LE A N ” “Clean” is top of mind now more than ever post-pandemic, but what does it mean to be clean, exactly? And just what does this need to look like? Incorporating antimicrobial additives into clinical surfaces at the point of manufacture is an integral part of ongoing plans to enhance product cleanliness in health care environments. The health care sector was expected to experience the fastest annual growth rate of all the industries relying on antimicrobial technologies between 2022 and 2030, according to a report by Grand View Research. Leaders in the industry say efforts must be made to keep up with growing demands. Enter Microban International—home to two of the most trusted and well-known global brands in the antimicrobial, odor control, and continuously active disinfection and sanitization markets. Their proactive solutions keep products cleaner by preventing microbial problems before they start. For more than 40 years Microban has been innovating to produce technologies that enhance medical products and more all over the globe.

Microban® technologies are especially useful in health care settings. “Our technologies keep treated surfaces cleaner between cleanings and are a complement to good hygiene practices,” says Michael Ruby, president at Microban. While disinfectants wipe out bacteria on surfaces, they are only a temporary solution. It takes just moments for bacteria to begin propagating on an untreated surface after cleaning. “You start over. That untreated surface starts to bloom again,” Ruby says. Microban technologies work 24/7 to cap the number of microbes that grow on a surface. Treated surfaces aren’t sterile, but microbe populations can be kept in the hundreds rather than the millions. This not only supports regular cleaning and disinfection routines but also extends the longevity of products and surfaces. These solutions can be engineered into practically any product or surface during manufacture to deliver permanent product protection against degrading microbial growth—including a broad-spectrum of bacteria and fungi.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF MICROBAN

MICROBAN WANTS TO BE PART OF THE SYSTEM OF CARE THAT DELIVERS A CLEANER, GREENER PLANET FOR ALL.

It’s solutions like these that lead to cleaner health care environments and more positive patient experiences. Ruby says Microban antimicrobial technologies should be considered for all high-touch, high-traffic, and cleanliness-critical areas in health care spaces. “By keeping products and surfaces cleaner, built-in antimicrobial solutions deliver added peace of mind for health care workers and patients. These technologies should also be considered for products that can replace single-use items and those that are harder to keep clean.”

S US TA I N A BLE S O LUT I O N S Microban offers a wide range of antimicrobial technologies based on more sustainable active ingredients. These solutions are favored by architects, specifiers, builders, and building occupants who are seeking more durable and longer-lasting supplies. Their technologies can benefit many spaces across health care facilities, especially with solutions like Ascera™, MicroGuard™, and LapisShield™—all on exhibit at this year’s Greenbuild International Conference and Expo. ● Ascera is an antimicrobial technology inspired by nature that offers

continuous product protection against bacterial growth for olefinic polymers and solvent-based coatings. (The Microban technology used in Ascera is similar to acids found in nature and is used in multiple consumer product applications. Ascera technologies are currently only available for sale in the United States and Asia.) ● MicroGuard is a line of metal-free antifungal additives for PVC, PU, and EVA

applications, offering an effective alternative to arsenic-based formulations. ● LapisShield is a heavy metal-free solution that offers improved quality,

stability, and antimicrobial product protection for water-based coatings.

These novel formulations not only deliver lifelong product protection to a wide range of building materials, extending their functional life, they also inherently reduce end-of-life waste generation—another key factor in many health care facilities’ sustainability goals.

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KEY BENEFITS

2. Decreased Chemical Disinfectant Use Traditional cleaning and disinfection methods in health care facilities often involve the use of harsh chemical agents. Built-in antimicrobials can supplement these efforts, reducing the frequency and amount of chemical disinfectants needed. A decrease in the use of chemical disinfectants can lower the release of potentially harmful chemicals into the environment and reduce the carbon footprint associated with their production and transportation. 3. Less Water Use Surfaces with built-in antimicrobials are often easier to keep clean and maintain because of the inherent resistance to microbial growth. In addition to fewer cleaning supplies needed, this can mean less water is needed for upkeep. Streamlining main-

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tenance practices contributes to resource conservation and cost savings over time. Microban treatments can also lengthen the life of soft goods like furniture covers, scrubs, sheets, pillows, and footwear. “When you can use those in an environment for a longer time it reduces not only the need to replace them; it also reduces the need to launder them as often,” Ruby says. And by washing the items less frequently, health care facilities can use fewer harmful detergents, minimize water and energy consumption, and reduce the release of microfibers into the environment.

