WINDOWS CASE STUDY

Photo courtesy of Marvin Windows and Doors

Project: Folts Residence
Location: Austin, Texas
Architect: Kris White of Dick Clark + Associates (DCA)
Developer: Vinson & Radke

The Project: Located in the vibrant Zilker neighborhood in Austin, Texas, this custom home was built in partnership between Kris White of DCA and boutique developer Vinson & Radke. The home combines unmistakable mid-century influences with a neutral color palette and generous amounts of natural light that suffuse its living spaces with warmth.

The Design: Architect Kris White provides the background on the design, saying, “This is how we start the design process: what’s the site, what’s the context, and what are the views we want to capture?” The orientation of the home on the land and its layout express White’s belief in using windows strategically to bring light into the home and to frame views out of it. “I’m a huge fan of the pattern language,” he explains. “My favorite one of those patterns is getting light on both sides. No one uses a room when there’s only one window.”

The two facades, or elevations, of the corner lot allowed White to place the pedestrian entry on the long side, in the center of the home. As you enter, private rooms are on the left and public spaces are to the right. This moves the communal spaces away from the busy street corner and toward the back of the house, enhancing the feeling of privacy. “You get that real indoor/outdoor connection by putting the public spaces to the corner,” he says. To further enhance the feeling of connectedness to the property and neighborhood, White blew out the entire facade on the right side of the home beyond the living and dining rooms with nothing but glass to frame the yard. “People don’t enjoy a space because it’s rectangular,” he explains. “They enjoy it because 1) they get light from two sides and 2) what they’re looking at is intriguing and has a connection to either the landscape or a strategic view of something they want to see all the time and want in their lives.”

The Fenestration: “We use light and glass almost like its own material,” White says of this light-filled modern home. Contemporary styled windows and doors are used to create connectedness between the home and the yard, the neighborhood and the city itself, a feeling White really wanted to convey through the architecture. On the open, right side, he used two multi-sliding glass doors spanning a total of 32 feet to physically connect the living and dining rooms to the sleek, white, seamless patio and visually to the outdoors and yard beyond.

While some modern homes can feel cold and uninviting, the thoughtfully placed contemporary windows in this home bathe each room in natural light that complements the color palette and animates the living spaces. And even though the interior wood clad on all the windows and doors was painted white, the subtle yet visible natural wood texture still imparts a feeling of warmth that other contemporary windows sometimes lack. “Aluminum gets so cold, and it’s hard to get it to respond to an interior color palette,” White says. “The beauty of using the windows we selected is that they immediately bring in warmth.”

Another benefit of the windows’ interior wood cladding is that it reinforces the home’s mid-century aesthetic and design philosophy, where a sense of connectedness to the environment was created by bringing natural materials like stone and wood inside. “The windows complement the architecture,” White says.

The Results: The home’s thoughtful architecture, considered materials, and color palette are beautifully executed in a way that perfectly complements the site, the neighborhood, and the city. Connectedness doesn’t get any more complete than that.

OPENING GLASS WALLS CASE STUDY

© David Wakely Photography/NanaWall Systems

Project: American AgCredit National Headquarters
Location: Santa Rosa, California
Architect: TLCD Architecture

The Project: Originally intended to be a 50,000-square-foot new national headquarters comprised of two separate buildings with the option to expand, the new American AgCredit building in Santa Rosa, California, blossomed into a 120,000-square-foot work of art. Completed in March 2016, this “Building in Motion” is comprised of two organically shaped buildings surrounding a central courtyard that is bridged together on two levels. The top floor is conjoined by a roof walk that connects the upper wings of the building. As the light interacts with the shapes throughout the day, this building presents more as a kinetic sculpture than a headquarters of an agricultural financing institution.

The Design: TLCD Architecture, also of Santa Rosa, worked synergistically with client and contractor Jim Murphy & Associates to bring the many goals into fruition, including a flexible floor plan to accommodate rapid growth and change, collaborative space and transparency to reflect the company culture, and an energy-efficient and sustainably designed structure.

