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Kolumba Art Museum | |
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Predock's Architecture School | |
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Predock's Architecture School "In architecture schools, there is something going on night and day," Predock notes, "so the building has a lot of animation: you can see students working, the lights are on all night. It's very important for me to have, rather than a closed-wall type of UNM building, a building that is really open." University design directives also required that the style and feel of the architecture building, named George Pearl Hall, integrate with other buildings on campus, which Predock says was achieved through the earthen color and stepped massing. "The big gravity wall gives it that relationship, which is well received and authentic," he asserts. Contained Enlightenment The architecture school exudes a sense of light, space, and openness, not hinting at any of the challenges that vexed the architects in the early days of the design process. Predock reports that the site — a spatially constrained parking lot — proved challenging. In addition, his firm and executive architect Jon Anderson Architect were working with an extremely tight budget. Predock says he designed the 110,000-square-foot (10,200-square-meter) architecture school as he does all buildings: "I took program requirements they had for instructional purposes and then worked them spatially and in terms of materiality to interpret the program." One goal was to facilitate intellectual sharing. "When you get inside the building, there are a lot of spatial dynamics where different levels visually connect with other levels," says Predock. "You have a real sense of students visually eavesdropping on each other's activities, and lots of cross-pollination. Ideas are constantly crossing over from one studio to the next." "Hanging" seminar rooms float in between the big outer wall and the different studio levels. "They're basically glass cubes where you can have a seminar and look into the courtyard below," describes Predock, "but they have moveable panels for pin-up and critique. They're quite flexible where they are arrayed, so each studio can have access to one or another of them, thus offering teaching flexibility." The Fine Arts Library was relocated to the building's top floor from its previous home on campus. Predock thinks the move was good for everyone, and not just because of the great views from the new location: "Architecture students get cross-disciplinary exposure through the Fine Arts Library, and people coming to the library are exposed to architecture." There is also a multiuse auditorium at one end of the building that can be used by other schools within the university, offering additional opportunities for cross-disciplinary contact. Sustainable Example Like many clients on tight budgets, the university opted not to apply for LEED certification because of the expense of doing so. Predock says the project does incorporate many sustainable measures, however. The building's mass provides great thermal stability. The thick wall facing the street also serves as a plenum chamber for HVAC air circulation, part of the mechanical system that conditions the building with inductive air flow assist to the return air pattern of the main mechanical system. Almost no artificial light is used in the studios during the daytime, thanks to extensive daylighting, and occupancy sensors help reduce electric light use in the building at night. Low-e glass was used for the large amount of glazing, and some of the glass has a ceramic frit applied in horizontal strips to filter incoming sunlight and reduce glare. Sheltered below grade, a courtyard off one of the studios extends the school's usable space. A green roof planted with native grasses and fed by collected rainwater provides another outdoor space. There has also been discussion about adding photovoltaic cells to the building in the future, Predock says. >>> Discuss this article in the Architecture Forum...
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