4. Improved Energy Efficiency The integration of antimicrobial technology can lead to more efficient systems in health care facilities—including HVAC systems and insulation. By controlling microbial growth on surfaces these systems may require less energy to operate optimally. Improved energy efficiency contributes to reduced greenhouse gas emissions, further aligning with many facilities’ sustainability objectives. 5. Durability Embedded antimicrobials are added to the products at the point of manufacture and become a permanent part of the products. These built-in technologies can offer continuous microbial reduction on a material for the life of the treated product. They also operate a multi-modal attack, making it harder for microbes to become resistant to their effects. And because Microban technologies are incorporated into the treated product, “The functionality is indelible. It will perform 24/7 for the lifetime of product use,” Ruby says.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF MICROBAN

1. Extended Lifespan of Materials Products featuring Microban’s antimicrobial technology can resist deterioration and degradation caused by microbial growth for the entire life of the product. This prolongs the lifespan of materials and reduces the frequency of replacements or renovations in health care facilities. Fewer replacements mean less waste generation, reduced water and energy consumption, and greater cost savings. Longer lifespan, of course, also means less materials end up in the landfill. Of the 14,000 tons of waste generated daily in US health care facilities, about 20 to 25% is plastic. More than 90% of plastics, including those used in health care, are not recycled and either reside in landfills or infiltrate natural environments. “When we extend the life of a product we are reducing landfill loading. We’re reducing the need for repurchase and replacement,” Ruby says. Microban’s solutions promote a circular economy, and design teams will find a wide variety of products available with antimicrobial product protection—including treated concrete; flooring options like carpeting, ceramic tile and grout, vinyl tile and laminate; paints and coatings; and powder-coated door and furniture hardware. Microban technologies show up in many hospital plastic goods as well, including everything from bedpans and key card holders to keyboards, privacy curtains, and the crash carts used during emergency codes. The materials require no special handling or extra steps during installation—other than what Ruby calls the most important step. “Look for the Microban Trustmark (on the product or on the packaging).”

P R OAC T I V E P R O D UC T S Microban stays focused on innovating and is now working to launch a new range of even more environmentally friendly technologies. Many traditional antimicrobial agents employ the use of heavy metals to deliver functionality. Microban is now developing alternative formulations to meet the ever-evolving needs of brands, manufacturers, and product innovators worldwide. “We are proud to have developed a series of new technologies that represent the culmination of many years of intensive research,” Ruby says. “These are the first of an exciting series of nature-inspired solutions that address the need for sustainable product protection in different market segments, including health care.” MicroGuard, mentioned earlier, is a key example. This technology provides high antifungal efficacy for building materials, preventing microbial degradation to extend the useful product lifetime. MicroGuard was developed as a non-leaching antifungal agent with active ingredients that are metal-free, offering an alternative to arsenic-based OBPA—a common antifungal additive—that is causing regulatory concerns. As the company continues to find new ways to incorporate its technologies into products, Ruby wants to hear more from health care providers about what else might be beneficial. “Microban wants to be part of the system of care that delivers a cleaner, greener planet for all,” he says.

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Stanford University in Palo Alto is home to one hospital system that’s continually exploring the evolving territory of health care design. Modular construction is one big topic they’ve focused on recently. Modular design allows spaces to be easily reconfigured depending on what a clinic needs. Offices can become exam rooms or exam rooms can become treatment rooms without the need for large, costly, and material-intensive renovations. As part of their recent modular construction efforts Stanford Health Care is increasingly turning to vacuum-based plumbing. These systems are easier to reconfigure than traditional gravity-based plumbing and use less water, which is more sustainable and sanitary. In all building projects Stanford is looking for environmentally friendly and sustainable building materials, flooring, and furnishings— even if that means a larger upfront cost. “It’s a bit of a learning process as we go, as greener materials become available,” says Molly Fries, Stanford’s interim director of operational excellence. “We do look at things from a life cycle analysis perspective, moving away from just looking at the first cost.”

