The bobblehead created for Bill Valentine is an award that will travel worldwide to recognize offices and teams for advancing the HOK Sustainable Roadmap.

The Roadmap is taking sustainability to the next level at HOK globally. It was launched with a series of workshops at offices worldwide that generated ideas to reach the goals of the Roadmap. I previously blogged about the goals in an earlier post “On the (Sustainable) Road | Some Ideas from Tampa” (http://hoklife.com/2010/07/07/on-the-sustainable-road-some-ideas-from-tampa/), which briefly described some ways HOK is measuring and recording our progress. 

“Bill” has visited a few locations to award ideas that included incentives for becoming a new LEED® AP and creating a green scorecard for catering office luncheons and L-n-L presentations. …

Carnival House is the new headquarters space for Carnival UK (the holding company for five of the best-known cruise lines in the UK: Cunard, P&O Cruises, Ocean Village, Princess and Yachts of Seabourn).

Previously located in five different buildings around Southampton, these brands now share a single space, one designed to facilitate the cross-pollination of ideas between teams via open plan areas and free access to different departments.  (Not to mention it floods the place with tons of daylight!)  Check out the cool cruise-ship-like atrium and the whole Flickr set to see what we mean…

Not all of you have been to Los Angeles office, and that’s a shame. We’re awfully friendly and remarkably good-looking in person. We do neat things here, like Parking Lot BBQs, pot-luck lunches, World Cup Match parties and (lest you forget), really creative work on some incredible projects. But don’t take my word for it, you can ask bobblehead Bill Valentine. He’s just left our office with a fistful of memories from our sunny state.
Bill(ette) visited us after the Los Angeles office secured the inaugural “Bill Valentine Award” for tangible action supporting HOK’s Sustainable Roadmap. HOK LA’s plan to encourage …

I received one of those e-mails that gets sent around to just about anyone who has an e-mail address.  Most of the time I ignore them, but this one I found not only funny, but helpful and ingenious [thanks to fellow engineer David Bruce].  Here are some of the highlights, you can find more at There I Fixed It. 

…

If you hang out on Twitter, you may have seen a few Back to the Future tweets about today (or yesterday) being the day in which Marty McFly goes into the future!   I’m not really going to dispute that here (I honestly believe the actual year is 2015, and I also think it should be in October).  My whole point to this blog is about hover-boards!  For those of you that may not remember (or worse, are too young to know), a hover-board is a board much like a skateboard without wheels that was used in Back to the Future II.  It is, as it says, a hovering board that is supposed to be abundant in the near future.  I’m …

It’s one thing to bet the shirt off your back. It’s another thing to bet a shirt onto your back. 

The Lakers, a quality basketball team and winners of this year’s championship, have a very nice shirt. The Celtics, a “quality” basketball team and, well, not the winners of the year’s championship have a shirt as well. But you won’t see a Celtics shirt on Mr. Mark Fernandes, despite the fact that a Celtics shirt would be his preference.

Mark, a Boston native and fan, but a Los Angeles resident, made a bet with co-worker Kyle Wang. Lake-show wins, Mark wears their jersey. Celts win, Kyle wears their jersey. Kyle did not wear a jersey …

HOK Florida has been in the spotlight lately and earning free publicity for some notable projects.  
American Style magazine – billed as the “nation’s premier magazine for art, collectors, and cultural travelers” - named St. Petersburg as the top arts destination in the country, out of all mid-sized cities. The magazine cited the new wing at the Museum of Fine Arts and the under-construction Dali Museum.

