Design Matters	A Building Breathing by Albert Chao

Half organism and half machine, the newly completed San Francisco Federal Building (pictured below) towers 18 stories high but is only 60 feet wide. Completed recently in 2006, the building is a testimony to new approaches to architecture, both in sustainability and also in the journey from design to built form.

A skin of three-by-eight-foot steel plates wraps the building’s internal organs. These plates are automated to open and close at different times of the day, and utilize winds and breezes for natural ventilation. This skin becomes both mechanical and organic. It is permeable and responsive to the environment. The design of the floors is also an integral element in creating natural air flow. The underside of each floor is fluted, which, again, enhances the natural rhythm of warm air rising, thus creating a natural air conditioner.

The collaborators on the project developed new technology in an effort to bridge digital models with physical form. In fabricating the skin of the building, Morphosis, the lead design firm, developed a building information model (BIM) as a tool to bridge between both digital design and fabrication, as well as between architect and engineer. Using BIM, B.D.S. Steel Detailers created a final detailed model that diverged slightly in small areas of no more than a few millimeters. This tool was also useful in estimating costs, detailing fabrication and scheduling. Architecture has become extremely specialized, as demonstrated by the process in fabrication of the skin. New ideas for buildings are constructed by different parties with different expertise. Through collaboration, new technologies can be integrated throughout every aspect of architecture.

The development of the BIM tool reflects other contemporary architects’ interest in the gap between the digital and the real. Internationally renowned architect Frank Gehry, for example, worked on the skin that wraps the Gugghenheim Museum Bilbao in Spain in dynamic sweeping curves. The San Francisco Federal Building, however, also engages the pertinent issue of sustainability. Skins in contemporary practice today reflect a move toward green architecture.

Concrete is an important material in the new federal building. First, concrete’s strength helps stabilize this unconventionally narrow building in an area of greater seismic activity. It also provides thermal mass that absorbs heat from during the day and releases it during the night, a quality also used by other contemporary architects, like Will Bruder in his design of the Phoenix Central Library in Arizona.

The use of concrete’s thermal properties, though traditional, remains common in contemporary architectural practice. But today’s architects use lighting and color in new and different ways. Using slag concrete (which is almost white) mixed with Portland cement makes the concrete lighter in color and increases reflectivity. As a result, less lighting is needed throughout the building. The planning of offices in the new federal building inverts traditional hierarchies, so that most workers can have access to windows and more access to sunlight. In addition, 90 percent of workspaces will have views of the city. The overall design of the San Francisco Federal Building, from skin to concrete, is estimated to use 50 percent less energy than a similar structure.

The key players were involved in the design, including the client—the General Services Administration—worked closely with Morphosis, the architects, and Arup, the engineers of the project. The incredibly detailed building of stainless-steel-cladded panels, all custom made, required intensive communications between designer and fabricator. The building is not the work of one architect but rather a collective effort. It is also a model to follow, an example of new innovations and ideas in sustainable architecture. Green architecture is not only about attaching solar panels to buildings; it’s about rethinking all the integrated functions of a building.

These pertinent issues will be a part of a discussion held at the University at Buffalo on Monday, March 19 in 301 Crosby Hall on South Campus. Engaging the successes of the San Francisco Federal Building project as well as its limitations will reveal contemporary issues in architecture. This discussion/lecture will include the client, architect and engineer in a discussion that reflects process and collaboration, rather than just design.

The lecture schedule is as follows:

1:30pm: Introductions

2pm: Gilbert Delgado, GSA (client)

3pm: Tim Christ, Morphosis (architect)

4pm: Erin McConahey, Arup (engineer)

5:30pm: Roundtable discussion

The lecture is sponsored by UB School of Architecture and Planning, UB School of Management and Uniland Development Company.

Design Matters is presented in association with the UB School of Architecture and Planning and supported by a fellowship endowed by Polis Realty.