PHOTO BY WILL PRYCE

Going forward Stanford aims to achieve LEED Gold for every major renovation and construction project. They first received the certification at a new hospital completed in 2019. “It’s quite unusual for a hospital to achieve that,” says Helen Wilmot, Stanford’s chief facilities and sustainability officer. “Stanford is definitely ahead of the curve.” But achieving LEED certification requires far more than just reducing waste and using greener materials. “The infrastructure is where it’s at. And for a health care building that’s the hardest part,” Wilmot says. Hospitals face particular challenges when it comes to their heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems. Hospital HVAC systems are highly specialized to control disease spread. Wilmot says some Stanford facilities have 20 individual zones, all with their own regulated humidity, temperature, airflow, and air pressure. Designing a system that can accomplish those tasks while also being energy-efficient is difficult. “We have very sophisticated designers to help us with that. We’re asking them to think how to make it more sustainable,” Wilmot says. Natural gas is another obstacle facing hospitals wanting to go green. In health care settings natural gas is primarily used to make steam, which is used to sanitize medical instruments, cookware, and dishes. The steam is created in an onsite steam plant often powered by natural gas. “We use a lot of natural gas,” Wilmot says. “Producing steam with electrification is not standard.” She says creating more sustainable systems requires designers, architects, general contractors, and subcontractors to be familiar with health care–specific building needs. And once the facility is built engineers must be trained to keep these innovative systems up and running. “It has to be an entire flow of change that occurs. All the parties along that chain have to be committed,” she says. As a large academic medical center, Wilmot says Stanford bears a responsibility to lead the way. “We are meant to be a role model for how it is we address human planetary health,” she says. “We cannot do it alone. The architects have to do it with us. The contractors have to do it with us. The suppliers have to do it with us.” g

Stanford Hospital at 500 Pasteur Drive received LEED Gold certification in 2022. Going forward Stanford aims to achieve LEED Gold for every major renovation and construction project.

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Revolutionizing Building Efficiency Invisible Leaks, Visible Results.

Air leakage in buildings is one of the biggest contributors to energy waste, leading to higher energy costs, compliance setbacks, and environmental impacts.

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Your path to building performance, code compliance, and energy optimization has arrived. GBDMAGA ZINE.COM

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From ductwork to building envelopes, Aeroseal’s groundbreaking automated air-sealing technologies are transforming buildings for a net-zero future.

aeroseal.com

practice

RENDERING COURTESY OF CORGAN

in conver sat ion

THREE STRUCTURES ARE COVERED IN PHOTOVOLTAIC PANELING. RATHER THAN CONCEAL THE PVS, THEY ARE HOISTED IN THE AIR WITH A FINELY ARTICULATED STEEL CANOPY STRUCTURE.

Corgan on Designing a Net-Positive Energy Development How Wells Fargo’s Texas campus is harnessing the sun BY YUYAN ZHANG

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competitive and really doing the right thing. They realize they’re the entities that have the ability to influence how the real estate market happens and how commercial real estate gets developed.” Corgan recently designed an incredibly sustainable campus for Wells Fargo in Irving, Texas that will go beyond net zero to generate more energy onsite than it consumes when it’s complete. Currently under construction, the mixed-use development will consist of two 10-story office buildings connected to a parking garage via a skybridge. The 850,000-square-foot project is targeting LEED Platinum, with special attention paid to site planning and building orientation, facade design that mitigates heat gain, solar panels, regionally sourced materials, lighting interventions, and interstitial biophilic elements throughout the space. It’s Corgan and Wells Fargo’s first net-positive project. We recently sat down with McDonald to learn more about how they plan to achieve this inspiring project and its challenges. What is net positive? The idea of creating a net zero development or building is giving back an equal amount of the power of your consuming, so therefore your impact on the utility grid is zero. It’s net positive when you’re generating more energy on the site than you’re using. You’re able to give that power back to the utility grid, store it, or do something else with it. This is a very aspirational goal, and we’re thrilled on many levels to actually achieve this. How do you achieve net positive? You can create power onsite in a couple of ways. You’ve got hydroelectric if you’ve got a river or a dam close by. You’ve got wind potential if you’ve got the availability for that. But based on where we are and where the site is, it made the most sense to focus on solar power. Access to sunlight and views is also important. One of the sustainability goals is to make sure you’re getting natural light deep into the building floor plates. These are really large floor plates—40,000 square feet each—but we’ve designed them to be long and narrow so you don’t have dark spots in the middle of the building. One of the counterpoints to that is when you have too much natural light, you have some heat gain and glare that comes along with that. This is probably one of the larger installations on a corporate campus of an electrochromic glazing system on the exterior. What that does is when the sun is bearing down the glass darkens a bit so you are minimizing some of that heat gain, while still taking advantage of the views and the light without using window shades to block the view.