TLCD served as both the architect and the interior designer, making for a very cohesive approach toward the design. With flexibility at the forefront of the client’s goals, concepts like circulation, indoor/outdoor connection, space for individual concentrated work, places to connect, and flex space were all part of the project. Creating the most agile interior possible to satisfy the requirements of the workforce at the headquarters, different work zones were addressed throughout the floor plan. From open office workstations that convert from sitting to standing positions to demountable semi-transparent private office partitions, flexibility was the main objective.

With a client requirement for energy efficiency and LEED certification, pigmented exterior perforated zinc panels were selected to be installed over a curtain-wall exterior to help mitigate some of the impact of the sun and provide structural sun shading. Raised floors accommodating wiring and displacement air distribution provide energy-efficient and superior interior air quality. Furthermore, environment-controlled motorized window shades and a plethora of daylight harvesting minimize the energy consumption of this building and yield a comfortable workplace for all.

The interior environment is further highlighted with smart furnishings and impressive artwork. Three walls in the interior are home to large installations, from the epic rammed earth wall at the reception that is formed with layers of soil collected at the various branch locations of American AgCredit across the United States, to a two-story cowhide wall mural that tells an aerial story of the surrounding agricultural land, to the wine barrel wall representing the many local clients of this Northern Californian location. All these well-chosen details amount to a truly modern and forward-thinking workplace environment.

The third-floor executive boardroom is the pièce de résistance situated in prime orientation to capture all the beauty the location has to offer, with stellar views of Mt. St. Helena, the surrounding hillsides, and the fields of grapevines surrounding two sides of the building.

The Fenestration: To achieve a light-filled interior, the shallow building is wrapped in a glass facade so light from both the surroundings and the central courtyard flood the interior with natural daylight. The glass allows the occupants to connect to the outside views and one another from almost every angle. This concept was further carried into the two meeting/project rooms that are adaptable for various-sized group work. To achieve this, TLCD specified two opening glass walls made up of single track sliding glass wall systems, which can be opened or closed to suit the needs of the group. “We were looking for a product that was easy to operate, energy efficient, has very clean lines, and is modern. We are very comfortable using the product that we ultimately selected,” says Don Tomasi, AIA, principal of TLCD. The 9-foot-9-inch-tall panels conveniently slide into a parking bay when open and close with simple operation when the space needs to be occupied by two groups working on different projects. Tomasi continues, “One of the most important things we did relative to the interface between the indoors and the outdoors is to use sliding glass partitions.” The use of the opening glass walls allows for visual connection balanced with the required acoustical privacy for groups working in tandem.

Related to the screen over the curtain-wall glazing, Tomasi notes, “The screen was designed to provide a sense of motion around the building. The idea being, as you go around either the courtyard or observe the building from the outside, the views are constantly changing, the image is constantly changing. It is always a new experience as you are looking out into the courtyard, as you are moving from one space to the other.”

On the executive-level third floor, fenestration agility is displayed with the installation of an impressive 10-by-38-foot opening glass wall that adjoins the boardroom with the adjacent outdoor patio. The operable wall fills the space with fresh air and natural daylight that can make even the longest of meetings enjoyable, with a flexible space that is able to breathe and adapt to the requirements of the meeting or event. Because of Tomasi’s previous experience with the opening glass wall product on other projects, he knew that it could provide the panel height and aesthetics that were needed for this beautifully appointed room. He points out, “My favorite part of the building, and I think most people’s favorite part of the building, is the boardroom and the outdoor deck connected by the sliding glass partition. It has an absolutely stunning view to the hills and the vineyards. It is a unique space, and there is nothing else like it.”

The Results: With sustainability tantamount to contemporary commercial building practices in this region, the American AgCredit headquarters exceeded the LEED requirements for Gold-level certification. This “Building in Motion” encourages both the occupants and visitors to explore all it has to offer—from inside to outside, across bridges and through various outside spaces, to the adaptable interior spaces.