In anticipation of this year’s AIA Kansas City 2017 Design Excellence Awards on November 10, we are featuring the Pacific Center Campus Development: Research + Development Building, a recipient of last year’s award. Follow @aiakc #dekc2017 to learn more.

This innovative workplace and development lab is designed around one notion: human nature. It upends the traditional notion of the workplace by optimizing passive design strategies to achieve high-performance results and provide a high-quality environment that boosts employee productivity and well-being.

The building makes the best of a disconnected, remnant part of the campus with its east/west solar orientation and narrow floor plates, which also promote natural ventilation and daylighting. The design capitalizes on the nearby canyon trails that wind through the campus and creates outdoor lobbies/atriums that expand the usable space and make the outdoors as integral to the experience as the indoors.

In addition to establishing connections to nature, the building establishes connections between people. Its layout draws employees away from their individual workstations towards spontaneous interactions with each other. Interior colors and finishes were intentionally selected to support the various types of environments.

Also posted to Medium.