AIA Kansas bestowed seven awards on five architecture firms and recognized six architecture students at their annual Honors Program October 11 in Kansas City in tandem with the AIA Central States Region Conference. AIA Colorado architects Chair Harry Teague, AIA, Harry Teague Architects, Aspen; Glenn Rappaport, AIA, Black Shack Architects, Basalt; and Brad Zeigel, AIA, A4 Architects, Carbondale, served as jurors. And the winners are:

Honor Awards for Excellence in Architecture

Manhattan Public Library Addition and Remodel, by Brent Bowman & Associates Architects, PA, for the City of Manhattan
Brent Bowman & Associates' project expands and renovates the Manhattan public library, a civic landmark anchoring the west end of the downtown business district. The new expansion draws on 1967 original library forms that recall the contemporary work of Breuer and Pei and interprets them in a more compact, vertically organized volume. Stacked within the new volume are a ground-floor library for the visually and physically disabled, a main-floor children's library, second-floor administrative offices and meeting room; all topped with a glazed third floor that houses library staff and processing. The building's key organizing feature, a three-story skylighted atrium, connects the existing building and the new spaces, provides legible circulation among the various library services, and serves as a gathering place for library users and for receptions. "Additions provide architects with an opportunity to exercise restraint. Occasionally the restraint results in a building that is more successful, powerful, and memorable for it. This addition is such a building," the jury commented. "Its spectacular ornamental sculpture enlivens the space with beauty, whimsy, and savory counterpoint."
Photograph by Mike Sinclair, Rod Mikinski

Lawrence Arts Center, by GLPM
Architects, Inc., for City of Lawrence
GLPM Architects designed the Lawrence Arts Center as a unique city-owned facility that encompasses a full spectrum of arts-based programs, including classrooms for studio arts and performance spaces for music, drama, dance, and multimedia activities. Located on a redeveloping downtown block, the site offered a prominent location while restricting the project's size, the architects report. They employed a strong contrast between materials: brick masonry deferring to tradition and matte-finished standing-seam stainless steel to infuse the project with a contemporary energy and create a dialogue between the building and its context. An indoor street connects a sequence of destinations: studios, galleries, and performance hall. With a construction budget of under $6 million, economy of means and creativity in both planning and the use of materials were essential. The lobby sports polished, colored concrete floors, unpainted plaster walls, and acoustic panels faced with unbleached cotton fabric; cabinets in studios and sound-reflective ceiling panels are clear-finished exterior grade MDF board. The architects used finer materials selectively to enrich major public spaces, such as stainless-steel-and-glass railings and bamboo flooring in the galleries. The jury commented that by looking at the final product, they could tell that "the Lawrence Arts Center Board of Directors, the architect, and the contractor all understood the importance of what they were accomplishing for the city of Lawrence and committed themselves to it." Further, the jury was soundly convinced that "this building celebrates the arts without overwhelming them. The combination of the bridge and theater circulation in the entrance lobby exposed to the street activates both the street and the space, truly inspired."
Photograph by Michael Spillers

Merit Awards for Excellence in Architecture

Hollister Elementary School by ASAI Architecture
for the Hollister R-V School District
ASAI Architecture's design challenge for the Hollister Elementary School was to house 600 K–5 students plus a preschool while incorporating advanced instructional and facility technology. Located on a south slope, the two-story structure builds into the hillside to reduce site-development costs and preserve gentler topography for playfields and vehicles. Three functional areas create efficient spatial relationships, minimize corridors, and create an easy-to-understand building. The architect made each area partially open to expose school activities for passive learning, connect directly to outdoor instructional spaces, and offer a captivating view of the Ozark countryside. The central component houses the large-group activity areas: library, multipurpose cafetorium, and gymnasium. Classroom wings provide a mini-school for each grade level, with homerooms clustered around a shared learning space designed with age-appropriate computer lab and a unique color palette and flooring. Daylighting in all main spaces reduces energy consumption and provides an uplifting environment. Substantial overhangs shade south-facing glass to reduce solar gain and preserve glare-free vistas. The jury said that the school "achieves a high-quality educational environment on an extremely modest budget." They particularly liked the "lots of nice, bright, naturally lighted spaces that relate well to the exterior spaces."
Photograph by Rob McHenry

Scott Rice Office Works, by Finkle|Williams
Architecture for Scott Rice Office Works
As an office furniture provider, Scott Rice Office Works' only mandate to Finkle|Williams Architecture was to create an architecturally significant space that enhanced—not overwhelmed—their products. A 28-foot-tall ceiling height, limited budget, and the desire to create a flexible work environment defined the architect's parameters for the final design. They configured core rooms requiring "hard walls" as geometric shapes and arranged them throughout the space to define circulation patterns. The majority of shapes were constructed using metal studs, drywall, and different painted finishes. The architects emphasized the industrial theme by leaving structural, mechanical, electrical, and information systems exposed and layered at various heights, thus creating an infrastructure network above the work plane. Pendant lights, track lights, and sections of dropped ceiling added throughout bring a sense of human scale to an otherwise large volume. The architect afforded careful attention to the relationship between product and architecture. Systems furniture integrated throughout distorts the lines between architecture and systems product. Space maintained between core areas allows a range of the client's products to be used as an operational gallery, and infill areas are easily reconfigured as the workplace environment changes. "Intriguing integration between architecture and 'furniture' and provides by example an exciting alternative to the default office environment most people must work in that can be achieved very economically," according to the jury.
Photograph by Mike Sinclair