RENDERINGS COURTESY OF CORGAN

W orkspaces designed around wellness and sustainability are important for attracting top talent, says Matt McDonald, the commercial sector leader at Corgan. “If you’re a college graduate, you’re going to be looking for an organization that aligns with your priorities. You want to put your career and energy into a place that is giving back to the environment, giving back to a community, or giving back in some capacity.” He’s noticed some financial institutions, like JPMorgan Chase’s net-zero HQ in Manhattan and Goldman Sachs’ Dallas campus, have been making a push toward sustainability in their building efforts. “Corporations these days are looking beyond being

How has this plan evolved?

DESIGNED BY CORGAN, WELLS FARGO’S NEW CAMPUS IN LAS COLINAS, TEXAS PRODUCES MORE ENERGY ONSITE THAN IT CONSUMES. IT’S THE FIRST NET-POSITIVE PROJECT FOR BOTH THE CLIENT AND THE ARCHITECTURE FIRM.

The initial goal was to be net zero. The client came back to us late in the design process and said, “Hey, we want to really bump the goal here to be net positive.” We really had to knuckle down and scrutinize every system, every plug load, every computer, taking it down to the actual number of employees who were going to be utilizing power onsite. Wells Fargo has its own sustainability team. They’re challenging us on our energy models, our solar heat gain, and our energy usage. They’re really pushing the envelope, no pun intended, to really make sure we’re maximizing the availability of technology and really trying to stretch sustainable development. How do you balance aesthetics and performance? This is an initiative Wells Fargo is very proud of. The idea of seeing the solar panels was something they were not afraid of. The solar ISSUE 69

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canopy makes that top level of the architecture usable by shading it, while also being able to showcase and make visible what we’re doing on the sustainability front. There was a balance between the calculation of the required area and then structurally how far you can cantilever those things out at an economic rate. We did have to be very particular about how the underside of those canopies look because it will be visible from the street. It will have to be very carefully installed, and we’ll be monitoring that very carefully, but the idea of creating that as a thoughtful and very visible approach to sustainability was something that became a design element in itself. Where does biophilia fit in? We wanted a large parking structure because we are going to have 5,000 to 6,000 cars we have to manage on a daily basis. Putting that on a separate piece of property gave us the perfect opportunity to utilize that upper level for photovoltaic panels to harness all the energy. That also reduced surface parking and minimized paved outdoor spaces. We could maximize the green both from an accessibility and walkability perspective but equally for views. You offset the heat island effect by utilizing more landscaping and create outdoor amenity space that is so desired. With this site being on the waterfront, you have this tremendous outdoor amenity that will never be blocked. Not only does it help you from a sustainability perspective because you won’t have anything that’s casting shade on your building, but you’ve got these unadulterated views of this really thoughtful development that’s here in Las Colinas. How do you see sustainable design strategy evolving? I think there’s a lot of tried and true sustainable practices that are being tested for their maximum potential. If you think about using the sun to generate power, using the earth to do geothermal wells for heating and cooling, these are not new practices. These are timeless practices that have been done based on what the good earth has given us. We’re just learning new and innovative ways to utilize them and maximize their efficiency. g

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RENDERING BY COURTESY PHOTOS TK TKOF CORGAN

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Residential Redo

of establishing a better economic, commercial, cultural, and civic hub. As such, The Residences at Rivermark set out to revitalize the downtown district. Unlike many cities, historically Baton Rouge’s downtown housing has not included many high-rise rentals. Furthermore, during the boom in high-rise construction in the last 20 years, no such properties were constructed. This presented an opportunity for Wampold Companies to convert an older office asset, the Rivermark Centre South tower, into rental apartments. The North tower remained an office building with an existing parking garage at the base.

