Voices of Design Leadership. Ken Sanders
individuals representing a variety of neurological conditions. The Human Experience Lab at Perkins&Will translated its original scientific research into objective design principles for the team.
An elegant, sculptural mesh scrim wraps the cantilevered east, west, and south facades of the building. The sheathing softens direct sunlight and addresses the light sensitivity of patients while still allowing views outside. The scrim also reduces solar insolation, significantly improving energy performance. The infusion-treatment rooms, where some patients receive intravenous therapy for hours at a time, are placed along the perimeter. The physical therapy space also offers a large terrace for outdoor exercises.
I also love the school work we do in our firm. Our K-12 practice just finished a beautiful project for Billerica in Massachusetts. It’s inspiring to see when a community really invests in its young kids. I used to live up there when I went to high school and college and grad school, and it used to be called Taxachusetts. Maybe people still call it that. But, if you’ve been to Massachusetts recently, you realize that it’s one of the most successful states. It used to have a Republican governor, Mitt Romney, who implemented statewide healthcare and one of the best funded public education programs in the country.
And it shows if you invest in the right things, great things happen. And people want to live in Massachusetts because it’s got great social services and fantastic public education. So instead of building schools for $150 a square foot, they’re spending $500 a square foot, and this is as nice as any school anywhere in the world. Truly great architecture, amazing facilities, and just everything coming together to empower people. And so that project is stunning. Those are the kinds of things that I’m most excited about.
KS: You mentioned Dar Group, the majority owner of Perkins&Will. Do you work closely with their leadership? Or is it mostly hands-off?
PH: I would call it a collaborative relationship that is built on respect. Perkins&Will has no operational connection with Dar. We’re completely self-managed. The Dar Group Chairman and CEO sits on our Board and attends an annual meeting in which we present our annual business plan. And they review major things like changes to our stock plan or a major acquisition.
But we run the firm and there’s no operational connection. We don’t share any IT or accounting or anything like that. I now sit on the Dar Group Board, so I participate with group-wide strategy, but that’s really in addition of my role as Perkins&Will CEO. The essence of the relationship is one where we create value through collaboration.
We do work with Dar on projects and it’s a preferred relationship. If they ask for our support, we almost always give it. We’ll end up doing major health science education projects across the Middle East and Africa, mostly, sometimes some other types of projects, hotels, or airports, but usually it’s health science and education work. And we help Dar win and deliver major projects that they wouldn’t be able to do it without our expertise.
You know, they work with other architects, but basically, they have a preferred relationship with us. They know us, they trust us, and we know how to work with them. And it means that we’re able to do things that I think would be hard for them to do with another firm. But they still work with other firms from time to time because of client preference.
KS: It’s your earlier point about acquisitions. You’ve helped Dar stretch their own boundaries.
PH: They’ve since built their own expertise in healthcare and many of these typologies themselves. And on more modest projects, they don’t need us anymore, which is fine, because we’re working with our own clients. But it’s a very good synergistic relationship. They’ve had ownership in Perkins&Will since 1985.
KS: Has that model created opportunities to collaborate with other Dar Group firms, like T.Y. Lin or Integral or Landrum & Brown?
PH: We’re doing that more and more. We didn’t used to, and that’s a missed opportunity. We call them sister companies: Integral, T.Y. Lin, Currie & Brown, Ross & Baruzzini, and others. And one of the things we’re trying to do is drive more and more collaboration now. We see this as a collaborative world, so just because we’re working with Dar Group companies, we’re still working with WSP or AECOM or whoever. It really depends.
Canada’s Earth Tower
| Client: | Delta Land Development |
| Architects: | Perkins&Will |
| Location: | Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada |
| Size: | 339,000 square feet | 31,500 square meters |
| Completion Date: | 2026 (estimated) |
Photo Credit: © Chuck Choi, courtesy of Perkins&Will
Canada’s Earth Tower is a 40-story mixed-use development expected to be the world’s tallest hybrid wood tower when completed. Located on a 1.3-acre (0.5-hectare) parcel along Eighth Avenue near Vancouver’s Burrard Slopes neighborhood, the project will include approximately 138 homes together with shops, restaurants, and office space. South-facing outdoor garden spaces are provided for residents on every third floor, providing opportunities for social interaction and a chance to connect with nature.
The building reduces its embodied carbon footprint through a hybrid structure, which combines mass timber with reinforced concrete cores for elevators and emergency stairs, which provide lateral stability to the structure along with seismic and fire protection.
Earth Tower is designed to be a zero-emissions building, consuming no fossil fuels while in operation. Canada’s Earth Tower will include energy-saving features, such as triple-glazed windows and a heat-recovery system and is targeting Passive House certification. Integrated photovoltaics are expected to supply roughly 15 percent of the building’s electrical demand.
Billerica Memorial High School
| Owner: | Town of Billerica, Massachusetts School Building Authority |
| Architects: | Perkins&Will |
| Location: | Billerica, Massachusetts, USA |
| Size: | 325,000 square feet | 30,200 square meters |
| Completion Date: | 2020 |
Photo Credit: © Chuck Choi, courtesy of Perkins&Will
When the town of Billerica, Massachusetts, began planning the replacement of its aging high school, they sought to make the new facility a community center, providing public access to the gymnasium, auditorium, and dining commons.
The new school serves more than 1,600 students in grades eight through twelve and the 200 students in a new pre-K program. Academic programs offered include nationally recognized robotics teams, an award-winning drama department, and a business and entrepreneurship club. The design of the school supports Billerica’s diverse and forward-looking educational program through flexible planning and design. Highly specialized areas, such as the auditorium and STEAM spaces, are complemented by classrooms and learning areas that can be easily modified to meet different needs.
Perkins&Will partnered with students, staff, and community members to ensure that the town’s largest civic building embodied its aspirational commitment to education while respecting its historic civic legacy. Sustainable strategies including a high-performance envelope, daylighting, active dimming systems and all-LED lighting, help the school achieve energy use 59 percent below the regional average for similar project types.
And one advantage of Dar Group’s model, we call it a pillar model, is that it’s a multi-branded model. There’s no intent for everyone to become Dar Group, partly because there’s independence of each of these pillars. Perkins&Will can work with whoever it makes sense to work with to deliver value to the client.
And that is