SDC Projects

Jacob Burns Media Arts Center, Pleasantville, NY

2009 AIA Westchester Mid-Hudson High Honor Award Winner

The Jacob Burns Film Center (JBFC) is a nonprofit cultural arts center dedicated to: presenting the best of independent, documentary, and world cinema; promoting visual literacy; and making film a vibrant part of the community.

JBFC began in 2001 when a group of individuals interested in creating a cultural arts center in Westchester County purchased the old Rome Theater in Pleasantville, New York. The Rome Theater, a beautiful Spanish mission-style, historic landmark building, was built in 1925 as one of the first movie theaters in Westchester County. Opened during the golden age of cinema, the New York Times called it "The Show Place of Westchester County." The theater was an active cinema, showing films until 1987, when it closed its doors due to competition with neighboring multiplexes. Since the JBFC opened its doors to the public in June 2001, the Westchester community and those from surrounding areas have enjoyed thousands of films from around the world.

The new Media and Education Center, located several blocks down Manville Road from the main Center, has been designed and constructed in ways that promote the health and well-being of the community and the environment. Through careful choice of materials and efficient design, the building will promote an environmentally responsible way of life.

Design features for the Center include:

• Geothermal heating and cooling
• Radiant heat
• Natural daylight for the second floor offices
• A green roof infrastructure for insulation and storm water absorption
• Recycled building materials

The Jacob Burns Media and Education Center was completed early in 2009, and achieved LEED Gold Certification early in 2010.

GE Energy Financial Services, Stamford, CT

AIA Connecticut 2009 Design Award Winner

GE Energy Financial Services (EFS) experts invest globally with a long-term view, backed by the best of GE's technical know-how and financial strength, across the capital spectrum and the energy and water industries to help their customers and GE grow. With $19 billion in assets, GE EFS, based on Long Ridge Road in Stamford, Connecticut, invests more than $5 billion annually in two of the world's most capital-intensive and essential industries: energy and water.

The 800 Long Ridge Road property will provide an energy efficient headquarters in the spirit of GE's ecomagination program, in which the company helps its customers meet their environmental challenges while expanding its own portfolio of cleaner energy products.

The 275,000-square-foot Renovation project was occupied early in 2009.

Rating: The project was awarded a LEED-CI Gold Certification in 2009, achieving 100% of the points attempted in five green design categories: sustainable sites, water efficiency, energy and atmosphere, materials and resources and indoor environmental quality.

Architect: Perkins Eastman Architects

Faculty House - Columbia University, NY

Designed by McKim, Mead & White in the original campus plan, Faculty House is located at 400 West 117th Street and is adjacent to Wien Hall and the President's House.

Since 1923, this red brick and limestone building has served as a gathering place for social and intellectual interaction among University faculty.

In recent years, Faculty House has opened its doors to serve the various needs of university administrators, alumni, graduate students and members of the community.

Faculty House has undergone a total interior renovation which is now complete. Work began during May of 2008 with careful deconstruction including the removal of kitchen equipment which was then shipped to Central America.

LEED-NC version 2.2 Gold Certification was received in early 2010.

Architect: Bogdanow Architects

Queens Botanical Garden Administration Center, NY

The Queens Botanical Garden is located on 39 acres of land owned by New York City, in Flushing, New York. The new 15,800 square foot Visitor and Administration Center includes a reception area, an auditorium, a garden store, gallery space, meeting rooms, and administrative offices. The project is made up of three interconnected spaces sheltered by a sloping green roof.

This LEED Platinum-rated Design began in 2001, with a Charrette conducted by SDC President Bill Bobenhausen, FAIA, CCS, LEED AP (then Director of Sustainable Design, Steven Winter Associates). Mr. Bobenhausen then led BKSK Architects and P.E. Collins MEP to design a Center that celebrates the relationship between diverse cultures and the environment, showcases water management, integrates with the landscape, and conserves and generates electricity.

Reusing graywater for flushing toilets reduces the project's potable water consumption by 55%. The building also features waterless urinals and composting toilets. Thanks to extensive bioswales and a green roof on the auditorium, the project manages all stormwater on site. A water channel, fed by rainwater that cascades off the roof canopy, weaves around the building and through the gardens.

The reception building's long, narrow shape is oriented along an east-west axis, allowing daylight to penetrate all interior spaces. An efficient lighting system, daylight dimming, and occupancy sensors reduce energy consumption. Glass doors and windows open in temperate weather, providing natural ventilation. The building uses photovoltaic panels and a ground-source heat-pump system to harvest energy on site.