Adaptive reuse on display in Baton Rouge office to residential conversion BY BROOKS HOWELL

The Plans The initial plan for the project was driven by the building’s two elevator banks and involved converting the top elevator bank—12 of the tower’s 21 floors. The lower floors remained as office, with Chase Bank as the primary tenant. During the project Chase Bank proposed two additional floors, levels 8 and 9, which were added to the project for a total of 168 residential units. The Gensler team was also responsible for infusing the building with a variety of high-end luxury amenities, replacing an aging pedestrian passage connecting the North and South towers to the parking garage, and relocating an existing basement-level Chase Bank branch to a street-facing retail pavilion at the ground level. When looking at potential office to residential conversion projects, several factors determine how well a building will convert based on efficiencies—including site context, building form, floorplate, building envelope, and servicing. Gensler’s scorecard tool and an added financial component revealed that The Residences at Rivermark scored highly in all categories.

he Residences at Rivermark is a transformative office to residential conversion. Built in 1968, the office tower owned by Wampold Companies is in a multiple building development on a full city block in Baton Rouge. Gensler’s history with Wampold Companies dates to 2015. During this time we collaborated on the conversion of the historic Louisiana Trust and Savings Bank building to the Watermark Baton Rouge Hotel—part of the Autograph Collection. The partnership revealed that our client valued enhancing the metropolitan center with hospitality and residential projects that are in alignment with the city’s goal

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GENSLER TRANSFORMED AN OLDER OFFICE ASSET, THE RIVERMARK CENTRE SOUTH TOWER IN BATON ROUGE, INTO LUXURY RENTAL APARTMENTS.

How We Did It Beyond the scorecard analysis, many other determining factors make a project possible. In the case of The Residences at Rivermark, the original design of the Brutalist towers allowed the team to carefully coordinate the preservation of the facade with the Louisiana State Historic Preservation. This resulted in the approval of the project for historic tax credits and incentivized an adaptive reuse design strategy for the building facade and lobby. The existing building utilizes a “tube” style concrete and panjoist structural frame in which the building floors are supported entirely from the core elements and an external facade of tightly spaced structural columns. Building glazing is installed as infill between the columns. To add open balconies to the facade, the team conducted studies on removing some of the exterior tube columns. Our structural engineer determined the columns could be removed without impacting the structural integrity of the building. A special concrete saw was utilized to remove the columns, and concrete from the cuts was reused as benches in the plaza on the ground level. Rather than covering the existing rough-Brutalist interior ribbed concrete walls, we exposed them and layered new finishes, highlighting the concrete walls with indirect lighting as a nod to the building’s history. The existing ribbed concrete walls served as inspiration for the integration of several new design elements, including fluted paneling throughout corridors and entries. The apartment unit mechanical system utilizes a chilled water and fan-coil HVAC strategy. As a result our team was able to save costs by keeping the existing mechanical systems—including cooling towers, boilers, and equipment from the upper levels. Ultimately this benefitted the building’s office tenants because the systems remained functional during construction. The Result As office users and residential tenants share the first-floor lobby of the building, it was important to allow for the coexistence of office and residential uses in the same elevator bank. This was done by

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DESIGN DETAIL This efficient space realizes a 34% reduction in embodied carbon when compared to workspaces of similar size and focus. The firm achieved this through minimal interventions, constructing walls only where necessary, subtracting extraneous elements, and sourcing from local vendors and manufacturers.

Meet the Architect

Brooks Howell is principal and global residential practice area leader at Gensler.

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PROJEC T

The Residences at Rivermark LOC ATION

Baton Rouge ARCHITEC T & INTERIOR DESIGN

Gensler CONTR AC TOR

Lemoine Companies OWNER & DEVELOPER

Wampold Companies BR AND & ENVIRONMENTAL GR APHIC S

Gensler CIVIL ENGINEER:

Stantec STRUC TUR AL ENGINEER

Walter P. Moore MECHANIC AL ENGINEER

AST Engineers LIGHTING

Lang Lighting Design ACOUSTIC AL

SLR International Corporation L ANDSC APE ARCHITEC T

TBG Partners WIND ENGINEERING:

Cermak Peterka Petersen

PHOTO BY RYAN GOBUT Y

incorporating a destination dispatch-type system, which was implemented without changing the physical elevator structures. This system also serves as a security amenity for residents. To create the finished apartment units and expose the pan-joist concrete slabs in the ceilings, a topping slab was poured over the existing concrete pan-joist slab for upgraded acoustical requirements between floors. This strategy specified vertical surfaces at the perimeter of the balconies to terminate the waterproofing system and to provide for drainage on the balconies, which were previously interior spaces. The topping slab was feathered at the corridors to accommodate the existing stair landings and elevator stops. The one-, two- and three-bedroom units incorporate natural wood finishes, wall paneling, chair railings, and Shaker-style cabinetry. The column-free floorplate allows for open floorplans with features like quartz countertops, stainless steel appliances, gas ranges, washer and dryer, double bathroom vanities, standalone glass showers and private balconies.

