Dattner Architects’ Manhattan Districts 1/2/5 Garage & Spring Street Salt Shed have been awarded an AIA COTE (The Committee on the Environment) Top Ten Award from AIA National, the organization’s highest honor for projects that advance integration of sustainable design practices in the built environment. Designed in association with WXY, this project embodies the team’s commitment to not only design a sustainably innovative building, but to create a facility that benefits the surrounding community, responds to the local ecology, and plans for long-term use in regards to the sites environmental impact, and its function as a civic utility.
Whether it is the 1.5 acre green-roof that supports 25 distinct plant species and migratory birds, or the water recycling system that re-purposes captured rainwater for the truck wash and plumbing system, the Garage represents each of the COTE Top Ten measures in a way that is unique to the buildings urban context. As a firm committed to responsible civic architecture that benefits this urban context, we are proud the Garage can represent innovative sustainable design at a national level.
The Manhattan Districts 1/2/5 Garage , Dattner Architects, and our associate architects WXY, will be honored in Orlando for the A’17 Conference on Architecture on April 27th. For additional information on the event please see the event page here.
Jury Comments:
“The project achieves two extra ordinary feats: It raises the bar for a municipal sanitation building to the status of an excellent civic structure in the heart of the city, and it also evidences extraordinary skill in changing an initial negative community response into a welcoming presence. The green roof participates as a building system by providing a habitat and food for migratory birds, capturing 100 percent of rainwater and improving views for neighboring buildings. Greywater is used as a source for flushing restroom fixtures and truck washing. Attention to its civic responsibility is shown in the cost-effective paint color palate, which creates a polychrome façade at night. The salt shed is an unexpected sculptural elements, creating visual interest in an industrial context and demonstrating investment in an undeserved neighborhood.”