In addition, AIA Florida has announced the 2010 Florida/Caribbean Honor & Design Award Winners. In the Design Awards category HOK received the Award of Excellence for the Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum. The firm will formally receive the award at the Honor & Design Awards Presentation and …

On-the-ground at World Expo 2010 Shanghai, HOK Global Director of Climate Action Stan Wrzeski is gearing up for the Monday workshop he will lead: Global Voice, Local Choices: Creating Low-Carbon Communities, in collaboration with the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). Here is an onsite report:

It’s my third day here, and my body is just starting to adjust to the time zone and high summer humidity. You wouldn’t think so, but the long lines of people entering the Shanghai Expo grounds are actually cooled by a water spray beneath the metal canopy. I suggested to Paul Woolford and Kelly …

So, I know this building has been up for a while, but it was the first time I got to experience it….and it was weird.  Partly cool, but mostly weird.  Which building, you ask?  Why the new(ish) San Francisco Federal Office Building designed by Morphosis/Thom Mayne.

Dedicated in July 2007, the building is the outcome of the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA)’s Design Excellence program. It’s an 18-story building located roughly where the Tenderloin, Union Square, and SOMA neighborhods come together….on some pretty seedy blocks!  Many props to GSA for building in a challenging neighborhood – but,  it’s certainly not a place I’d like to walk alone pretty much any time of …

The St. Louis Diversity Task Force concocted an exciting office-wide event blending elements from four popular games: The Amazing Race, Survivor, Lego and The Game of Life.

Designed to lower the barriers that separate practice neighborhoods, The Amazing HOKLife encouraged people to collaborate with members of other groups while promoting a deeper cohesiveness among the people and teams that form the HOK St. Louis community.

Armed with maps and instructions, 20 teams visited “neighborhoods” and gathered as many Lego pieces as possible to build the most creative structure to enter in a prestigious design competition (juried by HOK practice leaders, who are still deliberating…)

Congrats to our …

I’m always interested to find out what HOKers do in their spare time when they’re not in the office. There’s always a great travel story or a profile of an individual and their volunteer work, and it’s great to find out what makes everyone tick in the HOK community. As I’ve been quite busy in my time away from the office lately, I wanted to share a little of what I’ve been up to when I’m not helping out our sustainable design practice in San Francisco.

Always been fascinated with images that capture a moment. When you see something that catches your eye, you may not even understand why, …

I’ve just finished a charrette for a master plan project in Southern California in which our LA office is collaborating with Chris Fannin, Director of Planning from our St. Louis office. One of the great intro that Chris brought up that I thought worth sharing here was raising the question ‘What is the google image of our project?’

This has not been an option to look at architecture until few years ago when google maps go mobile, which was planned to run on any Java-based phone or mobile device with free navigation that will definitely have a major impact on the navigation industry. And this is even a bigger question for …

So one of the perks of working at HOK is that we get to see all kinds of cool spaces. Frequently we’re touring for the purposes of our own project (for example, when we went on a tour of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing as part of a pre-bid meeting); sometimes we get to tour completed HOK facilities.

This week, Walter Urbanek and Frank Etro of the DC office organized a fantastic field trip to the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum (NASM) – Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center near Washington Dulles International Airport.  HOK is currently doing construction administration on the second …

Tonight I’m heading down to Miami to check out the work on the headquarters we have designed for Bacardi USA. I’m excited to see how construction is wrapping up and hopefully I can post more about it soon!

The project however is not what this post is about. This post is about life in the airport. Usually I am depressed by the chains of restaurants and magazine shops scattered about, but tonight I’m having a blast at a place located on terminal B called ‘cafe intermezzo’. Of the 6 terminals at Hartsfield Jackson airport, I’m not sure that I’ve ever flown out of B, but from now on I’ll stop here in every flight out of town and have a beer …

Today is Earth Day and HOK offices everywhere are celebrating through participation in “Lights Out: Go Barefoot Day.”  Beginning at 10:00 am, and for four consecutive hours, we are working in the studio with the lights out! The Tampa office is located on the 18th floor of an office tower therefore we coordinated with building management to manually shut off our lights to work under natural light conditions.

Coincidentally, a few designers were able to attend a Lutron lunch and learn presentation on office daylighting and the integration of dimming and shading.  Juan Figueroa explained that 39% of energy use in an office is for lighting and shared this graph that illustrates how much it costs to generate ONE watt and …

Math nerds around the world celebrated a little known, but widely growing holiday called Pi Day.  The St. Louis Structures Group celebrated our 3rd Annual Pi Day on Monday, March 15.