Solving Challenges A challenge of office-to-residential conversions is locating outdoor amenities like pools, hot tubs, fire pits, and grill areas. In this project we placed these luxuries on the roof—a setting that offers panoramic views of the Mississippi River. Other communal tenant amenities include a clubhouse, onsite parking garage, fitness center, and pet amenities. Located at 451 Florida Street, The Residences at Rivermark also offers convenient access to the nearby Red Stick Farmer’s Market, YMCA, and the Shaw Center for the Arts. In developing the project, Wampold Companies aimed to create a modern urban highrise community anchored by walkability to nearby dining, nightlife, arts, and parks. Adaptive Reuse Worth Celebrating Overall successful adaptive reuse strategies increase the building value and provide an evolved authenticity that celebrates the intent of the original architecture. Additionally, embodied carbon savings can be substantial. On average we have found that retaining an existing structure can prevent 349 kilograms of carbon dioxide equivalents from being released into the atmosphere per square meter. For a 14-story conversion like The Residences at Rivermark, this is the equivalent to 1.75 million kilograms of carbon dioxide—or flying across the world more than 100 times. g

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Responsive & Responsible

town business district with South Austin. Surrounded by the picturesque Butler Metro Park and Lady Bird Lake, the building offers occupants stunning views that provide a sense of tranquility amid the vibrant urban setting.

An Environmentally Responsible Building The development results from a joint venture between Stream Realty Partners and QuadReal Property Group, and it proudly stands as the flagship project within the Waterfront District. The ground floor is home to various retail establishments featuring attractive outdoor seating areas adorned with heat-reducing vegetation and canopies, creating an inviting and sustainable environment for visitors and occupants alike. Encompassing an impressive 327,500 square feet, the building proudly meets the rigorous criteria set by Austin Energy’s Green Building Commercial Rating System. As the first program of its kind, the rating system, developed in 1991, evaluates and recognizes buildings that prioritize environmental responsibility. In addition, RiverSouth has achieved the prestigious LEED Gold certification, a testament to its exceptional performance in energy efficiency, water conservation, indoor environmental quality, and sustainable site development.

Austin’s smartest building achieves environmental goals. BY NATALIE TERRILL

A Collaborative Approach to Problem-Solving To achieve the project’s ambitious environmental and sustainability goals, the design team employed a collaborative problem-solving approach inspired by Toyota’s A3 process. This method, developed by Toyota in the 1940s, guided the team in identifying and analyzing key project elements and offering innovative design strategies. One remarkable example of the design team’s problem-solving ingenuity lies in their analysis of the diaphragm wall. Serving as an underground concrete wall that acts as a retention system and permanent foundation walls, the diaphragm wall presented a unique challenge. However, by designing a flood-preventing wall, RiverSouth ensured resiliency, maximized the underground parking garage, and added 40,000 square feet of office space. This creative solution increased the building’s floor-area ratio, enhanced the facade’s appeal, and improved leasing efficiencies. The problem-solving approach also influenced the window mullion spacing. The building’s facade incorporates high-performance glass, creating an aesthetically pleasing curtain wall layout that provides unobstructed city views while maintaining energy efficiency.

ustin’s RiverSouth building stands tall as a gleaming Class AA office tower, offering breathtaking views of the city’s bucolic hilly terrain. More than just a striking architectural structure, this 15-story building helps solidify the Texas capital’s position as one of the nation’s most environmentally friendly cities. Located within the 118-acre South Central Waterfront District, RiverSouth also plays a crucial role in the major redevelopment project connecting Austin’s down-

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RIVERSOUTH IN AUSTIN FEATURES A GREEN ROOF THAT BOTH HELPS TO KEEP THE BUILDING COOL AND GIVES PEOPLE A PLACE TO ESCAPE.

