Using a traditional palette of stone and brick, KlingStubbins and Croxton Collaborative Architects infused generous amounts of glass into the building's facade to modernize the facility's appearance while respecting the institution's surrounds. The faculty and students worked carefully with KlingStubbins to consider a number of factors associated with the need to locate a massive, energy-demanding, and technically complex building within the context of a visually attractive campus. The resulting positioning of the facility unites the sciences with the rest of campus and draws students into the science complex as they commute from one part of campus to another.
Sustainable design strategies, such as orienting the new building on a true north/south axis and separating the building into two connected wings, result in a maximum effort to harvest daylight into all prime program areas. With a high-insulation envelope roof, dimmable fluorescent lighting, intelligent HVAC occupancy sensors, heat recovery on ventilation exhaust, and high-insulation glazing, the building is designed to operate on approximately 30-percent less energy than a conventional building and is intended to meet LEED® (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification.
"The new facility brings a forward-thinking design to a forward-thinking field while remaining true to the university setting," says Peter Blewett, AIA, LEED® AP, the principal-in-charge of the project with KlingStubbins. "St. Lawrence now has a state-of-the-art science facility to support its research-intensive programs."