This year’s events included two awards: 1 for the “Best In Show Pie”; 1 for the most recited digits of Pi.

Each recipient recieved a $30 gift card to Pi Pizzera in St. Louis courtesy of the Structures Group!

And the winners were:

Lemonade Pie by Jason Wandersee (of the Justice Group) (recipe below)!

111 digits (including the 3) – Yong Yu (of the Strurctures Group)(Erich Friesen from the Healthcare Group was a very …

Tampa residents have long awaited the re-opening of Curtis Hixon Waterfront Park which is situated between the new Tampa Museum of  Art and the overly manucured Kiley Garden (design by the renouned Dan Kiley and stripped of nearly all vegetation!). Curtis Hixon is the closest thing to a central park the city has and is hosting a number of events to keep the people coming  downtown on the weekends.  The city DOT was tasked with finding bike paths to the park, however a sign declaring park rules clearly prohibits bikes in the park and it is being enforced. Furthermore, the park  is connected to the Tampa Riverwalk which is a pedestrian thoroughfare that  allows bikes, but there are only 4 …

Karen (Kassabaum) Ivory, the youngest daughter of HOK co-founder George Kassabaum, recently came across an HOK YouTube video tribute to her father and sent us a nice note along with this fantastic snapshot of her dad wearing his HOK T-shirt and characteristic infectious smile. Thanks Karen!

There is so much that can be said about the Idiotarod that it just won’t fit in this space.  So, I’ve decided to give you the condensed version.  Here, you’ll have, the who, what, when, where, and why of the St. Louis Idiotarod! [--Video (my team 27 secs in) --]

IDIOTAROD: Idiotarod pays homage to the Alaskan tradition of the Iditarod (going on right now) in which dogs pull a sled and musher across the Iditarod Trail. Idiotarod is similar, except replace the dogs with people and the sled with a shopping cart, put it in a downtown city, and add a heavy dose of weirdness. [This sounds exactly like my kind of …

HOUSTON, TEXAS – The Green Workplace Booksigning Tour made its long awaited stop in the Lone Star State, after multiple stops in St. Louis, NY, WDC and Chicago. HOK along with Hines and Knoll sponsored the one night booksigning event which proved to be a lively yet intimate green evening. The event took place Wednesday, February 17, 2010, in the KNOLL showroom and in the lobby of the recently certified LEED Gold Williams Tower.

Leigh Stringer from Advance Strategies Washington DC, was the special guest to present findings and sign her book, The Green Workplace: Sustainable Strategies that Benefit Employees, the Environment and …

TED. That’s all that needs to be said. It’s been such a big part of my personal development over the last few years and it’s something that has grown to be so beloved for its accessible brilliance that it’s permeated even the most prominent of new sources today including all over CNN. (it’s about time “good” became mainstream)

Well a lesser known “baby TED” is home right here in my own backyard, and its called TEDx Atlanta. Some of you may have read my earlier posts about the September TEDx, interviews and more, and for others I hope you will read them soon. Even if you don’t really read …

It was recently announced that  the Salvador Dali Museum has received the Novum Design Excellence Award within the Specialty Clad Structure Category.

A design objective was to protect the most significant collection of Salvador Dali’s art while creating a new museum with iconic presence. The museum is currently under construction and has more than 900 triangular shaped pieces of glass that make up what is called “the Igloo” at about 45′ tall and “the Enigma”  which is more than 75″ tall.  Each piece of glass is different within the Novum structure that overlooks the water at the St. Petersburg, Florida site.

Meet John Wilganowski and Louie Vargas, IT super heroes. Their shirts say everything. The duo is half the IT team in Houston. They are our first line of defense when technology magically goes awry. Louie and John save the day.

