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MASTER PLANNER
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Around the World and Here at Home,
HOK Creates Sustainable Designs Now and For the Future
By Laurie Burstein
In a laboratory complex, two researchers cross paths and share ideas to advance a project. In a crowded airport, a harried traveler catches a connecting flight with ease. In a hospital, a patient is comforted by a home-like environment. Coin-cidence is not at work here. Thoughtful design is.
 St. Bartholomews and The Royal London Hospitals -London, UK (rendering by HOK) |
Forest Park Grand Basin -St. Louis, Mo.
(completed in 2003) |
Barnes Jewish Hospital and Washington
University School of Medicine, Center for
Advanced Medicine -St. Louis, Mo.
(completed in 2001) |
Alfred A. Arraj United States Courthouse
-Denver, Colo. (completed in 2002) |
| Indianapolis International Airport Midfield Terminal -Indianapolis, Ind.
(rendering by HOK) |
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Since 1955, architectural firm Hellmuth, Obata + Kassabaum has helped shape the skyline of cities around the globe and redefine how we connect with our world. With its corporate headquarters in St. Louis, HOK is the largest architecture/engineering firm in the United States. The firm plans and designs airports, offices, labs, museums, courthouses, universities, hospitals, shopping centers, sports complexes and convention centers. And while HOK has transformed the urban landscape from a visual perspective, its design work has had a deeper impact in the way we build, work and live.
Close to home, HOK has designed more than 25 major structures in St. Louis. Twelve of these buildings are downtown landmarks, including the Equitable Building, the Union Station renovation, Met Square, and the Eagleton Federal Courthouse. Currently HOK is the lead architect for several high-profile local projects, including the new ballpark at Busch Stadium and Ballpark Village. The firm is also part of the team now developing a master plan to revitalize the St. Louis Riverfront and is actively involved in the new Pinnacle Casino downtown.
Leading the St. Louis office is HOK Vice Chairman Clark Davis. A St. Louis native, Davis has been with HOK for 17 years. He oversees the 250 professionals in the
St. Louis and Chicago offices, as well as members of the corporate staff based in St. Louis. Director of Human Resources John Mahon, Chief Financial Officer Bob Pratzel, CEO Patrick MacLeamy, Chairman Bill Valentine and President Bill Hellmuth serve with Davis on HOK’s six-member Executive Committee.
Davis is a member of the RCGA Board of Directors, a vice chairman of the Regional Business Council and a leader in several other community organizations.
Nationwide, the firm has 1,800 employees in 22 offices throughout North America, Europe, Asia and Australia. Revenues for 2004 were $325 million.
But being the largest architecture firm was never the intention, says Davis.
“HOK has always been entrepreneurial in our approach. Being the biggest firm has never been the main goal. Innovation and enthusiasm for the work are the main goals,” he says.
Davis talks about how HOK has grown over the years. “We began as a group of architects in St. Louis. Over time, we have grown in three ways: new office locations; more services such as interior design, engineering and landscape architecture; and by specializing in markets such as healthcare, aviation, laboratories, sports and corporate facilities.”
Among the many projects he has been involved with at HOK, Davis points to The Boeing Company Leadership Center in North St. Louis County as one of his favorites. “This was an opportunity for us to work with the top leadership during the merger of McDonnell Douglas and Boeing. We were involved in choosing the historic site for the center, and then created a complex which represented a major corporate investment and commitment to the St. Louis community.”
Sigma-Aldrich Life Science
and High Technology Center
-St. Louis, Mo.
(completed in 2001) |
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HOK'S LEGACY
Fifty years ago, Gyo Obata founded the firm with George Hellmuth and George Kassabaum. In 1962, the firm designed the
St. Louis Priory Chapel, one of its first
landmark projects in the St. Louis region. Many other significant projects followed including the master plan for Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville, and the simple and elegant design of The Planetarium in Forest Park in the 1960s.
But the project that first put HOK in the national spotlight was Obata’s design of the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C. in 1976. It remains the world’s most visited museum, attracting 10 million visitors each year.
