Piano in the park

Italian “starchitect” Renzo Piano is partnering with San Francisco’s Chong Partners Architecture to compose a new score of architectural jazz in Golden Gate Park.

Designers and engineers behind the California Academy of Sciences redevelopment are aiming for LEED Platinum certification from the U.S. Green Building Council [see “Green building by the Bay,” SI, May 2005]. It’s an unprecedented goal for a world-class museum incorporating a “living rainforest,” a 225,000-gallon exhibit of a Philippine coral reef and thousands of science exhibit specimens.

Design features for the new structure include ample natural lighting and ventilation, nontoxic building materials, on-site solar power generation and a 66 percent-grade eco-roof providing native habitat for butterflies, hummingbirds and increasingly elusive honeybees. Energy-efficiency technologies could reduce energy consumption to 50 percent less than prescribed by California building codes.

The roughly $500 million project, financed through a combination of public and private funds, is scheduled for completion in 2008. Museum leaders say the project isn’t costing more than a comparable world-class museum. They expect huge returns, however.

More info:
www.calacademy.org/ newacademy/index.php

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Above California Academy of Sciences’ historic structure in Golden Gate Park is kept intact while new additions increase the facility’s size from 375,000 square feet to 410,000 square feet. (During construction, the museum is being housed south of Market Street near the Moscone Center.)



The Morrison Planetarium (left) will display a digital view of the earth on its exterior, encircled by a canal of running water. And the structure of a massive aquarium (above) will hold saltwater pumped into the academy from the nearby Pacific Ocean to support three ecosystems of different salinity for tropical fish.

Design
Renzo Piano Building Workshop,
Chong Partners Architecture

General contractor
Webcor Builders

Engineering and sustainability consulting
Arup