Achieving a SmartScore Platinum Rating Moreover, RiverSouth has achieved the prestigious SmartScore Platinum certification. This distinction further highlights RiverSouth’s advanced smart-building technology and unwavering commitment to optimizing energy efficiency, occupant comfort, and operational performance. The building uses cutting-edge sensors connected to its automation system, effectively controlling air quality, heating, ventilation, air conditioning systems, lighting, and security. Data collection from these systems is analyzed using artificial intelligence to predict and maintain the building’s energy efficiency and to improve performance. With its advanced technology and commitment to sustainability, RiverSouth has earned the title of Austin’s “smartest building” while setting new standards for high-rise safety. “RiverSouth features technology to tailor the user experience for each occupant,” says Brian Miller, chief design officer at The Beck Group, the project’s architect and general contractor. “The focus was to thoughtfully impact human health, wellness, and comfort into the design to increase occupant satisfaction and reduce environmental impact.”

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Meet the Architect

Natalie Terrill is the director of sustainability at The Beck Group.

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A Model for Today’s Commercial Buildings RiverSouth’s distinctive smart-building features have achieved accolades for its innovations in designing and constructing one of Austin’s most environmentally sustainable commercial buildings. It represents a new model for building technology and practices to create a more energy-efficient and safer future for our cities. g THE BECK GROUP WAS THE RIVERSOUTH PROJECT’S ARCHITECT AND GENERAL CONTRACTOR, EMPHASIZING A COMMITMENT TO HUMAN HEALTH, WELLNESS, AND COMFORT TO INCREASE OCCUPANT SATISFACTION AND REDUCE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT.

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Designing Projects for Walkability JZA’s Jeff Zbikowski on the benefits of walkable design BY MATT WATSON

cross the US two separate but related trends are coming to define the current housing market. On one hand an affordability crisis is putting homeownership out of reach for many. On the other both home buyers and renters are gravitating toward more walkable communities, where daily amenities and necessities can be reached without a car. For architects like JZA Architecture principal and founder Jeff Zbikowski, specializing in designing affordable and walkable communities, the two go hand-in-hand.

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DENSE, WALKABLE PROJECTS AIM TO EASE THE AFFORDABILITY CRUNCH IN CITIES ACROSS THE US, ACCORDING TO JZA.

That’s because the rise in popularity of denser housing developments that forego onsite parking is helping to alleviate a housing shortage that has driven up costs from coast to coast. “Eliminating cars typically frees up ground floor space for retail and eliminates basement parking, which reduces the cost of construction and allows developers to provide more dense housing,” Zbikowski says. “That increases supply and further drives down the costs of those units, creating a more affordable community.” A number of factors have made walkable design increasingly popular, especially among young professionals in major cities. The rise of remote work and post-pandemic desire for socialization has had a large impact. “People really value living in a community where they don’t need to drive to work. They’re biking, taking transit, and walking around,” Zbikowski says. “If you’re not spending 45 minutes a day each way going to the office, you have so much more time to go out and live in your community.” But as Millennials age and struggle to purchase a home as previous generations have, the affordability that walkable design offers is critically important. Few areas have experienced the nationwide affordability crunch like cities such as Los Angeles. But over the last year conditions have begun to change—dramatically—with a new California state law. “This year it turned into the wild west with these affordable, walkable projects,” Zbikowski says. “Developers are building crazy density right now.” In January 2023 California eliminated parking minimums within a half-mile of transit stops. That law complements a 2014 LA transit oriented development (TOD) ordinance that allows greater density the closer a development is to transit. This, along with increased affordability bonuses and reductions in red tape, has led to a boom in walkable, affordable development. “Last year we had 600 units under contract. This year that’s up to 4,000 affordable housing units under contract,” Zbikowski says, despite rising interest rates. “The vision for the future is to continue on this trajectory, bringing identity to each project, being respectful of local contexts, and promoting walkability.” JZA’s Cherokee Ave. Apartments in Hollywood is one such development that benefited from these zoning changes. One of Zbikowski’s first projects when he founded the firm back in 2017, Cherokee Ave. is emblematic of the many roadblocks that slowed dense, walkable projects under the former development regime. Initially planned as a 12-unit apartment building, Zbikowski was then tasked with redesigning the project into 18 units before opposition to the increased density sent the unit count back down to 12, and then from an apartment building to a small-lot subdivision. With the changes in state law, Zbikowski and the developer were able to bypass the traditional review process and were approved for a 53-unit, five-story affordable development. “We were able to convince city planners that we’re on a busy street and should be able to build higher density, taller, and still create something that’s tasteful,” Zbikowski says. “Now you have affordable housing, density, and it’s in an area where you can walk to retail and grocery stores.” Though taller and denser than its immediate neighbors, city officials agreed the Spanish Revival design with a modern twist fit well into the neighborhood context. Construction is expected to start in late 2023. And while affordability is top of mind for many, it’s hardly the only advantage of designing walkable communities. Additional benefits range from fostering social interactions among neighbors and enhancing a sense of place within communities to the climate benefits of fewer cars on the roads and the health benefits of walking and biking. That’s one of the key approaches Zbikowski takes to designing walkable projects. “We typically like to oversize our bicycle park-

