Valerio Dewalt Train Archives - Archpaper.com

January 23, 2019

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The San Francisco Bay Area is nourishing one of the country's most active architecture scenes. Fueled by a booming technology sector, rapid population and commercial growth are delivering exciting new projects to the region. On February 7, The Architect's Newspaper is gathering leading local and California-based design practices for Facades+ San Francisco, a conference on innovative enclosure projects across the city, state, and country. Participants include EHDD, BuroHappold Engineering, CallisonRTKL, CO Architects, Heintges Consulting Architects & Engineers, and David Baker Architects. Joe Valerio, founding principal of Valerio Dewalt Train Associates (VDT), will co-chair the half-day symposium. AN interviewed Valerio about what VDT is working on and the firm's perspective on San Francisco's architectural trends. The Architect's Newspaper: San Francisco is arguably the nation's leading technological hub. How do you see this role impacting the architectural development of the city, and what do you perceive to be the most exciting facade trends in San Francisco today? Joe Valerio: Perhaps, the pressure that technology companies are creating on the building sector will finally lead to real innovation in how we build things. The San Francisco building sector does not have the capacity to move forward using conventional means. I believe that continual innovation will help the city catch up to its vast demand. It’s an exciting time for design in San Francisco. With technology evolving at such a rapid rate, it has been interesting to see how it is beginning to manifest itself in architecture, both physically and experientially. For instance, in the physical sense, buildings like the de Young Museum or the Transbay Terminal are utilizing parametric modeling to create interesting forms and textures with metal mesh. Faceted glass is also being implemented in interesting ways in high-rise projects, such as the LinkedIn headquarters or the Oceanwide Center. But on the experiential side, digital is becoming a new palette for architectural design. The Salesforce lobby, for example, uses digital projection mapping to draw people in from the street. Its translucent facade almost disappears from view, making the lobby feel like its extension. This is something that we have been experimenting with in our own work, in projects such as Art on theMart in Chicago or the YouTube lobby in San Bruno. What projects is VDT working on, and what innovative enclosure practices are being used? JV: We are developing a graduate student village for Vanderbilt University in Nashville, with our partners at Lend Lease Communities, and are looking at a wide range of modular and prefabricated construction techniques to meet the speed at which we need to deliver this project. New modular techniques that implement cross-laminated timber and steel into their modules are allowing us to go higher than the five stories limited by wood stick construction. We’re also implementing modular prefabricated cold-formed steel panel systems for quick assembly on site. Universities present tremendous opportunities in housing, and we find that embracing challenging parameters leads to very exciting outcomes. VDT is located in multiple cities across the country; what are the particular challenges and benefits of working in San Francisco? JV: One of the most exciting aspects of working in San Francisco is our client base. We work with companies that are constantly pushing the boundaries of technology, and for us, finding new ways to meet their needs with architecture is a thrilling prospect. Quite often, our work in the city deals with very interesting pre-existing buildings, such as in the case of Adobe Town Hall. Here we were challenged to both expand and reinvent the company’s dining experience all the while preserving a building that’s listed as a historic landmark. Its previous function as a tool factory became the driving force behind a new design, conceptually celebrating culinary tools developed by their new chef, and digital tools that Adobe continues to develop to this day. It’s opportunities like this that constantly pique our interest in San Francisco. But on the other side of the coin, having such a highly innovative and skilled architecture community has created a severe labor shortage in the city—a constant reminder of how thankful we are to have such a talented team. Is there a particular technique or materials that VDT is experimenting with? JV: There has always been a drive to bring new materials into our enclosures. Yet these systems are still dominated by old techniques and primitive materials such as glass. We have experimented with new materials such as ETFE, and we would forecast that assembling these old materials in innovative ways is the path forward. Remember the iPhone has a glass screen. Additionally, cross-laminated timber (CLT) continues to show a lot of promise. We have been working with a company on modular prefabricated CLT housing at a larger scale, and we’re excited to see how we can begin to leverage cost and design with new techniques. Further information regarding Facades+ San Francisco may be found here.