These two enjoy making things work faster, better and more efficient for the office so everyone else can perform faster, better and more efficient. Also, they like to do fun stuff like coordinating their costumes. I just had to snap a picture of this “cute” moment.

They have helped and fixed my share of technical difficulties. Thanks. And from everyone who has needed an software update, deleted something on accident, crashed a computer, …

The Houston Chapter of the AIA recognized a legend in the architecture community for his contribution to, and uncompromising support of, the profession. Of course, I am writing about William M. Pena, FAIA, known to many of us here in Houston as just ‘Willie.’ Willie defined the practice of architectural programming, co-authoring four books on the topic. The process of problem seeking evolved over many years and involved many architects working with clients to reach programming decisions that support good design. The passing of years has not affected the process – it still holds fast. The tools have improved, thanks to technology, but the fundamental principals have remained …

Last Friday, the Tampa Bay AIA held its annual holiday party and Gallery AIA exhibition showcasing the Annual Thumbnail (napkin) Sketch juried competition. For those that don’t know, a “napkin sketch” is a thought or idea that is graphically communicated onto a physical napkin.

The competition displayed napkins that captured a great moment or idea on the fly, a cool diagram, or a mini manifesto, all hung on the wall for the jury to choose their favorites.  A few of us here in the studio happily shared in the competition, and our very own Tommy Sinclair won honorable mention!

Tommy’s concept:

Inspiration for the napkin sketch comes from the idea that the holidays always …

Recently, HOK Tampa employees Jillian Schultz and Kelly Betts completed the Women’s Running Magazine Half Marathon in downtown St. Petersburg.  Sarah Freeman highlights their efforts in the form of an interview. A first for both, Sarah gave their feet a day to recover and then asked Jillian and Kelly about their experience.

SF: How long have you been running?

KB: 13 years.

JS: I have been a 1 or 2 mile runner on and off for a few years. 

SF: What made you get started? 

KB: Training with the crew/rowing team in high school pushed me to start running for training purposes.  I started entering races about 5 years ago.

JS: My real efforts began when …

Just this week The Williams Tower property management decided to strategically block out the windows on one face of the building from the inside allowing the interior light shine through at night. The result is above, the building spelled out the word T E X A N S. The effort was created to show support for the NFL’s Houston Texans playing on a rare Monday Night Football. Each letter ended up about 65 feet tall and 35 feet wide.  

The Williams Tower, formerly known as the Transco Tower, is a 64 story tall skyscraper landmark in the Houston Galleria area which houses the HOK Houston offices, topped off with a revolving spotlight at the top. The …

Many of us have had the experience of living in either a dorm room or a studio apartment (or both) – but these are typically short-term living solutions.  What if you lived somewhere tiny full time?  And by tiny, I mean really tiny!  Like two times the size of my desk (plus circulation) tiny.

Check out Michael Wolf’s photography of 100 residences of 100 SF each in Hong Kong: 100X100.  Who are you?  The minimalist?   The pack rat?

Ah, the joy of an escalator commute!  No stop lights, no traffic, I don’t even have to wait in line to swipe my transit card. My commute to work in Hong Kong begins with walking a little less than a ¼ mile before hopping on the Central – Mid Levels Escalator.

The escalator is 2,600 ft (800m) long with a vertical climb of 440 ft (135m). According to Guinness World Records, the twenty escalators and three moving sidewalks combine to form the longest covered escalator system in the world. The escalator runs downhill until 10 am and then uphill until midnight. (An important fact if you …

So I went to Storm King Art Center over the weekend because it was a beautiful 68 degree day in November and my friend had access to a car for the weekend with free gas.  Storm King is a 500 acre sculpture park about an hour outside NYC in Mountainville, New York.  They have works from many famous sculptors including Alexander Calder, Richard Serra, Andy Goldsworthy, Isamu Noguchi and a new installation from Maya Lin.  There was also a piece from Roy Lichtenstein.  I just thought I’d share a few pictures I took of this awesome place.

As simple as the …