ARCHITECTURAL FOCUS
Inside the suites, the plan makes the best use of the building’ s expansive floor plate, while ensuring that occupants are never far from views, natural light, and a relationship to the city beyond.
exterior of each suite. A mix of private offices and open plan areas delivers a variety of workstations, allowing for flexibility and modularity as uses change and adapt with future College programming. Within each suite, a grid of familiar columns punctuates the open space, serving as more than just structural support for the building, but also as a distinctive aesthetic feature that defines the identity of the third floor. Color-coded acoustic panels line each of the suite’ s ceilings, combining with the bright visual aesthetics of each space while simultaneously ensuring the acoustic comfort of each room.
The experience of the 3rd floor begins as users enter the elevator lobby, covered with a comforting and lively shade of yellow paint across the walls, ceilings, and newly exposed structural columns: a relic of the building’ s history that showcases its strong, yet elegant structural systems. Playful lighting design mixed with bright colors illuminates this otherwise dark corner of the building, warmly inviting guests into the space and establishing design motifs that continue across the floor.
Outside of the third floor’ s office suites is a shared conference room at the end of the central spine, as well as newly expanded ADA-accessible bathrooms. Due to the Pearl Building’ s previous use as lab spaces, this project also included extensive hazardous material abatement, as well as all new building systems, AV / IT design, and a completely new layout. In addition to being the architect, SGS provided furniture, lighting, and graphic design services.
Beyond the elevator lobby, users are ushered into the central spine of the 3rd floor, a long, wide hallway that extends the length of the building. Looking down the length of the hallway, users see a pleasant palette of bright colors— green, blue, orange, and purple— each representing the assigned visual identity of a different administrative suite. These colors, which predominate the interiors of each suite, extend outward into the hallway’ s floor, adding new dimensions and a clever system of wayfinding to an otherwise blank and rectilinear space.
Inside the suites, the plan makes the best use of the building’ s expansive floor plate, while ensuring that occupants are never far from views, natural light, and a relationship to the city beyond. The building’ s concrete curtain walls, a remnant of its origins as a factory, allow for large, abundant windows along the
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