TEMPE, Ariz.—A major construction milestone was achieved recently with the topping out on the new $192 million Interdisciplinary Science and Technology Building 7 (ISTB7) project at Arizona State University (ASU) in Tempe.

The new five-story, high-performance research facility spans approximately 280,000 square feet and will foster an interdisciplinary approach to knowledge generation and leading-edge research, including innovative endeavors focusing on the sustainability of food, water, and energy. In expanding the research district at ASU’s Tempe campus, the building will give researchers a means to collaborate on pressing environmental and food challenges.

Slated for completion in December 2021, McCarthy Building Companies is the general contractor on this impressive project. Grimshaw Architects and Tempe-based Architekton are the architects.

The ISTB7 building is the latest among dozens of Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) projects on campus and is by far the most ambitious, pursuing LEED Platinum status. The flagship building for ASU’s School of Sustainability is using a range of innovative approaches, including concrete admixtures and the void form structural deck system known as BubbleDeck, that foster sustainability as well as evapotranspiration, photovoltaics, and ASU’s own carbon-capture technology.

“The ISTB7 construction project is proof positive that regardless of the challenges or difficulties, strong teamwork and commitment to success can overcome any obstacle,” said Bruce Nevel, vice president for Facilities Development and Management at ASU, in a statement.

“The ISTB7 project team has overcome unforeseen site conditions, unprecedented industry conditions all during a pandemic and yet has persevered to become a role model project—on schedule, on budget and outstanding quality—on our way to providing the most advanced and state-of-the-art research facility at ASU.”

Added Bryan Kuster, senior vice president of McCarthy Building Companies’ Southwest Region Education Building Group, in a statement.

“As a gateway to the Tempe campus, this represents a legacy project for our team and we are proud to continue our involvement with ASU on a complex that will connect the science and innovation districts on campus. Our laboratory construction team is working with the university and project partners to attain the highest sustainability goals utilizing innovative materials, processes and technology.”

Materials on the building incorporate ASU’s own cutting-edge scientific research on integrated carbon-capture technology. Methods to save and produce energy that will be utilized include air currents, evapotranspiration, and photovoltaics. The complex will also treat and recycle sewage for use as greywater using low-energy, bio-based systems.

“This was an incredible opportunity to celebrate the historic nature of the site while creating a project that leverages both the interior and exterior spaces to support and promote ASU’s innovative research,” said Rachel Green Rasmussen, AIA, with Architekton, in a statement.

“The team’s goal was to design a project that roots itself in our evolutionary past while creating a living lab for our sustainable future.”

ISTB7 will also be home to the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory, the Rob and Melani Walton Sustainability Solutions Service, the School of Sustainability, the Institute of Human Origins, and a five-story atrium biome of flora and fauna.

The facility will contain wet and dry lab space, a conference and education center with a 389-seat presentation hall, university classrooms, and faculty and staff offices. Dry lab space may include computing, cyber-security, engineering design and fabrication, and robotics. ISTB7 will also have research labs for biological sciences, engineering, life sciences and sustainability.

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PHOENIX—In partnership with Arizona State University (ASU), established architecture, and planning firm Studio Ma has announced the groundbreaking of the new ASU Downtown Phoenix Residence Hall and Entrepreneurial Center, a 16-floor residential tower with academic and interdisciplinary facilities. The innovation hub’s unique design expands community living space for up to 530 students and assists visiting professionals to connect organically with the city and regional business community through large windows and an urban paseo.

The new, 284,000-square-foot building also creates a resource platform supporting creative ventures among students, faculty, and alumni with local artists, businesses, and government agencies.

Studio Ma earned the commission through a highly competitive process led by Capstone Development Partners, a national leader in student housing development and management. Studio Ma was recognized and selected for its “committed leadership, familiarity with the university and market, and ability to push the envelope on design and sustainability while maintaining all budget and performance parameters.” Rounding out the project team is DPR Construction, another longtime partner of Arizona State University, as the design-build provider.

Drawing on deep experience with diverse institutions, including Cranbrook, Princeton, and Washington University in St. Louis, Studio Ma’s work presents students and faculty with a new way of working in the arts and design. Scheduled to open in the fall of 2021, the transformative downtown complex will set the stage for the university to cultivate new entrepreneurship research.

Employing an innovative design concept that brings academic space and student housing under one roof, the team envisaged a 16-story innovation hub concept consisting of 13 floors of student housing above three levels of academic space. The innovation hub will be wrapped in a bioclimatic façade designed to minimize energy use and glare from the desert sun, conceived with simulation software that Studio Ma is beta-testing in partnership with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The angular façade in ultra-high-performance concrete and metal panels and floor-to-ceiling windows—materials also used for the residential tower exteriors establishes a striking and memorable icon for the city.