June 20, 2017

It was a long road from design to construction for Vue53 in the South Side Chicago neighborhood of Hyde Park. The 13-story tower sits along the bustling 53^rd Street and has completely changed the character of the area. While change to the busy conduit was inevitable, not everybody was thrilled about it.

Designed by Chicago-based Valerio Dewalt Train Associates, Vue53 was originally scheduled to begin construction in early 2014. A NIMBY lawsuit delayed that start date by nearly one and a half years. The Save 53^rd Street advocacy group felt the project was out of scale for the neighborhood and that the zoning change passed by the city, which allowed the tower to go up, was illegal, among other complaints. Opponents donned “Sky, Not Skyscraper” buttons at community meetings. The First District Illinois Appellate Court did not agree. In February 2015 the case was dismissed, permitting the project to continue.

Fast forward two years or so, and Hyde Park has a new 135-foot-tall 267-unit tower. A formally expressive building in glass and concrete, Vue53 comprises a large base and two shifted linear towers. The base rises to the height of the surrounding buildings and contains retail and amenities. These include a compact urban Target store as well as a rooftop terrace, complete with grass and views of the lush park across the street. The building also includes an exercise facility, a business center, and a number of study rooms distributed throughout (for the students the Vue53 is aiming to attract).

The studio, one-bedroom, and two-bedroom units may be a bit smaller than the average being built downtown, but they may also be just right for the intended tenants. The project was in fact initiated by the University of Chicago, just blocks to the south. Yet it is not the amenities, or the battle against upset neighbors, that have set this project apart.

While developers are busy constructing sleek, glassy monolith apartment buildings downtown, Vue53 takes a decidedly more formally daring approach to attracting young renters. Particularly in the upper towers, the project plays a Tetris-like game of solid and void. Together with the shifted relationship of the two towers, the project is more than a glass box on a plinth. The interplay of glass and exposed concrete only exaggerates these moves.

That relationship of glass and concrete carries right into the building’s multi-story lobby and even the units themselves. Cashing in on the trend of rougher unfinished materials, the units are a mix of the exposed concrete and more typical drywall. And though the units may be small, they are all dominated by floor-to-ceiling windows with views either to the north to downtown, or to the south over the picturesque Hyde Park neighborhood.

While Vue53 ran into some stiff opposition in its initial stages, it is by no means alone in the rising skyline of Hyde Park. With multiple new Studio Gang towers in the neighborhood as well, it may seem a bit out of the blue for the area to be receiving so much architectural investment. Yet it should be remembered that, historically, Hyde Park has been one of the most architecturally rich neighborhoods in the city. The University of Chicago alone is a zoo of formal exuberance, from Saarinen to Legorreta. Despite its detractors, Vue53 may be only the beginning of a reenergized architectural scene on the city’s South Side.

February 9, 2017

Chicago based-Valerio Dewalt Train Associates (VDTA) has transformed Walsh College in Troy, Michigan. The adult business school caters to students who work full-time and attend classes at night. Since the 1970s, the college has grown organically. In order to better unify the campus and increase its visibility in the community, VDTA was asked to master plan, renovate, and build new buildings. The latest and the final phase of the project is the Livernois Road addition. The new addition re-imagines the public face of the college by adding three glass and steel pavilions to the street side of one of the oldest buildings on campus. The geometry and materials of the new addition reference a previous VDTA-designed project on campus. The pavilions provide new spaces for student services, a student lounge, and a “success center” for students to practice their professional communication skills. The master plan also called for improved circulation throughout the campus. The confusing floor plans of the existing buildings were rationalized and two primary paths were used to organize the entire complex. Media Objectives, an interdisciplinary design studio within VDTA, handled site-specific graphics to aid in wayfinding and the schools overall visual identity. Throughout the project, spaces were re-positioned to the advantage of the students. The existing administration space was reconfigured to eliminate all private offices. This freed up a substantial amount of space that was converted for student use. Extensive use of glass on the facade and the interior was used to bring light into the project and add transparency and light to passageways. Walsh College’s curriculum includes project-based learning, which requires students to often work in teams. Collaborative workspaces, leisure spaces, meeting rooms, and work rooms were all added for use by students, faculty, and staff. These new collaborative spaces are meant to emulate the latest in business work environments.