At age 82, Obata is the firm’s surviving founder, and still comes to work almost every day. He is retired from day-to-day firm management, but still picks and chooses key projects. Davis says,” Gyo is very healthy and is a wonderfully creative person. His love of architecture is apparent in everything he does.”
DESIGNS THAT LEAD
While HOK has hundreds of projects on the boards, its greatest impact is in pioneering new dynamics in lifestyles.
Chouteau Lake District
-St. Louis, Mo. |
St. Louis County
Memorial Plaza
-Clayton, Mo.
(completed in 2000) |
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HOK’s single-largest current project is a new replacement hospital complex in the center of London for St. Bartholomew’s and The Royal London Hospitals. HOK is providing full medical planning, architectural, interior and landscape design services. The project has a construction value of $1.2 billion.
Barts and The London NHS Trust is the largest provider of medical care in the U.K., serving more than half a million people, and is also a major teaching facility. HOK’s design will create a state-of-the-art medical facility, while blending the complex into existing buildings dating back to the 1700s.
Paul Strohm, director of HOK’s Health Care practice, says HOK has worked to create a design that will produce an optimal healing environment and bring a human scale to the massive project.
“This health care project will transform the setting for care delivery and healing for a vast segment of London’s population. The sites are urban, historically significant and provide the setting for a unique design solution.”
In this country, HOK is master designer of the Indianapolis International Airport Midfield Terminal, the first new U.S.
terminal to be designed and built since 9/11. It will accommodate new security protocols while eliminating the sterility found in airports. With an
overall construction value of $939 million, HOK created a civic plaza with skylights, centralized passenger security area, and incorporated environmental features to reduce energy costs.
YOUNG LEADERSHIP BRINGS NEW SPIRIT
There wasn’t a time when Chip Crawford didn’t want to be in architecture. Crawford, a landscape architect, says he was doodling cityscapes and building with Lincoln Logs from an early age. Today he is the director of HOK’s Planning Group, managing teams of planners, landscape architects and urban designers around the world who work on projects from Dubai to China to India.
Crawford began his career with HOK in 1984 and his first project was the renovation of St. Louis Union Station. “This is still my favorite urban revitalization project. I will never forget the excitement of the opening ceremony and what an accomplishment this was for St. Louis,” Crawford says.
The HOK Planning Group has delivered projects in more than 30 countries, and Crawford has personally led new community projects in China, Mexico, Chile, Indonesia, Malaysia, India and the U.S. Two standout assignments are a redevelopment project for
the Carmelite Monestary in Haifa, Israel, which included several meetings with Vatican officials; and Dasve Village, a
new sustainable resort community in the Mose Valley of Maharashtra, India. His group is also designing several large
communities in the Middle East and a new university in Vietnam.
Here in St. Louis, Crawford and HOK’s Planning Group have made a profound impact through projects such as Saint Louis Galleria, St. Louis County Justice Center in Clayton, and America’s Center including Baer Plaza. His group led the design team on the recent work in Forest Park for the Grand Basin and Jewel Box. In the region, he has developed master plans for the Great Rivers Greenway and communities of WingHaven in O’Fallon and Richland in Belleville, Ill. He is currently working on new town centers for Chesterfield and Creve Coeur.
Crawford singles out the St. Louis County Memorial Plaza in Clayton as a recent local project of which he is extremely proud. He worked with the late Buzz Westfall on this urban memorial plaza to honor fallen policemen and firemen. A statue of Westfall was added to the park after his death.
In his 21-year career at HOK, Crawford says he has seen the firm grow and change. “Everyone thinks they know HOK, but we really continue to evolve. The impact we are having on projects here and around the world is significant, and we are very much aware of our obligations to do the right thing with the land we touch.”
TRANSFORMING ST. LOUIS
Today, HOK’s forte of forward-thinking designs is helping to shape the revitalization of downtown St. Louis. Crawford and a team of young architects and planners are bringing HOK’s global experience to bear on many critical projects, including the new ballpark, Ballpark Village, the St. Louis Riverfront, and the Chouteau Lake District.
