by Heather Livingston
Contributing Editor

Summary: The Signature Centre at Denver West is the first commercial LEED® Platinum building in Colorado and, according to the developer, the largest speculative Platinum project in the U.S. Designed by Binh Vinh, AIA, and built by developer Aardex, LLC, the 186,000-square-foot Signature Centre was designed to meet the collective needs of the community, the occupants, and the environment. While many speculative projects are commissioned for the greatest return on the cheapest design and construction, the Signature Centre illuminates that speculative building doesn’t have to neglect sustainability to turn that buck.

Designing for the people
“I never set out to design a Platinum building,” recalls Vinh. “I set out to design the best building for the environment and for the people. That’s been my philosophy for 20 years. I always design the best building for the people and for the environment. LEED Platinum came because of that approach. I never really aimed for LEED Platinum. I know that I got way beyond it, but that was not my objective. I design for people and for environment.”

Vinh, who previously was vice president and board director at Aardex, says that his objectives for the building were laid out from the beginning. Present in all his projects, Vinh’s personal design goals are to “provide highest quality built environments that impact human achievement, improve human creativity, and champion worker productivity in the workplace by fostering a life-sustaining environment of humanity and innovation.” The goals for the Signature Centre in particular were to create a quality building that contributes to the bottom line without extra cost, increase people productivity in the workplace by 20 percent, reduce energy and fossil fuel consumption by 50 percent, reduce construction costs by 20 percent, attain full occupancy before completion of construction and lower turn over rates, and reduce operation and maintenance costs.

Green measures
Sustainable measures achieved during the construction phase include recycling more than 75 percent of construction waste; using more than 20 percent recycled content materials, 50 percent FSC-certified wood, and 20 percent local materials; increasing ventilation by a minimum of 30 percent; providing daylighting and views for over 90 percent of occupants; lowering landscaping water needs by half; reducing indoor water usage by over 40 percent; using low VOC materials; and providing indoor chemical and pollutant source control.

For occupant comfort and productivity measures, the five-story building features underfloor air with individual temperature and ventilation controls. Natural daylight filters through the glass skin and interior and exterior light shelving, nourishing both productivity and creativity in the workplace. Artificial lighting is controlled by photo and occupancy sensors and dimmable switches. Orienting features include positioning the building in relation to the path of the sun and tilting the elevator core to the west in homage to the red rock of Colorado that tilts west toward the Rocky Mountains. The Signature Centre also provides its occupants with three floors of below building parking; a landscaped park with a garden feature, seating, and wi-fi connectivity; café; and a fitness center.

Green design is good business
“Our staff outdid themselves,” says Rick Butler, CEO of Aardex. “We are now the greenest building in Colorado! We received the Platinum certification and the staff achieved it at standard construction costs. We can do LEED for free.”

Adds Vinh, the Signature Centre “demonstrates one can do the right thing ecologically and humanistically, and it still is the right thing economically … I just want to send a message to our colleagues and all the people who create buildings around the country and around the world that to do good design that benefits mankind and the environment, there’s no extra cost. You do good things. You make a good profit and you benefit the environment without paying any extra, so don’t worry about costs. Good design will pay for itself. Good design is good business.”