December 13, 2016

The Architect’s Newspaper (AN)’s inaugural 2013 Best of Design Awards featured six categories. Since then, it's grown to 26 exciting categories. As in years past, jury members (Erik Verboon, Claire Weisz, Karen Stonely, Christopher Leong, Adrianne Weremchuk, and AN’s Matt Shaw) were picked for their expertise and high regard in the design community. They based their judgments on evidence of innovation, creative use of new technology, sustainability, strength of presentation, and, most importantly, great design. We want to thank everyone for their continued support and eagerness to submit their work to the Best of Design Awards. We are already looking forward to growing next year’s coverage for you.

2016 Building of the Year > Midwest: University of Iowa Visual Arts Building

Architect: Steven Holl Architects Location: Iowa City, IA

The new Visual Arts Building for the University of Iowa’s School of Art and Art History, which replaced a 1936 building that was heavily damaged by a flood, provides 126,000 square feet of loft-like studio space for all visual arts disciplines by utilizing both traditional techniques and advanced technologies. Alongside Art Building West—also designed by Steven Holl Architects and completed in 2006—the two structures define a visual arts campus for the theorizing, teaching, and making of art. Studios are open and visible to display each discipline’s practice and product, while seven vertical cutouts through the building’s horizontal floor plates maximize natural light and ventilation.

Associate Architect BNIM Architects

Structural Engineers BuroHappold, Structural Engineering Associates Mechanical, Electrical, and Plumbing Design Engineers Zinc and perforated stainless-steel exterior skin RHEINZINK Glass Bendheim Architectural Glass Honorable Mention: Building of the Year > Midwest: Gordon Parks Arts Hall

Architect: Valerio Dewalt Train Associates Location: Chicago, IL

Reinterpreting the neo-gothic architecture of the University of Chicago’s neighboring buildings, the Gordon Parks Arts Hall celebrates the school’s commitment to hands-on learning with rooms designed to produce and present content.

July 29, 2016

Media Objectives (M-O), an environments and branding studio within Chicago-based Valerio Dewalt Train Associates (VDTA), has produced an installation in homage to a former YMCA. The YMCA was located where the recently finished NEWCITY lifestyle center on Chicago’s near North Side. The YMCA was built near the former Cabrini-Green public housing projects. It was envisioned as a place to bring the Cabrini-Green community and the nearby Gold Coast communities together in a common recreation facility. Built in 1981, the YMCA’s membership declined in the 1990’s, and the building was eventually sold to developers. The NEWCITY Heritage Installation is comprised of three walls sections built on raw steel frames. Each section is made from glazed bricks salvaged from the colorful facade of the YMCA. Surrounding the installation, the walls of the gallery space are typographic patterns spelling out ideals associated with the YMCA including; “safe haven,” “inclusivity, and “a shared memory.” The NEWCITY development is a large three building complex that includes a residential tower, retail, and commercial office space. The installation is in the high-rise’s ground-floor pedestrian through-way.

July 10, 2015

Metal and glass accentuate Chicago high-rise's iconic form.