Crawford says,“We are excited about the possibilities for our new Riverfront and are dedicated to creating a vibrant downtown.”
“We can really help people by bringing our international experience to local markets,” Crawford says. He adds, “We are working all over the world, yet we love
St. Louis, and want to bring what we have learned to our hometown.”
HOK and a team of designers are developing the master plan for the downtown
St. Louis Riverfront. They unveiled initial ideas to the Riverfront Advisory Committee and the public in October. Plans call for re-connecting the city to the river and the arch grounds. A completed master plan will be delivered by the end of the year.
“Now is the right time to rebuild our riverfront. All the stakeholders are ready and the agendas of these major groups are aligned,” Crawford says. “As planners, we understand we have to be patient, but we need to leverage the optimism everyone shares about rebuilding downtown.
The 200-acre Chouteau Lake District near downtown is another key HOK project in the works that will tie a number of sites together and re-engage the city back to the river Crawford says. In collaboration with McCormack Baron Salazar, The HOK Planning Group created the master plan for a mixed-use district to be redeveloped around Chouteau Lake that will reconnect the neighborhoods along the corridor back to the central business district.
Crawford has been a guest on “The Charles Brennan Show” on KMOX to talk about plans for downtown. Although Brennan says he has a healthy dose of skepticism about plans to revitalize the
St. Louis Riverfront, he believes Crawford and the HOK team have the track record and experience to make it happen.
“The transformation of the St. Louis Riverfront is in great hands with Chip Crawford and HOK,” Brennan says. “Chip brings two decades of experience on two continents to this critical local project. If he does half as good a job on the Riverfront as he did on the policemen and fire fighters memorial in St. Louis County, then it will be a job well done!”
Crawford adds, “We are ready to continue the revitalization of downtown. There is a new level of collaboration among business, political, civic and public entities. This is a great time for St. Louis.”
WORLDWIDE CONTRIBUTION
A fundamental part of HOK’s philosophy is to enrich people’s lives through planning and design. Davis explains, “What we do has a real impact not only on the natural environment, but particularly on the people who live and work there.”
“In honor of our 50th anniversary, we have donated $500,000 to fund a solar-powered medical diagnostic and treatment center in rural Kenya,” Davis says. “The center will offer X-ray procedures to screen patients for TB and other conditions. We wanted to go outside our own regions to fill a fundamental human need.”
Most recently, HOK contributed $50,000 for hurricane relief, while staff from the firm’s Texas offices helped house colleagues from New Orleans. Once reconstruction efforts are underway, HOK hopes to have a role in rebuilding the city.
But its greatest global contribution remains its dedication to creating new ways to work, live, build and ultimately define our cities.
“HOK used to be hired either because we were local or the biggest,” Davis says. “Now we are hired for what we know and what we know how to do.”
HOK'S STATS:
The January 2005 edition of Building Design/World Architecture magazine named HOK the largest architectural ½rm in the U.S. and the second largest in the world based on the number of fee-earning architects.
According to Engineering News-Record magazine, HOK has top 10 practices in many sectors, including sports (#1), aviation (#2), commercial of½ces (#2), general building (#3) and religious and cultural (#4).
HOK’s 40-year-old health care practice has completed projects worth
$3 billion in construction costs in the past 10 years including more than 500 separate projects in acute and ambulatory care.
The interior design practice is the second largest based on fees according to Interior Design Magazine.
And the list goes on.
HOK LIVES GREEN
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HOK Turns Corporate Of½ces into Urban Loft
when HOK decided to remain in Metropolitan Square after 10 years of having its 250 St. Louis employees spread out on three different floors, HOK Vice Chairman Clark Davis decided the firm had to do something very different.
Davis explains, “I knew we had to do something dramatic. We wanted to create an urban loft in the middle of a high-rise office tower in downtown St. Louis,” he says.
When an entire floor became available last year, HOK took the opportunity to recreate the space incorporating many of the elements of sustainable design used in their projects around the world. HOK’s design team was challenged to redesign the floor into a “green” space–a healthy, energy efficient and environmentally responsible workplace.
