Beginning in the reception foyer, a tightly articulated grid drawn by shallow reveals the surrounding oak walls have been pulled apart to create a broad cylindrical oak stair with a smaller-scale, open-grid banister and granite treads that connects the elevator lobbies and the internal corridor-gallery spaces with offices on the perimeter. This system persists throughout the space, popping up in gridded oak doors with sandblasted glazing, coffered ceilings and interior windows of glass block.

SBK’s corridors exemplify the essence of the architectural intervention. Running counter to the more rigorous framework created by the grids, the corridors form more complex compositions. Their design both explores and exploits the notion that such channels are similar in purpose and function to an urban street. Asymmetry often prevails in these areas, expressed through wall elevations encompassing round columns, spiral staircases and gently curving surfaces, with ceiling plans carefully reflected by boundary and material changes in the floor below. All of these elements consciously erode the regularity of the grid system while existing comfortably within its framework.

The design of SBK’s various offices illustrates the idea that these spaces, too, should be part of the larger interior design whole, but also have their own, distinct personality. A custom modular office credenza, for example, was designed to lend itself to a host of variations and options for each employee. This single piece of furniture, installed along an interior office wall, can be adapted to a variety of storage and filing needs. Much of the furniture was custom designed.

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The clients were intensely involved in the design of the prototypical office of the future, which needs to accommodate a wide spectrum of knowledge-based employees: portfolio managers, research analysts and assistants, and legal, statistical and investment support personnel.

Rather than the usual desk/credenza arrangement, each office has a 3’-6” conference table that encourages the discussions so characteristic of the company’s approach to investing, as well as a U-shaped counter providing a generous horizontal work surface for an evolving assortment of office machines.

Maple panels, translucent glass and transparent glass are layered in corridor walls, creating an instant reading of private and public spaces and allowing work stations arranged around the core to borrow light from the offices. The perimeter offices combine natural light with incandescent and fluorescent illumination from individually controlled luminaires. The HVAC system in each office can be individually manipulated. Special acoustical treatments, such as recessed doorways lined with perforated vinyl to reduce noise transmission, were required to accommodate the company’s “open door” philosophy.

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The permanent ground-floor intervention includes a flexible exhibition gallery, a state-of-the-art 200-seat movie theater, a bookstore/museum shop, a lobby and a café. The second floor houses administrative offices, a multi-use exhibition loft, and the Tut’s Fever Movie Palace. Designed by artist Red Grooms as an interpretation of Egyptian-style movie theaters of the twenties and thirties, Tut’s theater adds an engaging dynamic to the exhibition loft. The roof will accommodate a prefabricated metal pavilion, providing exhibition and entertainment space.

The architects placed a new monumental stair and elevator tower on-axis with the main entrance to the building, so that it extends from the original courtyard façade as a counterpoint to its gridded solid-void frame.

The stair acts as the iconic object of the design and the orientation element for the entire complex. The landings provide visitors with an alternative exhibition experience, giving them the opportunity to reorient themselves before reentering through the façade of the original building, creating a sense of anticipation and reengagement. In the final phase, the courtyard will be developed as an outdoor movie theater and exhibition space to hold larger-scale installations.

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The two main entrances, one on the upper ground/street level, the other on the lower ground/parking garage level, are interconnected by an open, skylighted stair gallery paralleling the auditorium.

The traditional gallery is adjacent to the lower entry and the double-height, flexible, experimental gallery is another level below grade, adjacent to the service tunnel, which relates to the existing access road.

The 20,000-square-foot building was rendered in granite, tile and metal panels, presenting itself as a discreet architectural object in the “garden” perceived in counterpoint to the surrounding existing large-scale structures.

The compositional strategy of the Crocker Museum of Art addition and renovation was to establish a new and unique iconic presence for the addition, while framing the existing complex in a visual and physical dynamic, creating a collaged image for both the new and historic structures.

The new addition is rotated on a due north/south axis, disengaging it from the existing orthogonal street grid and Crocker complex, which reinforces the contrapuntal siting and massing.