Horticultural Science Center, by Theis Doolittle
Associates for Johnson County Community College
Situated on the former site of a productive farmstead, this Horticultural Science Center was designed by Theis Doolittle Associates and is operated by the science department of Johnson County Community College. Here students learn horticultural practices in a state-of-the-art greenhouse and classroom with outdoor gardens where an 1870 wood-peg barn and windmill stand testament to the original settlement. Preserving these elements was the architect's key factor in siting the building and gardens. The building employs a rainwater harvest system, which, together with the reactivated farmstead windmill, captures and conserves water for irrigation of the surrounding demonstration gardens. The array of hand-carved native limestone features on the primary facade expresses the mission of the facility. Stone scuppers carved as native sunflowers direct roof drainage via an aqueduct to large cisterns framing the building entry. Borrowing from the past, the horticultural science center incorporates native Kansas limestone and the wood siding of its predecessor farmhouse, as well as the "campus" brick. The 8,600-square-foot greenhouse incorporates three different zones to offer a diversified range of climatic and operational modes for budding horticulturists. "The project responds to the program with simple forms, honest structures, good lighting, and nicely scaled interior spaces," the jury said. "The classroom spaces seem especially pleasant with natural light and open trusses. The botanically inspired ornamental detail is especially appealing and appropriate and it is so refreshing seeing architectural ornamentation take such a strong role in a project."
Photographer Mike Sinclair

Citation Award for Excellence in Architecture

Airport Rescue and Fire Fighting Station, by Brent Bowman & Associates Architects, PA, for the City of Manhattan
"A striking memorable structure that is not only respectful of its context but also more successful for it," said the jury of the Airport Rescue and Fire Fighting Station, by Brent Bowman & Associates Architects, PA. "It is especially important that civic buildings set the example of environmental responsibility that this one appears to do." A joint-use facility, the station combines Airport Rescue and Fire Fighting (ARFF) with structural firefighting services for this area of the city. The 15,000-square-foot facility includes apparatus bays for six vehicles, airport snow-removal vehicles, complete living quarters for firefighters, police substation, and dormitories for a future helicopter paramedic crew. The building's orientation takes advantage of a southern exposure for the living areas, while shops and vehicle bays protect against the north winds. Large windows, broad overhangs, and clerestories capture and control opportunities for daylighting. The roof structure is composed of wood trusses fabricated at a plant less than a mile from the airport, and cellulose in the wall cavities provides thermal and acoustic insulation. The building's exterior finishes include locally quarried stone and low-maintenance, galvanized metals. The architects chose landscaping to minimize water and fertilizer requirements by using buffalo grass, native trees, and beds of native prairie flowers. The jury was enamored with this kind of attention to detail, citing "some simple thoughtful moves such as the pylons on the façade transform the mundane into a memorable building. The environmental qualities of the materials chosen and that fabrication focuses on the use of local resources are to be commended, as is its reference to the historic stone homes that gives the project its beauty and scale."
Photo courtesy of Mike Sinclair, Rod Mikinski

Memorial Stadium Enhancements by GLPM Architects, Inc., in association with HOK Sport for the University of Kansas
"The decision to restore, remodel, and rehabilitate a building of this scale is in itself monumental. The architectural effort was of equal scale," said the jury of the Memorial Stadium enhancements by GLPM Architects, Inc, in association with HOK Sport. Owning the oldest football stadium west of the Mississippi River, the University of Kansas was confronted with a choice of either relocating to a modern new facility or undertaking a complicated and extensive restoration, renovation, and addition to this landmark building. The university decided the value of the building's tradition outweighed the difficulty of adapting it. In all, seven phases were required, including waterproofing and structural repairs to the 70-year-old concrete seating bowl, fan amenities in the old concourse, and the addition of a new press box and scholarship suites. The work was completed in an aggressive two-year construction schedule without interfering with the football season. The concourse was completely gutted, and the architects devised a layered organization of mechanical services, then restrooms, then concession stands facing a spacious circulation zone along the outer bays of the original structure. Cast-in-place stair towers anchor the new elevated press box/suites building at the north and south ends. Between the towers, the building is clad in lightweight metal sandwich panels. An expressive steel roof (red in color to meet a university standard) of exposed curved trusses distinguishes the stadium from other campus buildings. "The refurbished areas under the existing concrete structure were transformed and beautifully done while the new additions make an important contemporary contribution," commented the jury.
Photo courtesy of Photography for the Built Environment—Michael Spillers, Mike Sinclair

Student Work

Six awards were presented for student work.
• Nick Curtis, Kansas State University, received an Award for Student Architecture for his Kansas City Public Library
• Camila Querasian and Christine Boehne, University of Kansas, received an Award for Student Architecture for their Museum of Aviation
• Jennifer Kerl, Kansas State University, received a Citation for Student Architecture for her Big Mac
• Design Studio 7, Kansas State University, received a Citation for Student Architecture for their Anthroposophic Therapy Center
• Brian Berg, University of Kansas, received a Citation for Student Architecture for his House for Wynton
• Justin Roth, Kansas State University, received a Citation for Student Architecture for his Manhattan Civic Alliance Center.

Copyright 2002 The American Institute of Architects. All rights reserved.