In December of 2004, HOK relocated its corporate offices to the seventh floor of the 42-story Metropolitan Square, a building the firm originally designed in the late 1980s. Davis says the firm has achieved its goals of creating an open, collaborative workspace, with plenty of natural daylight, using building materials that are recycled or recyclable.
Some of the more striking features include the two 600-square-foot skylights installed by HOK to bring natural light into the interior and reduce the need for artificial light. A computerized solar louver system also helps to distribute light evenly and block glare.
As part of the plan to minimize the use
of materials, most of the floors are sealed
concrete and not carpeted. There are no
ceilings and ductwork is exposed. In keeping with the open office format, there are no
traditional cubes or office walls in order to
foster teamwork and conversation among practice groups.
A community center with a café and coffee bar is centrally located to bring staff together. The kitchen counter is made from recycled aluminum cans. HOK also has an impressive library with its own librarian. Space is available for private meetings in areas called huddle rooms, along with larger conference rooms. There are even showers and lockers to encourage employees to ride their bikes to work or to exercise during lunch.
Other key “green” components include:
- Using bamboo instead of wood to
conserve trees.
- Automatic sensors that turn off the
lights when a room is not in use.
- No one sits more than 35 feet from
natural daylight.
- A recycling program begun by HOK is
now used by all tenants in the building.
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HOK is currently pursuing the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification for Commercial Interiors. HOK’s San Francisco office was among the first in the nation to achieve this LEED-CI certification, and HOK designed the first LEED-certified building in Missouri–The Nidus Center for Scientific Enterprise.
“As industry leaders, we have a commitment to make sure our new offices focus on the environment and sustainability,” Clark says. “By supporting the issues our firm represents to our clients, we have created a great place to work and a healthy environment in the heart of downtown St. Louis.”
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HOK’s Sports Division Is Major League
Busch Stadium Rendering
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As the number one architect for sports facilities, HOK Sports+Venue+Event has made a name for itself by designing Camden Yards in Baltimore, Jacobs Field in Cleveland, Coors Field in Denver and SBC Park in San Francisco. In fact, this division of HOK has a client list that includes 24 of 30 major league baseball franchises, 30 of 32 NFL franchises, 75 professional and civic arena clients, 40 soccer and rugby teams, and 75 colleges and universities.
HOK Sport+Venue+Event began in 1983 in Kansas City when four architects struck out on their own and under the HOK umbrella founded the first architecture practice dedicated exclusively to the design of sports facilities, and started a new specialty within the architecture industry.
Today, HOK Sport + Venue + Event has a staff of more than 300 with offices in Kansas City, London and Brisbane, and a role in more than 600 sports projects with a construction value exceeding $11 billion dollars, making HOK Sport + Venue + Event the world’s leading public assembly design firm.
The list of impressive projects goes on with the recently completed New Wembley Stadium, a rugby, football and concert facility in London, as well as projects in the works for the Washington Nationals Ballpark and the New Yankee Stadium.
Closer to home there is the new ballpark at Busch Stadium. As the lead architecture firm hired by the Cardinals, HOK was charged with creating a new stadium that blends well with the architectural history of St. Louis.
Jim Chibnall is HOK’s principal designer of the new Busch Stadium and has been designing stadiums for 20 years with HOK. He explains that the new stadium design draws inspiration from the rich architectural history of St. Louis.
“The new ballpark at Busch Stadium will look and feel like part of the St. Louis landscape with the red brick exterior, arched masonry windows and openings to recall the nearby architecture of Cupples Station and Washington Avenue,” Chibnall says.
“The Cardinals and HOK wanted to make sure that there were views from inside the stadium of The Arch and much of the City. The entire center field is open to the skyline, allowing the City to become part of the ballpark,” he says. Chibnall also said that the new design will be more intimate with field and deck seating situated much closer to the field.
