Custom ceiling solutions were installed in the lobby and services areas of the Minnehaha Academy Upper School. The installation focused on space and ambiance, with an emphasis on bringing nature into the buildings. A grille, made of hemlock wood, features an acoustical backer, which helps to control the sound in the main entrance.
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At Lisle Elementary School in the Chicago suburbs, an immediately striking feature is the sprawling wood-look plank ceiling that greets students outside in the canopies at the school’s south and east entrances. The natural aesthetic of wood continues into the school’s corridors,where the design team from Perkins + Will specified CertainTeed perforated ceiling panels in Rift Cut White Oak veneer for their natural look and acoustic qualities. From a distance, the ceiling is unmistakably wood. In reality, it’s metal with a wood-look finish from the Box series by Hunter Douglas Ceilings & Walls from CertainTeed. Thanks to a unique metal construction, of 92% recycled materia
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In adding outdoor amenities, including walking tracks, San Antonio, Texas’ North East Independent School District opted away from asphalt and other non-permeable surfaces, and instead employed Porous Pave XL to install ADA-compliant tracks at 44 schools. A highly porous and durable material made, with 50% recycled rubber chips and 50% aggregate mixed on site, the material delivers a more sustainable surface for outdoor recreation resource. Additionally, the project required a surface with superior flexibility so that serviceability cracks, caused by horizontal or vertical movements of the underlying soils due to expansion and contraction, would not create problems.
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While public schools may not be known for their forward-thinking designs, The Heights Building in Arlington, Va., is the exception. Merging two existing secondary schools—the H-B Woodlawn Program and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver Program—into a new 180,000-sq.-ft. building housing 775 students. The building exemplifies modern architecture, energy efficiency and a sense of community that connects students with the surrounding neighborhood as well as a focus on indoor-outdoor learning.Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG), in connection with Leo A. Daly, designed the school with a bold, energetic vision to support both schools’ unique student bodies—H-B Woodlawn’s visual and per
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Metal wall panels save money and add interest at the University of Texas. The University of Texas at Tyler created plans to add a STEM and business building to its expanding campus to attract students from across the country. The original specification called for aluminum composite material (ACM) to match metal wall panels on the College of Pharmacy Building. However, the construction team was looking for an alternative to save money and speed up installation. Additionally, the design team was not willing to compromise on design, so they wanted a system which could expand their creative possibilities. The team was also looking for alternatives for the wood soffit. They needed something
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Located on the east bank of the Mississippi River, the second oldest residence hall at the University of Minnesota recently became its second largest. The 90-year-old Pioneer Hall opened its doors to the 2019 freshman and sophomore class after completing $104.5 million in renovations. Now more than 40% larger than its original size, Pioneer Hall boasts a historically sensitive, but modern design within a 252,391-sq.-ft. facility supplying 756 beds to students across five floors. This includes preserving the building’s historic Georgian Revival-style exterior, while gutting an interior that previously consisted of adjoining townhomes that were exceedingly difficult to navigate and faile
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The National Aviary in Pittsburgh recently completed the installation of glass windows and doors at The Garden Room, a new glass-enclosed venue for weddings, special events and educational programs that also will serve as a showcase for energy-efficient, bird-safe glass. “The National Aviary works hard to provide the best possible care for the birds through field conservation programs and education,” said Cheryl Tracy, executive director of the National Aviary. “As we made plans for The Garden Room, it was important to us to practice these principles by selecting materials that would help keep the wild birds in our neighboring park safe.”
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The new Charles Library at Temple University serves as a central point of intersection between students, faculty, staff and the surrounding community. “An early goal of the library design was for it to be an organizing element and a way to pull students to the library from multiple parts of the campus,” says Chad Carpenter, project manager, Snohetta. “The goal was also for the physical space of the library to be a collector and a warm, comforting place that everybody would understand as the center of campus.” Between the exterior and interior ceiling and wall applications, over 50,000 sq. ft. of western red cedar panels were installed. Western red cedar was chosen bec
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When students attending Tulane University walk into the heart of campus, they will be greeted by the recent completion of Tulane Commons, a 77,000-sq.-ft., three-story eatery, study area and event space. Open space and a floor-to-ceiling curtainwall is featured throughout the building to provide views of New Orleans, as well as the regal oak trees that line the lush quad on Tulane’s campus. The end result is a stunning addition to Tulane University that will attract the best and brightest students and faculty members from around the world. The vision behind the iconic building was to design a forward-thinking, multi-functional space that would reflect the three prominent university int
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Winner in the Brick in Architecture’s Best in Class category for higher education, McCord Hall, at the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University in Tempe, was designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox. Its curving façade features a highly textured surface of projecting “corduroy” brick and deep vertical windows with projecting metal fins. The curved form of the building also increases the natural dynamism of the projecting brick shadows and operates like a sundial as the sun moves.
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New University of Southern Indiana facility features unique 'clipped' thin stone solution to meet design and budget demands. The University of Southern Indiana chose Arriscraft’s innovative ARRIS-clip (thin-clad) Rainscreen Stone as they envisioned a modern facility that acknowledged and honored the older stone buildings on campus and also set a new course for the school moving into the future. The challenge for the designers and the client was to find a premium stone cladding that met the unique design challenges of this building concept and also the budget and schedule requirements. The need was clearly for a versatile stone cladding that could still provide i
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Antelope Valley College focused on its future with a retrofit project that created the Palmdale Center that was an existing grocery store with attached office building. The retrofit market is filled with opportunity for the building owners who are willing to reinvest in structures. Antelope Valley College focused on its future with a retrofit project that created the Palmdale Center in Palmdale, Calif. With the project, the college now has a self-contained satellite campus that once was an existing grocery store with an attached medical office building.
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