Given the odds stacked against it, Godfrey Hotel's 2014 opening in Chicago counts as a major victory—even if it took more than a decade to get there. Valerio Dewalt Train Associates (VDTA) signed on to the project in 2003, after being approached by a developer affiliated with a mid-market hospitality chain. Four years later, following a delay in financing, construction was finally underway. Then the recession hit, the original developer went under, and the building remained half-finished. The case languished in bankruptcy court until 2012, when Oxford Capital Group purchased the property. Fortunately, boutique hotel operator Oxford Hotels and Resorts hired VDTA to complete the project—with few changes to the original plans. "It's interesting that through the course of the almost four years that this sat wrapped in tarps, it remained desirable," said VDTA's David Jennerjahn. "For the hotel operator, it was a really distinguishing architectural design." Together with its cantilevered form, Godfrey hotel's slick metal panel and glass facade combines function and aesthetics in an iconic package. The hotel appears as a series of three offset rectangular boxes, stacked vertically. "The building has a very symbolic form—what I would call a very muscular form—and none of that is arbitrary," said VDTA's Joe Valerio. The offsets serve two purposes. First, they express the building's structure, which follows the staggered truss system developed in the 1960s by William LeMessurier, a noted structural engineer. As the name suggests, LeMessurier's method involves staggering story-high steel trusses on alternating column lines, thus creating large clear span interiors. Though the staggered truss system is usually deployed to create buildings that "look like a cereal box," said Valerio, VDTA approached their structural engineer with an alternative proposal. "We nonchalantly said, 'There's a lot of redundant strength there. [The volumes] should be able to cantilever out,'" he recalled. The structural engineer gave them the go-ahead, and Godfrey Hotel's unique form was born. As an additional benefit, the stacked configuration allowed the architects to carve the interior spaces into a variety of room types and sizes, an idea they prized from the project's beginning—and which Oxford Hotels and Resorts, in particular, embraced.

Facade Manufacturer Metl-Span (insulated metal panels), Oldcastle (punched windows, storefront), Pittco Architectural Metals (curtain wall)
Architects Valerio Dewalt Train Associates
Facade Installer All American Exterior Solutions (metal panels), Alliance Glazing Technologies (curtain wall)
Facade Consultant Curtainwall Design Consulting
Location Chicago, IL
Date of Completion 2014
System insulated metal panel system with integrated aluminum punched windows, aluminum curtain wall system
Products Metl-Span insulated metal panel system, Reynobond aluminum composite panels, Pac-Clad corrugated perforated panels, Oldcastle aluminum punched windows and aluminum storefront, Pittco aluminum curtain wall, Nanawall moveable storefront, PPG Solarban 60 glazing

Like the offsets, said Jennerjahn, the building's skin performs a specific set of functions even as it "works toward the goal of creating a distinctive boutique hotel image." On the north and south facades, an insulated metal panel system from Metl-Span attaches directly to the stud work, doing triple duty as weather barrier, vapor barrier, and insulation. Integrated punched windows nod to the River North neighborhood's masonry fabric, while the panels' taut surface avoids detracting attention from the building's unique shape. Finally, said Jennerjahn, "using a metal skin on a metal frame building was another tie to an honest expression [of the structure]." The east and west facades are almost entirely transparent. "In 2003, no one had heard of LEED," said Valerio. Noting the potential for solar gain, he explained, "If we were designing the building today, we wouldn't have all-glass walls on the east and west elevations. We put them there because we wanted to take advantage of the views." The glass also reveals the staggered truss system. Because the trusses run north-south, opening the building to the east and west was the only way to show them off. "That created other opportunities we did not even think of," said Valerio. In some cases, he said, "the trusses really become a part of the room," operating as built-in furniture. Despite the change in ownership and an eleven-year gap between conception and execution, Godfrey Hotel's architectural design remained almost entirely unaltered. "There were some changes internally, but the exterior of the building and the expression of the building were very consistent," observed Jennerjahn. Valerio agrees—and is humble enough to acknowledge the unusual serendipity of the situation. "Oxford fundamentally built the hotel exactly as we had designed it," he said. "It was really just an amazing kind of dumb luck."