In addition to the new ballpark, HOK is currently working on the master plan for the adjoining Ballpark Village, a dynamic multi-block mixed-use village with residential, office, retail, restaurants, and nightlife.
“The new Busch Stadium and Ballpark Village will add so much to the vitality of downtown St. Louis, “ says HOK Vice Chairman Clark Davis. “The new stadium and soon to follow Ballpark Village, will be more integrated with the rest of downtown so there is activity 365 days a year.”
Clark adds, “HOK has an incredible legacy of building ballparks and sports complexes around the world. We believe we have brought the best of our design experience to create a dynamic new ballpark in our hometown.”
LANDMARK PROJECTS
HOK SPORT + VENUE + EVENT
Oriole Park at Camden Yards
- Baltimore (1992)
Jacobs Field
- Cleveland (1994)
Hong Kong Stadium
- Hong Kong (1994)
Coors Field
- Denver (1995)
Telstra Stadium (2000 Olympics stadium)
- Sydney, Australia (1999)
Millennium Stadium
- Cardiff, Wales (1999)
SBC Park (Fomerly Pacific Bell Park)
- San Francisco (2000)
Westpac Stadium
- Wellington, New Zealand (2000)
Reliant Stadium
- Houston (2002)
Nanjing Olympics Sports Centre
- Nanjing, China (2005)
The New Wembley Stadium
- London (2005)
The New Busch Stadium
- St. Louis (2006)
Washington Nationals Ballpark
- Washington DC (2006)
The New Yankee Stadium
- New York (2009)
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From HOK’S Thought Leaders
HOK AVIATION
THOUGHT LEADER:
Pat Askew, Senior Vice President and Director of HOK Aviation
AREA OF EXPERTISE:
Airport Planning and Design
15 years with HOK
RECENT PROJECTS:
- New Midfield Terminal at Indianapolis International Airport (Current)
- New Terminal 5 at Heathrow Airport
in London
- Midfield Concourses at Dulles International in Washington, D.C.
- New Terminal A at Boston Logan International Airport
- New Doha International Airport in Doha, Qatar in the Persian Gulf (Current)
- Chubu International Airport, Japan
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PAT ASKEW TALKS ABOUT THE LATEST TRENDS IN AIRPORT DESIGN:
“We work with many national and international cities who realize that airports are an important civic asset. An airport is a symbol that represents the region and the design should be a reflection of that.”
“Airport design today has to take into consideration the challenges of security, cost-control, and the need for flexibility. We design airports that can adapt and grow as the airlines and the industry changes.”
“The new Indianapolis Airport is a good example of many of the new trends in airport design. As the master architect and lead designer, HOK led this $900 million project now under construction. It includes a new terminal between the airport’s two main runways with a centralized passenger security area, offices, and environmental features to reduce energy use. We’ve incorporated huge skylights and open public spaces as well ways to make loading and boarding more convenient. There is also a large civic space in the airport for city-related events.”
“A reality of designing airports today is the threat of terrorism. New airports are designed with blast-resistant materials to minimize damage as much as possible.”
“Even with high oil prices and
struggling airlines, travel continues to
grow. There is still a great demand for airport expansion and design. We have airport projects in the works all over the world from Chicago and Baltimore to London, the Middle East and Japan.”
HOK–ST. LOUIS HEADQUARTERS
THOUGHT LEADER:
Ripley Rasmus, Senior Vice President
and Design Principal
AREA OF EXPERTISE:
Commercial and Public Buildings
16 years with HOK
RECENT PROJECTS:
- WilTel Technology Center-Tulsa, Okla.
- East Terminal at Lambert St. Louis International Airport
- Enterprise Rent-A-Car Data Center
- Edificio Malecon office tower
-Buenos Aires, Argentina
- Torre La Nacion office tower
-Buenos Aires, Argentina
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RIPLEY RASMUS TALKS ABOUT THE LATEST TRENDS IN OFFICE AND URBAN DESIGN:
“There is now a great opportunity for us to rethink how we take on rebuilding urban environments. St. Louis is much like the rest of the world where people are rediscovering urban centers.”