More than 33% of the cost of materials in the building, were harvested or manufactured within 500 miles of the project site. The project team also selected materials with high durability, low maintenance requirements, recycled content, low chemical emissions, and Forest Stewardship Council certification.

Completed September 2007, LEED-NC v2.1 Platinum

YMCA Greenkill Camp Lodge, Huguenot, NY

Completed in April of 2009, the YMCA Greenkill Camp Lodge located in Huguenot, New York now serves as a new year-round residential facility for up to 44 guests, including sleeping rooms, a service kitchen and multiple indoor and outdoor lounge spaces.

The 5,700 square foot facility houses various green design measures including a green roof, radiant floor heating, and a highly efficient lake-connected geothermal heat pump system.

LEED design features include fly ash concrete, use of recycled and local materials, LED lighting, and recycled blue-jean insulation.

The Greenkill Camp Lodge not only provides a welcome, enjoyable space for accommodations and programming, but it also fosters awareness and practice of sustainable living through a series of interactive building components.

The project was awarded a LEED-NC version 2.2 Gold Rating in 2009.

Heimbold Visual Arts Center, Sarah Lawrence College

2005 AIA Award Winner: Design and Sustainability

The 60,000 sf Monika A. and Charles A. Heimbold Visual Arts Center at Sarah Lawrence College brings together the visual arts in one dynamic interdisciplinary environment at this progressive, liberal-arts institution.

The LEED design process began during September of 2001, with a charrette led by SDC’s Bill Bobenhausen, FAIA. Site planning considered a campus characterized by undulating topography, dramatic rock outcroppings, and dense foliage. To reduce the impact to the site and blur the distinction between exterior and interior, the new building is integrated into the topography of the existing hilltop.

Given the constraints of the site, more than one-third of the total building area is embedded in the ground, well suited for photography labs and other studios that do not need daylight. A stepped, grass-covered roof reduces the building’s impact on the natural environment and controls stormwater runoff. Native plants and low-flow fixtures reduce potable water use.

In selecting the building’s primary materials—fieldstone, cedar, channel glass, and zinc—the design team found inspiration in the campus’s rich landscape and historic architecture. Quarrying the stone nearby continued the College’s history of utilizing local fieldstone in the construction of its buildings.

Materials were also selected to reduce contaminants that impact indoor air quality and to lessen the environmental impacts of material manufacture and procurement. More than 60% of the wood materials used on the project were certified as sustainably harvested by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). Low-VOC adhesives, sealants, paints, and carpeting were installed, and composite wood or agrifiber products containing added urea formaldehyde were prohibited. Indoor environmental quality is improved through the use of daylighting and operable windows

This project was chosen as a Top Ten Green Project for 2005 by the AlA Committee on the Environment (COTE).

The Heimbold Center is the first LEED-certified visual arts center in America.

Architect: Polshek and Partners

Sam's Point, Dwarf Pine Ridge Preserve, NY

2005 AIA Award Winner: Design and Sustainability

SDC consulted with Matthew Bialecki Architects of New Paltz, NY on the design of this new headquarters building for this division of The Nature Conservancy.

Great care was given to the design of a building that would be particularly energy conserving while utilizing natural daylight.

Construction materials were selected for their environmentally-preferable qualities including recycled content and local origin.

The preserve contains the best example of a ridge-top dwarf pine barrens in the world. It is part of the 90,000-acre Northern Shawangunk Mountains, whose cliffs, summits and plateaus form a unique landscape of extraordinary ecological significance.

Home to nearly 40 rare plants and animals and three rare natural communities, the Northern Shawangunks represent one of the highest priorities for conservation in the northeastern United States.

Other consultants involved in the project include Donald Watson, FAIA, as concept planner and exhibit designer and O'Dea Lynch Abbattista as mechanical/structural consultant.

The project was LEED-NC Certified in 2006.

American Institute of Architects (AIA) Headquarters, New York, NY Center for Architecture

William Bobenhausen, FAIA has proudly assisted the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects in developing the design for it's new headquarters on LaGuardia Place in New York's Greenwich Village. The building is now known as the Center for Architecture. The design for the renovated building was developed by Andrew Berman Architects upon his selection through a design competition that was judged by a distinguished jury.

The image shown on the left was developed from composite photographs viewed from the ground floor southeast-facing street frontage for the Center for Architecture. Superimposed on the photograph are the sun positions throughout the year. With the aid of this study, project-specific daylighting and sun-control design strategies were incorporated into the now actively used Center.

New Jersey Higher Education Partnership for Sustainability

SDC was retained by NJHEPS to develop Guidelines to assist in the selection of construction materials for a wide range of university projects. The Guidelines are organized along the lines of the Uniform Construction Index and CSI's 3-part section format.

