http://www.vimeo.com/11993807
I am so excited to share this video fresh from our latest and greatest PechaKucha Night in STL a few weeks ago.  HOK’s very own Tim Gaidis was one of the biggest highlights of the night with his 20 x 20 presentation revealing the big paradigm shift in his life as a designer.  As you might imagine from the title, this had a lot to do with our alliance with the Biomimicry Guild. 

We had 12 other wonderful presentations at PK Night, some of which you can find here.  In addition to some great photography here, we also had the wonderful surprise of a sketch artist in our midst who captured another lively presentation and posted on his blog, here.  …

St. Louis Sustainable Practice Leader Tim Gaidis seems to have confused Bike to Work Day with Bike AT Work Day. Here he is trailing Brok Howard, who just joined the Interiors group and clearly is a conscientious bell-ringer, on a tour around the office. Not visible in the video is Sustainable Design Specialist Mary Ostafi, who was holding onto Tim’s wheel and gliding in his slipstream. No HOKers were harmed in the making of this film.

Kim Passmore, Seth Teel, Eric Schneider (RCGA), Jim Alexander (RCGA), Mark Rosen, Tim Gaidis and obviously not Photoshopped Abdel Ferhi

…

This is a report on the zero emissions building design charrette that took place on September 17. HOK and The Weidt Group participants in San Francisco, Toronto, St. Louis, Berkeley, Calif., and Minneapolis saved carbon emissions from air travel by using Cisco Telepresence Technology, Polyvision THUNDER Express, WebEx and HOK’s Advanced Collaboration Rooms to meet virtually.

The team designing the a zero carbon emissions office building has made lots of progress since my last ZEB post. With the final meeting fast-approaching and an affordable carbon-free solution on the horizon, it’s time to crank out some posts to catch you up on what they’ve been up to.

Finally, a Focus on the Building …

This is a report on the zero emissions building virtual design charrette that took place in HOK’s Advanced Collaboration Rooms in San Francisco, Toronto and St. Louis on 13 August 2009.

This virtual meeting’s participants included Bill Valentine, Tim Gaidis, Tyler Meyr, Gerry Faubert and Jeff Sanner of HOK along with Prasad Vaidya of The Weidt Group. Ideas were flying, and the electronic flipcharts received a heavy workout. Here’s a summary of the outcomes.

Bar Length, Alignment and Core Configuration

Previous energy efficiency and generation models had demonstrated that it would be tough to meet the zero emissions goal if the total building area surpassed about 180,000 square feet. “If we need to increase …

This is a report on the zero emissions building virtual design charrette that took place in HOK’s Advanced Collaboration Rooms in San Francisco, Toronto and St. Louis on 31 July 2009. Lots of video clips at the end!

This meeting began with a restating of the goal of designing a zero emissions building design that will reduce the energy requirements for a traditional St. Louis office building of 150,000-200,000 square feet by 70-80 percent. They will use on-site renewable energy sources to get the rest of the way to zero emissions.

Because energy conservation typically costs less than energy generation, the team is using off-the-shelf technologies to design a building that consumes 17-18 KTBUs …

The second zero emissions building design charrette took place July 23 in The Weidt Group’s naturally daylit offices in a Minneapolis suburb. The brainstorm team included five designers from each firm, with combined expertise in energy and daylighting modeling, architecture, engineering and integrated design. Click here to see the agenda.

The team began by restating its goal: To design a 150,000-200,000-square-foot, high-end speculative office building in St. Louis that is a zero emissions building (ZEB). The group also wants to document a process that could potentially change the way they design buildings.

HOK Sustainable Design Director Mary Ann Lazarus clarified the team’s definition of a zero emissions building: …

We’re going to keep documenting the efforts of the zero emissions office building design team on this blog. You’ll find out along with the team whether they can meet their ambitious goal of creating a zero emissions design for a typical St. Louis office building.

Yesterday a group of HOK designers from St. Louis, Chicago and Toronto converged in Minneapolis to meet with our project partners from The Weidt Group, who are providing energy and daylight modeling for the effort. It was an amazing, eye-opening day, and we’ll have a full report next week.

Until then, here’s HOK Sustainable Design Practice Leader Tim Gaidis doing a couple of “Before” and “After” stand-ups at the airport in Minneapolis.

7:30 AM: Minutes After Arriving in …

They may not look like what you would first imagine. 

They may not look like anything TV makes them out to be. 

But they are . . .

the St. Louis HOK Biker Gang!
 
  

[It may be necessary to say "the St. Louis HOK Biker Gang!" in your best dramatic theatrical voice over; go ahead, try it again, I'll wait]

[l-r: Seth Teel, Jason Kerensky, Paul Wilhelms, Derek Prior, Brett Kostial, Tim Gaidis]

[l-r: Jon Cohen, JoAnn Brookes, Bruce Brunner, Derek Prior, Seth Teel,
Brett Kostial, Matt Snelling, Jason Kerensky, Tim Gaidis, Mark Rosen,
Paul Wilhelms, Steven Crang,

…

I know. I promised to try and frequently blog and post pictures from Greenbuild. I failed. Not for lack of effort. More like lack of time. Maybe next year.

As I look back on this trip, the most amazing thing about this event is the people – a people inspired by change. Everyone is cordial, welcoming and friendly. Everyone’s looking for answers to the growing questions surrounding sustainable design. Many answers are provided.

With my first trip to Greenbuild in the books, I’d like to walk you through it from my perspective as an exhibitor and not an attendee.

Monday, November 17, 2008
6:20 am – Flight leaves for Boston via DC. Much coffee needed.
11:15 am – Flight lands in Boston. Tim Gaidis and …

If you’ve worked at HOK for awhile or for a little, you are probably aware of our focus on sustainability in both our projects and practices. On Thursday, October 23, the outside world recognized our achievements as a firm once again. Several HOKers were present at the St. Louis Business Journal’s Heroes of the Planet Awards ceremony, where we were declared the winner in the Sustainable Employee Programs category. Here’s a link to a brief snippet about it (sorry, have to be a subsciber for the whole thing). Mary Ann Lazarus, firmwide Sustainable Design Director, and Tim Gaidis, Sustainable Champion in St. Louis, were on hand to receive the award. …