“As architects, we are constantly rethinking the way in which buildings occupy sites in order to accommodate higher densities, while making cities accessible, walkable and more sustainable.”
“HOK has spent the last 10 years working in Argentina to aid in redeveloping an important part of the central city. We have developed a master plan for 100 acres of urban land and have begun to build the third office tower in this area. In this case, we bring not only a new perspective on opportunities for development in the city, but also new ideas about the way we plan and build office structures for this unique place.”
“Our clients constantly challenge us to improve quality while sustaining reasonable building costs. Many of our projects include technological features like high performance curtain wall and envelope systems, operable windows for natural ventilation, natural daylight, high performance mechanical systems and green roofs. Our ability to keep up with these changes allows us to create new architecture driven out of the demands to create sustainable buildings for our clients.”
“HOK is the lead architect for a local project for Enterprise Rent-A-Car in Weldon Springs, that’s a great example of simple planning and design that incorporates the best new technologies to create an economically and environmentally sustainable project. We developed a plan which moves the core functions of the building outside the traditional building slab to allow for maximum efficiency and flexibility for the user groups over time.”
HOK HEALTH CARE
THOUGHT LEADER:
Paul Strohm, Senior Vice President/Director of HOK Health Care
AREA OF EXPERTISE:
Large medical centers and hospitals
12 years with HOK
RECENT PROJECTS:
- St. Bartholomew’s and The Royal London Hospitals (Current)
- William Beaumont Hospital “South Hospital”–Royal Oak, Mich. (2004)
- University of Alabama Hospital “North Pavilion”–Birmingham, Ala. (2004)
- Christus St. Elizabeth Hospital “Outpatient Pavilion” –Beaumont, Texas (2004)
- Saint John Hospital & Medical Center “North Pavilion”–Santa Monica,
Calif. (2004)
- Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital “Mountain Pavilion”–Roanoke, Va. (2003)
- Toronto General Hospital “Clinical Services Building”–Toronto, Ontario, Canada (2003)
- Barnes-Jewish Hospital & Washington University School of Medicine “Campus Integration Project” (2001)
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PAUL STROHM TALKS ABOUT THE IMPORTANCE OF DESIGNING HEALING ENVIRONMENTS:
“Designers must recognize the special obligations and demands of health care facilities. HOK works to create healing environments that support patients on the path to physical and emotional well-being through many key elements.”
STROHM EXPLAINS THESE CRITICAL ELEMENTS OF HEALTH CARE DESIGN AND ARCHITECTURE:
- De-institutionalizing design, whether by
a basic breaking down of large building masses into smaller functional units, or through the introduction of special building amenities.
- Maintaining a respect for patient privacy balanced with an understanding of the visual access required by staff within an acute care environment.
- Providing access to views, natural light, and air; bringing the “outside in” with
garden spaces, fountains, and other
natural elements.
- Developing a clear sense of organization
of the facility with straightforward “way finding” and visual cues for orientation.
- Controlling the generation of noise and
the proximity of patients and staff to sources of noise.
- Using color, materials, furnishings, and lighting to add warmth, to lessen the
institutional feel, and to be consistent
with functional requirements and
infection control.
- Preventing hospital-generated infection through the appropriate use of materials, finishes, and design of air handling
systems.
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HOK SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
THOUGHT LEADER:
Bill Odell, Director of HOK Science & Technology
AREA OF EXPERTISE:
Laboratories with office complexes for
corporate and academic clients.
30 years with HOK
Recently Completed Projects:
- Donald Danforth Plant Science Center -St. Louis, Mo.
- Nidus Center for Scientific Enterprise
-St. Louis, Mo.
- Sigma-Aldrich Life Science Technology Center-St. Louis, Mo.
- Emory University Whitehead Research Building-Atlanta, Ga.
- Georgia Institute of Technology Ford Environmental Science and Technology Building-Atlanta, Ga.
- Bristol-Myers Squibb Office and Research Campus-Lawrenceville, N.J.
- Hoffmann-La Roche Multidisciplinary Science Building-Nutley, N.J.