The ground floor contains a new entry off O Street, which simultaneously accesses the museum store, lobby, reception desk, double height multi-use gallery/reception space which opens to the new courtyard, café, public meeting rooms, auditorium, loading dock and service support spaces. Also accessible from the ground floor is a new connection/circulation space to the Herold Wing, which interconnects service and public access between the new addition and the existing buildings. The connection, which occurs on all three floors, re-facades the Herold Wing from the new courtyard, forming a consistent architectural image for the space.

The second floor is occupied by the administrative staff offices, art storage spaces with potential public viewing and access, service spaces and the second floor connection to the Herold Wing. This connection also facilitates service to the Crocker Art Gallery Ballroom for events and catered functions.

The third floor is occupied by the new suite of temporary and changing exhibition galleries that afford maximum flexibility and installation variation. The new galleries are directly connected to the existing Art Gallery building, allowing for a continuous circulation sequence from the new to the existing, both vertically and horizontally, thus totally integrating the entire complex.

Associate Architect: HMR Architects, Inc.

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One enters a gallery, which opens to the living/dining space and views beyond. Off the gallery is in the guest room, library, maid’s room, kitchen and bar/hi-fi room, all of which are distributed linearly front-to-back. Off the living/dining space, articulated by the curved extension of the gallery wall is the master bedroom suite, which includes a dressing room, extensive bathroom and terrace. This space separated by a mirrored sliding door is meant to be a literal as well as an illusory extension of the main space.

The edited palette- the black slate floor, white walls and ceilings and back and white lacquer cabinetwork—intensifies the abstract reading of the space.

On the main level of the twenty-five foot high, steel trussed volume, is the multi-use living/dining/ entertainment/gallery articulated by custom designed, space defining furniture. At the east end of the space is the master bedroom suite, and study/library balcony accessed by an exposed stair, which rotates at the landing, and runs parallel, behind the existing longitudinal steel truss, to attic guest bedrooms, over the kitchen, master baths and dressing rooms.

The study/library balcony is suspended under the east end of the barrel vault and revealed from the master bedroom below, by a continuous radial skylight in the floor, articulating its separation while maintaining the volumetric extension.

The floor of the balcony defines the bedroom ceiling, floating asymmetrically within the existing orthogonal building frame, articulating its objectiveness and sectional variation.

Three large skylights were inserted into the south side of the barrel vaulted roof, providing natural light into the longitudinal internal façade of the space and revealing the classic building pediment above.

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The new ICP was designed to accommodate varying scales of exhibitions as well as establishing an optimum state-of-the-art museum environment. The space has been transformed into an inspirational and memorable architectural sequence. It is simultaneously dense and open, simple and complex, with a clear objective to make the architecture as pertinent as the exhibitions it contains.

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The 270,000 square-foot library building reestablishes the public and institutional image of the Main Library and reinforces downtown Akron as an urban, cultural and architectural center. The design of the facility reflects the Library as a patron-friendly place, accommodating its users in a variety of environments.

The new addition negotiates the twenty-five foot difference in elevation between High and Main Streets. A three-story atrium along High Street brings natural light down to the lowest Main Street level and provides orientation for all patrons. The assemblage of building “objects” along Main Street includes the new library loft addition and the new theater flanking the existing library, maintaining a pedestrian scale along the mall in contrast to the automobile-scaled facade along High street, which is accessible by car.

The building encompasses the most advanced applications of technology and communication systems for administrative management, the processing of library records, and bibliographic and information networks. Special design consideration was given to provide the most flexible, state-of-the-art infrastructure and distribution systems for digital information.

Numerous community spaces are provided, including a 425-seat auditorium, a cafe, a bookstore, public meeting rooms and art exhibition spaces. An interior link to a new parking garage along High Street resolves into a new pedestrian ramp, activating the three-story addition. An outdoor amphitheater and landscaped park complete the complex.

Associate Architect: Richard Fleischman Architects, Inc.

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