Tenant Build-Out

Press House Warehouse is a new mixed-use complex located in Northeast, Washington, DC and surrounded by several urban amenity-rich neighborhoods such as Union Market, NOMA, and Shaw.  The 462,511 sf building features the historic retrofit and renovation of the existing building at 301 N Street, NE, a warehouse designed in 1931 for the National Capital Press.  The historic press building is a three-story building consisting of two levels of conventionally reinforced, two-way concrete slabs, with the roof comprising of a series of steel monitor trusses spanning between girders supported on built-up steel columns.  

The repurposed building is also used for office and ground level retail, while rental units were added between two new high-rise structures over two levels of below-grade parking.  Hickok Cole Architects currently occupy office space at the 2nd and 3rd floors of the newly renovated historic building.  SK&A served as the engineer of record for their office fit-out, which included cutting an additional large opening for an interconnecting stair.   

The Watergate EIG Tenant Fit-Out project involved fitting out levels 11 and 12 of the Watergate office building located at 600 New Hampshire Avenue, NW for EIG Global Energy Partners.  Structurally, SK&A was specifically tasked with creating three new openings in the existing 12th floor post-tensioned slab as well as designing two new inter-connecting stairs.  

The stairs were called the “Patricia” and “Ricardo” internally by the design team, named after the Nixon couple associated with the infamous Watergate scandal.  The Patricia is a single center stringer stair that is wider at the bottom and top than it is in the middle and finished with terrazzo treads.  The Ricardo was the more unique and challenging of the two stairs, using a ½” curved steel plate for the stringer on each side.

Architecturally, the team had very specific aesthetic expressions for each staircase, as can be seen by the specific naming of each, and SK&A met the challenge to ensure that the architectural vision was fully realized.

Major renovation and retrofit of the former Department of Transportation headquarters into a Class “A”, LEED Gold office building that exceeds GSA’s current Federal Office Building Standards and meets ISC Security Design Criteria.  Access to the subway is provided through the L’Enfant Plaza station, at D Street, SW.  The existing building was gutted down to its structure, which was salvaged and completely renovated to include replacement of the building façade and reconstruction of all service cores.

Amenity spaces were designed with a basic 30-ft. column grid to align with existing column spacing, with long-span designs considered for future tenant options.  Enhanced physical security measures exceed ISC Level IV, and include progressive collapse mitigation and blast-resistant building envelope, anti-ram barriers along the building perimeter, blast-resistant loading facilities, and common security checkpoints.

The modernized building boasts sweeping views of the city, a fitness facility, 400-seat cafeteria, and a major conference center.  The facility received Mid-Atlantic Construction’s 2010 Project of the Year Award in Renovation/Restoration.

SK&A also provided structural steel inspection; weld testing using ultrasonics for welds of the column steel jackets during construction; laboratory testing of concrete cylinders, mortar and grout tests, sprayed fireproofing testing and engineering supervision.

Selected as one of the most sustainable buildings in the world in the book, "The World's Greenest Buildings: Promise Versus Performance in Sustainable Design," the second office building at Tower Oaks, developed by the Tower Companies and Lerner Enterprises as their corporate headquarters, is a nine-story, Class "A" office building (200,000 sf) with four levels of below-grade parking for 550 cars (242,000 sf).

Located off of I-270, the building integrates “Vedic” architecture, which is based on specific design principles that promote the health of its occupants and enhance the building’s performance.  Building amenities include a light-filled lobby, state-of-the-art fitness center, and a sustainable 43,000 sf landscaped/hardscaped plaza with a garden terrace and serenity pools.

The project has earned numerous awards and has the distinction of being designated the first LEED Platinum building in the Washington Metropolitan region.  SK&A also performed tenant build-out services for several other corporate office spaces within the building.

This massive, mixed-use complex encompasses 5.9 million square feet of commercial, residential, and retail construction in 10 high-rise buildings with structured parking for 12,000 cars. The privately-developed project accesses the Tysons Corner Metro-rail station via an elevated pedestrian bridge. Specific buildings within the development’s larger master plan include:

• Tysons II Office Building F, PricewaterhouseCoopers Offices: Located at 1800 Tysons Boulevard, this world-class 320,000 sf, 15-story office tower was awarded the NAIOP 2005 Award of Merit for Best High-Rise Building.  The tower is dramatically elevated on five foot deep cantilever girders, supported on stainless steel bearings atop elongated columns.  Other dramatic structural features include a 36-foot long cantilevered restaurant that "floats" above the landscaped courtyard below, as well as folded concrete plate features at the roof and lower canopy levels.  A separate 275,000 sf, nine-story pre-cast concrete parking structure for 840 cars connects to Building E’s existing parking structure via elevated bridges.
• Tysons II Office Building H: The latest installation for the Corporate Office Centre is a 17-story, 476,000 sf office building eaturing a two-story, light-filled lobby and retail center with an iconic staircase and dramatic water feature, as well as other amenities, such as a conference center, fitness center, and café. The building’s 15 floors of office space sit above the two-story glass-enclosed lobby and retail center.  The third floor, directly above the podium, is cut back to the inner column line creating a strong reveal in the building’s form and providing a large external terrace for tenants.  The scheme also incorporates a pre-cast concrete garage on 11-levels for 1,185 cars as well as a 450-foot long enclosed pedestrian sky bridge that skewers through the building lobby and connects an existing parking garage across Tysons Boulevard to the new parking structure.

Mixed-use residential/commercial complex, consisting of two office buildings, two residential buildings, street level retail space, and underground parking for 1,988 cars, located at Wilson Boulevard and Quincy Street.

One Liberty Center is a 13-story, 316,000 sf office building and is 100% leased to federal government tenants.  The building is designed to meet GSA ATFP standards and is Energy Star Certified.  The Two Liberty Center office building is a nine-story, 177,000 sf office building featuring two-way post-tensioned flat plate construction with a column-free floor plan.

The development’s high-rise residential components are a 21-story apartment building (280,000 sf) with 11,000 sf of retail, and a 20-story (290,600 sf) condominium building with 9,000 sf street-level retail.  An impressive landscaped/hardscaped plaza serves the entire complex.  The entire development is served by five levels of below-grade parking totaling 750,000 sf.

Transformation of an existing 10-story office building, originally built in 1975, into a Class “A” structure.  The modernization of the base building  included: the replacement of the former facade with a modern, metal, and glass curtain-wall system; removal of all previous interior improvements; the systemic upgrade of the mechanical, electrical, plumbing (MEP), and life safety systems; modification of the service core and the addition of a new entry and entry canopy.  The base building received the 2008 NAIOP Award of Excellence, Best Urban Renovation award.

In addition to the base building modernization, SK&A also provided various tenant build-out services, including structural design services for the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) Headquarters.  The two-story, 75,000 sf build-out for USGBC was designed to achieve a platinum rating under the LEED-C1 Version 3.0 system.  The project received the Best of 2009 Project of the Year for Interior Design/Tenant Improvement from Mid-Atlantic Construction.