- Centers for Disease Control National Center for Infectious Diseases Research Facility-Atlanta, Ga.
- U.S. Department of Agriculture Plant Sciences Institute Building-Beltsville, Md.
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CURRENT PROJECTS:
- USDA Consolidated Lab-Ames, Iowa
- Tyson Foods Discovery Center and Pilot Plant-Springdale, Ark.
- University of Wisconsin-Madison, Interdis-ciplinary Research Complex-Madison, Wis.
- Missouri Western State University Science and Math Building-St. Joseph, Mo.
- West Los Angeles College Math and Science Building-Los Angeles, Calif.
- National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration Pacific Region Center
-Pearl Harbor, Hawaii
- University of Oklahoma College of Engineering-Norman, Okla.
- St. Andrews Biological Station New Research Laboratories-St. Andrews,
New Brunswick, Canada
- Center of Research, Technology and Entrepreneurial Exchange (CORTEX)
-St. Louis, Mo.
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BILL ODELL TALKS ABOUT SUSTAINABLE DESIGN:
“Sustainable design essentially means building in a way that doesn’t diminish the world for our children and grandchildren. It means building with nature and not against it to create healthy buildings that use dramatically less energy from fossil fuels, less water and produce no waste.”
“For example, we designed a complex for the University of Wisconsin where the lights don’t need to be turned on during the day because the design allows for plenty of natural daylight. If we are clever in how we design buildings, we can create low energy buildings where more natural resources are utilized.”
“We work with many colleges and universities to help them craft buildings that equip them to teach better and get the students excited about learning. We are very proud of a recent project for William Rainey Harper College outside of Chicago. HOK was asked to design a new science facility to replace an outdated one that students really disliked. The new building we created really turns students onto science and the school recently let us know that enrollment has increased with this new facility.”
“We have to be careful in our designs to make sure the buildings encourage collaboration among the occupants. We are constantly asking ourselves, ‘How can we make a better laboratory that is easy for people to work in’?”
HOK INTERIORS
THOUGHT LEADER:
Nora Akerberg, Vice President,
Co-Director of HOK Interiors
EXPERTISE:
Interior Design for Corporate Clients
14 years with HOK
RECENT PROJECTS:
LOCAL:
- Sigma-Aldrich-St. Louis
- Danforth Plant Science Center-St. Louis
- Boeing Leadership Center-St. Louis
- Academy of Science -St. Louis
- Marsh Mercer-St. Louis & Minneapolis
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NATIONAL:
- National Air and Space Museum-Va.
- Game Show Network
-Los Angeles, Calif.
- Winrock International Headquarters-Little Rock, Ark.
- Christus St. Elizabeth Hospital-Beaumont, Texas
- Time Life-New York, N.Y.
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INTERNATIONAL:
- Cisco Systems-London, England
- Forty Grosvenor Place office
building–London, England
- ExxonMobil Executive Suites–London, England
- Cisco Haarlerbergpark Campus–Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Plaza Indonesia mixed-use project–Jakarta, Indonesia
- CIBC Retail Banks–throughout Canada
- Henderson Land Development Company Headquarters –Hong Kong
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NORA AKERBERG TALKS ABOUT INTERIOR DESIGN:
“A key element in interior corporate design is how to effectively incorporate technology into the design.
“HOK is passionate about the sustainability movement. It simply means being smart in how we design and use materials. With interior design, we try to use materials that can be recycled as much as possible. “
“We are always working to educate our clients about the importance of sustainable designs. If we can help them achieve their goals and incorporate the key elements of sustainability, then we have done our job.”
“As the project manager for the interior redesign of HOK’s new offices, I felt we had a great opportunity to practice what we preach to our clients. I wanted to make sure our own designers were part of the process so we organized 30 designers into teams who came up with many ideas which were incorporated into the design.”
“The best part about designing
HOK’s new headquarters was the chance to push the envelope using the design techniques we use for our clients. We really look like an architecture firm in this space and it’s a great space to attract and retain young talent.” |
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