Houston Endowment Headquarters – Merit Award

2023 DESIGN AWARD RECIPIENT

Houston Endowment Headquarters – Merit Award

Through a 2019 international design competition conducted by the Houston Endowment and competition organizers Malcom Reading Consultants (MRC), Kevin Daly Architects (kdA) in collaboration with Mexico City-based Productora were selected to design the private foundation’s new home, the Houston Endowment Headquarters.

The Headquarters enables Houston Endowment, one of the largest private foundations in Texas, to relocate from its current offices in the city’s business district and embed itself within the community. The purpose-built headquarters creates a more accessible, welcoming base of operations where their work can continue to evolve and transform into the future.

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Very nicely proportioned, well calibrated, well designed; a fairly straightforward building made more engaging and site-responsive through the use of massing, material texture, and overhang for shading.

Noteworthy performance features include:

1. Zero Net Energy

2. Uses CLT floor assemblies in place of concrete

//framework for design excellence measures

Measure 1: Design for Integration

The 2030 Net Zero Challenge has been set as the project’s primary sustainability objective, providing an achievable and forward-thinking framework in setting a goal of carbon neutrality by 2030 through prioritizing energy-efficient planning and design. By including a geothermal well system, high efficiency rainscreen façade, and shade canopy, the carbon consumption of Houston Endowment headquarters will be reduced by 33%, as compared to a typical office building. The energy generation from the photovoltaic system would cover the balance of the required energy demand, therefore resulting in a “net zero” project.

Measure 2: Design for Equitable Communities

Located near downtown Houston on a prominent 1.5-acre parcel in Spotts Park near the banks of the Buffalo Bayou, the building’s design and programming are strongly connected to the site and influenced by the organizations mission of community enrichment through empowering a stronger and healthier Houston. Showers, lockers, and bike storage are provided on the lowest level to encourage commuting by bicycle instead of car.

Measure 3: Design for Ecosystems

The building sits on the edge of Spotts Park. The building landscape blends seamlessly with the surrounding park, promoting an extension of the park’s habitat up to the edge of the structure. The landscape palette includes local plants and trees appropriate for regional animal, insect, and bird life. The design is not a manicured landscape, but rather a natural aesthetic that reduces the need for frequent maintenance, and encourages biodiversity.

Measure 4: Design for Water

The visitor parking lot sits over a stormwater detention system that will retain and slowly release stormwater back to the water table over time. This system is sized to accommodate all impervious area on the site, reducing the potential of overloading the City’s storm sewer system, or contributing runoff to adjacent property. The landscape irrigation system is metered separately, and includes the latest technology for detecting weather patterns and soil moisture. Inside the building high efficiency fixtures are used at all restrooms.

Measure 5: Design for Economy

Open office areas, and multi-function meeting rooms still meet the necessary operational needs of the client, while removing burdensome area that is rarely used.
The steel and aluminum canopy ties the building into the surrounding park, and may seem to be a design feature, but it also acts as a shading device to reduce the load on the cooling systems, and provides a surface for mounting the PV array.
Polished concrete floors provide a hard-wearing aesthetically pleasing finish using an economical material.

Measure 6: Design for Energy

The building’s canopy features a photovoltaic array to provide the majority of power needs for the building while its aluminum louvers provide shade and reduce cooling needs. The building’s envelope and façade were specifically designed to reduce solar gains while capturing daylight throughout the day. There is also a geothermal system to reduce load on mechanical cooling system.

Measure 7: Design for Well-Being

The design promotes interaction between occupants through the interconnection of workspace with breakout spaces, a café, and soft seating areas. The atria let daylight into the heart of the structure, with views to the sky and a visual connection between floors. Exterior terraces overlooking the park directly connect to the workspace, encouraging employees to step outside for meetings or phone calls. Showers, lockers, and bike storage on the lowest level encourage use of the location on Buffalo Bayou for exercise, or use of the park’s public basketball courts before or after work.

Measure 8: Design for Resources

In lieu of concrete, Cross-Laminate Timber was selected for the floor and roof slabs to reduce the amount of embodied carbon on the project. This also allowed the size of footings to be reduced and by using CLT as the ceiling finish less drywall was needed. The canopy structure uses high-strength steel, significantly reducing the size of the HSS sections, and the overall weight of the assembly. By using lightweight aluminum louvers as the infill the load and overall weight of the structure was further reduced.

Measure 9: Design for Change

Programmatically the project allows for expansion and contraction in project teams and workforce by using breakout space as future expansion capacity. Conference rooms and private offices are the same scale and module, meaning as needs evolve spaces can be converted from one function to another. The entire structure is above the 500 year flood plain, with all critical functions and equipment placed a half level above grade on the first floor, to provide additional protection. If an extreme weather event did flood above predicted levels the parking level could be sacrificed without compromising access to the upper levels.

Measure 10: Design for Discovery

The same project team members from the competition remained on the project through Construction Administration. The breadth of knowledge and experience this fostered in the office is higher than if we had passed the project off between teams. By ensuring all team members visited the building during construction, and liaised with the local consultant teams, we embedded knowledge of local practices into our workflow for future projects.