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“You have so much more time to go out and live in your community.” OTHER BENEFITS OF WALKABLE DESIGN INCLUDE REDUCED CO2 EMISSIONS FROM FEWER CAR TRIPS AND HEALTH BENEFITS FROM RESIDENTS WALKING AND BIKING MORE FREQUENTLY.

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ing while reducing car parking,” he says, and adding space for larger, rentable cargo bikes gives residents another way to get to the grocery store without a car. At the under-construction Beta Apartments near the University of Southern California campus, JZA planned a large space for bicycles given the area’s walkability and the transportation needs of students—who tend to get around without a car. “Designing walkable projects is very site-specific,” Zbikowski says. “You can’t just place a 100-unit building with no parking anywhere.” Though LA has long been infamous for its car-centric design and urban sprawl, the city may look quite different a decade from now as these types of dense, walkable, and affordable projects continue to proliferate. “Creating these smaller community-centric developments will be a catalyst to create more walkability in these neighborhoods,” Zbikowski says. “The demand is certainly there.” g

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STRONG WALKABILITY DESIGN IN A MULTIFAMILY PROJECT MAY INCLUDE REDUCING OR ELIMINATING PARKING, FREEING UP SPACE FOR PEDESTRIANS. THAT ALSO MEANS AMPLE FRONTAGE FOR COMMERCIAL SPACES.

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DESIGNS LIKE THESE ALSO CREATE PEDESTRIAN-FRIENDLY EXPERIENCES WITH LIGHTWELLS AND ATTRACTIVE LANDSCAPING.

7771 W. BEVERLY BOULEVARD (PICTURED ABOVE) IS A PROPOSED FIVESTORY APARTMENT BUILDING WITH 53

RESIDENTIAL UNITS AND 1,694 SQUARE FEET OF GROUNDLEVEL RETAIL SPACE, WITH PARKING FOR 32 VEHICLES.

THE HKS PROJECT EARNED LEED GOLD AND WELL PLATINUM CERTIFICATION.

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at a glance

Queen’s Marque

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MacKay-Lyons Sweetapple Architects designed Queen’s Marque in Halifax to LEED Platinum standards, with one of the most efficient and technologically advanced heating and cooling plants in the region. The development saves on cooling costs by using water from the harbor. The project, which opened in spring 2023, also utilizes green roofing materials, Low-E glass, and plentiful public space to interact with the community.

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“Our goal was to create a ‘people place,’” says Brian MacKay-Lyons, the firm’s founder. “To us this is a home on a larger scale, where the new central square is the public living room of the city. The idea of home is charged with meaning: It tells something about who you are, where you come from, and where you are going. That is the story for Queen’s Marque, but in relation to this region, rather than an individual.” The project was originally

conceived as a district rather than a building in an effort to contribute to the urban fabric rather than simply making more architecture. The development was designed to enhance the skyline without overpowering it, to frame views, and provide sheltering courtyards and welcoming spaces. The mixed-use district includes offices, a luxury hotel, shops, restaurants, and rental apartments. —Laura Rote

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56% OF HOMEOWNERS WANT ALL BUILDING MATERIALS ECO-FRIENDLY.

At Malarkey, we strive simply to make the best shingles in the most sustainable way. It’s a dual mission. First, build the industry’s highest-performing shingle. Then, aggressively offset its footprint. Sustainability without sacrificing performance.

WHEN IT MATTERS®

PHOTOS BY TK TK

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MetalWorks™ Blades – Classics & Fine Fissured™ Panels > Red Thread, East Hartford, CT > QA+M Architecture, Farmington, CT

Sustainable and soothing by nature

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