The Guidelines will also cross-reference the credits contained in the LEED Green Building Rating System. Each Division highlights the key environmental design factors that pertain to that category of construction and also gives specific guidance as to the pros and cons of utilizing a wide range of materials for specific applications.

The New Jersey Higher Education Partnership for Sustainability (NJHEPS) is a consortium of 37 New Jersey higher education institutions that is now housed Ramapo College.

The mission of NJHEPS is to transform the higher education community to consistently practice sustainability and to more effectively contribute to the world's emerging understanding of sustainability, through teaching, research, outreach, operations, and community life.

Mount Hope Community Center

The Mount Hope Community Center has been built on an abandoned lot on E. 175th St., between Townsend and Walton Avenues. The Mount Hope Community Center centralizes not only recreational and cultural facilities, but also a broad array of Mount Hope community services.

A hugely exciting aspect to the project, one of the first in the Bronx, is that the Center is an example of sustainable design. It is energy efficient, environmentally sensitive and economically prudent. As illustrated, one of the principal design strategies investigated for the gymnasium/multi-purpose room was the sun-controlled use of natural daylight.

Human comfort is prioritized by attention to air quality and abundant natural light, gardens and green spaces. SDC assisted in the design by conducting computer modeling of daylighting alternatives.

Architect: The Croxton Collaborative.

Ramapo Sustainability Center, Mahwah, New Jersey

This soon to be occupied 5,000 square foot building will serve as both an environmental education center, classroom building and home for NJHEPS. Design features include the use of sun-controlled daylight and natural ventilation. Environmentally-preferable materials have been carefully selected for durability, recycled content, local manufacture, and positive impact upon indoor air quality.

Energy use for ventilation air will be reduced through the use of a heat recovery ventilator. The building will be sited in a carefully landscaped setting of local and sustainable plantings and will include an extensive "green" roof.

Architect: Stephen Tilly Architects.

Olana State Historic Site, Hudson, New York

Sustainable Design Collaborative is facilitating a process to utilize the LEED Green Building Rating System as a goal-setting tool for a new Visitor's Center at the Olana State Historic Site. This work is being conducted for the Olana Partnership in concert with Donald Watson, FAIA and with input from the NYS Department of Parks. The Partnership's mission is to advocate and support the preservation and enhancement of Olana and its integral viewshed, to sponsor educational programs, and to foster scholarly research on the artist Frederic Edwin Church and his property. A comprehensive plan for Olana includes full restoration of the existing house, grounds and collection, and the building of a new museum/visitor enter to focus on Church, Olana, and the Hudson River School of Art.

East Side High School, Newark

East Side High School will be centrally located within the vital Ironbound section of Newark. It will be a new 1,200 student, $60 million high school that will serve not only as a pace-setting educational facility, but also as a focus for evening and weekend community activities. The design of the school will adapt the existing structure of a low-rise industrial building. Reuse of a significant portion of existing structure is a vital ingredient for "green" design and is so recognized under the LEED green building rating system.

Through Executive Order 24, New Jersey has established a minimum environmental design standard equivalent to a LEED Certified Rating. The environmental planning process included a charrette held at the existing school where the LEED green building rating system was used for goal setting by not only the design team but also the school's faculty.

A major portion of the project will also include adaptive reuse of two long-dormant, but architecturally significant buildings.

Architect: Ehrenkrantz Ekstut & Kuhn.

The Center at Maple Grove, Kew Gardens, New York

Maple Grove Cemetery opened in 1875 as an alternative to the overcrowded Prospect Cemetery in Jamaica (opened 1668). Located on one of the highest elevations in Queens, Maple Grove was said to have beautiful views of Long Island Sound and the Atlantic Ocean - views which have since been obscured by the area's commercial and residential development.

The now occupied Center at Maple Grove is a 30,000 square foot building designed for spiritual and ceremonial purposes while also serving the community for serene musical events.

One of the major design strategies is the use of a geothermal (ground-source) heat pump system.

Environmentally-preferable materials are installed including the use of FSC certified flooring in major public spaces.

A silver LEED-NC rating is anticipated in early 2010.

Architect: Peter Gisolfi Associates. HVAC Engineer: OLA.

NYSERDA (NYS Energy Research & Development Authority)

SDC serves NYSERDA under both the New Construction Program and FlexTech Program. Projects include: the Jacob Burns Media Arts Center, the Mount Hope Community Center (Bronx, New York); New Heart Institute, Presbyterian New York Hospital (New York, New York); and the Clifton Park Library (Clifton Park, New York). Services include daylighting design, materials analysis, specification advice, and guidance on the LEED Green Building Rating System.