Yet the ASU Downtown Phoenix Residence Hall is more than a multi-purpose facility. The team also met challenging zoning and infill site conditions with an innovative massing and layout that offers a valuable east-west pedestrian paseo connecting the community to the new complex.

In addition to helping the university meet a minimum green-building rating level of LEED Silver, the new building optimizes indoor environmental quality in all spaces including high-tech fabrication rooms and studio areas where sensitive materials and equipment are used. Geared toward such academic programs as industrial design, fashion and popular music, the innovation hub consolidates a range of entrepreneurial and community-focused programs from across ASU’s Herberger Institute of Design & the Arts. Entrepreneurial center facilities include a mix of studios, classrooms, offices, exhibition and event spaces, as well as fabrication and workshop areas with specialized equipment and environmental systems.

The work promises to make Phoenix among the first U.S. cities with a university activated downtown space dedicated to collaboration across creative fields, organizations and market sectors, according to the project team. “The Studio Ma team rolled up their sleeves along with our design-build partners to create an innovative and sustainable building design, that involved multiple constituents and stakeholders, while optimizing the project budget and being steadfast in maintaining the schedule, despite evolving project and program requirements,” says William Davis, executive vice president of Capstone Development Partners, the public-private partnership (P3) developer.

Other recent works by Studio Ma for Arizona State University have included the award-winning conceptual design for ISTB-7, the 258,000-square-foot, interdisciplinary science and research complex designed as a triple-net-zero facility and lauded as “a new generation of sustainable design solutions that are climate responsive and employ regenerative technologies.” The architecture firm has also led Arizona State University’s designs for various major campus transformations, including their Sun Devil Fitness Complex and the acclaimed Memorial Union Plaza student complex.

The groundbreaking for ASU Downtown Phoenix Residence Hall and Entrepreneurial Center also heralds the arrival of next-generation sustainable construction on university campuses, showcasing Studio Ma’s capacity to design for a greener, more resilient future. The result is a thriving hub of enterprise at Arizona State University and an environmentally attuned showplace for students, the local creative economy, and entrepreneur development.

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“The stadium reconstruction will redefine stadiums, providing ASU with more and higher-quality amenities to improve the fan and team experience,” said Ryan Abbott, senior vice president and southwest district manager for Sundt Construction Inc.

A major part of the project was completed in Phase II, which focused on the west and north sides of the stadium. It created two new concourses, new concessions and restrooms, and three new premium club or suite areas. It also included the beginning work at the north end of the stadium that involved building a kitchen, operation center, loading area and back-of-house operations area. Gould Evans Associates, with offices in Phoenix, designed the $64 million facility.

“This project has not only improved the fan experience, but elevated an aging 58-year-old stadium to the most technologically advanced stadium in college football, featuring a state-of-the-art Distributed Antenna System (DAS) and Wi-Fi network,” Abbott said. “Once construction on the last phase is complete, the university will be able to use the stadium as a multipurpose entertainment hub.”

The stadium was originally constructed in 1958 with approximately 30,000 seats, then renovated in 1977 to hold 70,311 seats and then again in 1988 to hold 72,011 seats. While these expansions enhanced the stadium’s capacity, they posed a challenge for the project team working on the latest renovation.

“These renovations brought with them varying levels of infrastructure upgrades structural designs that stitched components together and isolated others,” Abbott said. “We’ve had to be diligent in discovery, an integrated input into the design.”

The Stadium was built between two mountains and the Salt River bed, which means any work on the bowl had to be completed from the field side and the narrow fire lane on the west (under the upper bowl), according to Abbott. The north end of the stadium is now constructed on engineered fill where the Salt River had eroded native soil when Hayden Butte diverted its flow.

The construction team is currently in Phase II-a, which will involve completing the north end zone with more new seating as well as the Sun Deck Terrace and a new Student Athlete Facility. Last year, Hunt-Sundt completed the first phase of the project, which included infrastructure work and rebuilding the south end zone, while Phase III will include focusing on the east side of the stadium to create a new main and upper concourse and a new east sideline club.

“The construction phases had to be threaded in between football seasons,” Abbott said. “The [project] team had to construct the equivalent of two average Arizona homes for 265 days straight to arrive at game day. We’ve had to develop new and varied ways of aggregating long lead materials, [managing] an immense workforce and being agile enough to accommodate better ideas in production.”

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