Altera
Location: Chicago, USA
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Program: Mixed housing complex with ground floor gallery, Sustainable Housing Development, Sustainable living
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Client: Altera, Private Developer
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Area:
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Year: 2011
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Status: Competition
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Design: Sig Froelich, Martin Kim, Aaron Gist, Cecilia Dobos at FKA
The design for this project addressed a sustainable four story mixed use building. The ground floor is an open floor plan with emphasized flexibility to be used as either office, gallery or retail space. The open plan apartments with large floor to ceiling operable windows in the back and front allow natural cross ventilation, long hours of sunlight and natural light in the core of the house. Solar and thermal panels on the roof not only provide shade but also electricity and hot water for the building. The roof planters comes from locally produced “greengrid” recycled plastic modules. The building materials are concrete masonry units and concrete floors on steel structure. Exterior solar curtains and wood slats provide shade. An integrated storm runoff collector stores rainwater in the garden, that later used in flashing toilets.
The design for this mixed housing is focused on the maximal use of natural systems to emphasize sustainable solutions. Sustainable solutions were not only applied through technology but also by the use of materials, initiating the maximal use of recycled materials.
Worked on this project as an architect from schematic design to presentation at Froelich Kim Architecture.