Contract - April 2010 - (Page 50)

design expectations. “We were not going to tell Peter Pfau how to design the building, but we were going to give him some adjectives,” recalls Filippi. The words the building committee used were transparency, visibility, presence, lightness, welcoming, accessibility, function, ﬂexibility, and sustainability, but Pfau’s ﬁrm ﬁrst spent a good deal of time ﬁguring out how to eﬃciently deliver the required functions in the allotted square footage within a tight budget. The need to accommodate exhibition, public gathering, work, and research spaces, as well as support services, in a deep, narrow ﬂoor plate dictated a building with stacked functions and active vertical circulation to tie them all together. “We knew the ground ﬂoor had to be open with exhibit space, and we needed a large space for public meetings,” explains Winkelstein. The third ﬂoor was assigned to the staﬀ as the working ﬂoor, and the fourth was ﬁnished out with libra space that is ﬂexible for gathering or to accommodate future growth. Yet addressing the functional needs was only a limited part of the challenge. “There was always this notion of transparency,” Pfau explains. “SPUR makes the public process in San Francisco visible and subject to discussion,” and that mission was quite literally translated into architecture. “We added a retail component so the people of San Francisco are invited into the process,” he continues. “The desire to make SPUR visible and inviting were the drivers for the façade.” On a heavily traﬃcked section of Mission Street known for its high-proﬁle museums—including Libeskind’s Jewish Museum and the Museum of the African Diaspora designed by Freelon Architects—SPUR’s glass and metal façade, bright orange signage, and tower of backlit translucent glass—which hides the internal stairwell and allows copious amounts of natural light into that interior space—serves as a beacon to attract public attention. At the SPUR maintains its connection with the outdoors even on the fourth ﬂoor with a small terrace overlooking Mission Street. “ is building has enhanced everything. Our work has gotten better, and the community at large is even more focused on what we do.”–Dianne Filippi A long, narrow ﬂoor plate dictated a building with stacked functions, including a highly ﬂexible, doubleheight exhibition space (le and top) that is clearly visible from the street. The second ﬂoor also houses SPUR’s main public meeting space (see ﬂoor plan, opposite bottom). 50 contract april 2010 www.contractdesign.com http://www.contractdesign.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Contract - April 2010

Contract - April 2010
Contents
Editor's Note
Industry
Resources: The Green Scene
Focus: Land of Opportunity
Green: Post-Occupancy Green
Practice: Legal Green
Lean & Green
Environmental Extraordinaire
Above the Legal Limit
Informing the Masses
Luxury in the Raw
Designers Rate: Green Products
Process: Science in the Age of the Invisible
Sources
Ad Index
Perspectives

Contract - April 2010