April 21, 2014

Last year, Mesa Development and the University of Chicago announced they’d planned a 13-story mixed-use development for the western end of Hyde Park’s 53rd Street commercial strip. The massive project drew opposition to its scale and a lawsuit delayed construction—until now. [beforeafter]

[/beforeafter] The Valerio Dewalt Train Associates (VDTA) design and its density ruffled some feathers around the neighborhood, as the 135-foot-tall building, dubbed Vue53, would be among the area’s tallest structures. (Nearby Harper Court tops out at 160 feet.) A judge in February threw out a lawsuit appealing the building's zoning change, paving the way for the 300,000 square foot facility and its 267 rental apartments, 228 parking spaces and 29,000 square feet of ground floor retail. Curbed reported McHugh Construction is apparently seeking subcontractors for the project. VDTA’s yellow-accented facade appears to have been traded for silvery glass. They appear to have adjusted the rhythm of the facade pattern, too. The developer is targeting completion during Summer of 2015.

December 6, 2012

AIA Chicago announced their 2012 awards, to be officially presented tomorrow at the chapter’s annual meeting. Firm of the year goes to Farr Associates, whose sustainable design credentials include seven LEED Platinum projects, two net-zero-energy buildings and three LEED-Neighborhood Developments. Farr was the first firm in the world to rack up three LEED Platinum projects. The New York Times’ Keith Schneider once called them “The most prominent of the city’s growing cadre of ecologically sensitive architects.” Eco-urbanists are in good company these days, and it seems a timely choice by AIA to highlight a firm so actively involved in the hard work of implementing smart growth and sustainable design. Valerio Dewalt Train’s Matt Dumich took the Dubin Family Young Architect Award. Dumich was project architect on VDTA’s upgrade of Bruce Graham's First Wisconsin Plaza and was previously honored with the 2011 Building Design + Construction 40 Under 40 award. His firm’s work includes a revival of the Staybridge Suites project at 127 W. Huron, and the University of Chicago’s Early Childhood Center. AIA is also awarding three Distinguished Service Awards, recognizing "outstanding service to the Chicago architectural community." Lynn Becker, mastermind of the essential ArchitectureChicago PLUS blog, Paul Knight of the residential energy-efficiency consulting firm Domus PLUS and the University of Illinois Chicago’s Vincent Paglione will be recognized by AIA’s board at 3340 N. Kedzie Ave., December 7.

October 30, 2012

Friday marked Designight 2012—AIA Chicago’s annual awards gala—which brought nearly 1,000 members of the area’s design community together at Navy Pier to recognize 39 projects in four awards categories: Distinguished Building, Interior Architecture, Divine Detail, and Sustainability Leadership. John Ronan’s Poetry Foundation; Perkins+Will’s Universidade Agostinho Neto in Luanda, Angola; Sheehan Partners’ Facebook Data Center in Prineville, Ore.; and David Woodhouse Architects’ Richard J. Daley Library IDEA Commons in Chicago (featured in the October Midwest issue of AN Midwest) were among the repeat winners of the night. Helmut Jahn accepted a lifetime achievement award, calling on the designers present to imagine a better future and then “make that future happen.” On behalf of his firm, Jahn also formally adopted the changes reported earlier—a new name, JAHN, and the ascension of Francisco Gonzalez-Pulido to share design leadership with Jahn. Click on a thumbnail to launch the slideshow. The full list of winners and all 262 projects entered into the competition can be found on AIA Chicago's website.

Posts tagged with "Valerio Dewalt Train":

Facades+ San Francisco will dive into the Bay Area's exciting technological trends

Valerio Dewalt Train Associates overcomes NIMBY lawsuit to build expressive tower on Chicago’s South Side

Valerio DeWalt Train transforms an east Michigan college

2016 Building of the Year > Midwest: University of Iowa Visual Arts Building by Steven Holl Architects

A colorful installation memorializes one of Chicago's lost YMCAs

VDTA's Taut-Skinned Godfrey Hotel

Valerio Dewalt Train's 13-Story Hyde Park Development Advances With Changes

AIA Chicago to Honor Farr Associates, Valerio Dewalt Train, Lynn Becker, More

Slideshow> AIA Chicago Honors 39 Projects