Designers can be found in many fields - from engineering, the arts to architecture. With any new client and project, designers have to evaluate how far they can push the envelope of innovation. Oftentimes, innovation is required to address some unmet needs or to realize financial savings - something concrete that calls for a practical solution, without expending any more efforts than necessary. But practical solutions don’t have to be drab, as a recent article in the Architect’s Newspaper shows.

In the case of the New York Times Company, building a gleaming new headquarters near Central Park, “the architecture and construction teams (…) devised a range of cutting-edge design elements that make the building one of the most technologically progressive in the country. Because the headquarters includes almost no back-office operations and is thus for editorial and higher-level business staff, a premium was placed on innovation.”

“What’s more, much of the original impetus for the innovations came from the newspaper itself, which pushed the architects and engineers to develop new solutions. Here are some of the building’s most notable design elements:

• Facade Lighting: “The facade is lit by an Erco lighting system, with lights installed at various floor levels, giving the building the appearance of being lit from the ground up. This gradation system means that the 250-watt lights consume only 25 percent of the energy normally required for a building this size.” (…)
• Natural Light: “The Times took things one step further by entering a partnership with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories, a leader in lighting studies, to evaluate and select a dynamic lighting and daylight harvesting system. “The philosophy is to maximize natural light coming in, maximize the connection to the outdoors, maximize the view, but not cross over into glare,” said Glenn Hughes, director of construction and real estate for the Times. (…) Based on data culled from a mockup [building], the Times expects a 35-percent energy savings from the shading system alone.” (…)
• Interior Lighting: “Only 2 percent of all office space in the United States is dimmable but the Times wanted to take things a step further, to have a system that would respond to incoming daylight and adjust itself automatically (…). According to Pekka Hakkarainen, “as sunlight enters the space, we had a requirement to dim the electric lighting so that the desk illumination is within the target settings in any given department on any given floor.” (…)
• Air Circulation: “Virtually every office building in the United States is equipped with ceiling HVAC systems. But once again, the Times decided to be different and placed the air conditioning in the floor—an idea borrowed from European office buildings, where natural ventilation is more commonly accepted. (…) The project designers realized that they could achieve remarkable energy efficiencies by piping cold air through the floor. (…) The supply air is coming through diffusers in floor, and it picks up heat as it rises. This is more efficient than dropping it from overhead ducts, which require lower temperatures in order to fully circulate the air.The diffusers are then covered with a specially designed carpet piece which has miniscule holes in it for the air.” (…)
• Backup Power: Because a national newspaper can’t stop for things like power failures, the Times required that its new building come with a backup power system capable of running its vital newsroom functions. (…) The solution came in the form of a co-generation plant, running continuously on natural gas and completely isolated from the city power grid. The plant’s two engines generate 1.4 megawatts continually, (enough) to (…) cool the data center and (…) run all of the newsroom.” (…)

Read the full article…