by Emily Nemens
The Clinton Climate Initiative’s Arah Schuur with Center for Architecture Foundation’s Jaime Endreny in the restored lobby of the Empire State Building. The Clinton Climate Initiative was the recipient of the 2010 Center for Architecture Foundation Award.
Emily Nemens
Frank Prial, AIA, of Beyer Blinder Belle Architects & Planners, looked the world over for the perfect marble to restore the lobby. He found half the marble in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, and the other pieces in Italy.
Emily Nemens
The team built an in-house windows workshop to glaze the 20-year-old windows in the building. Inserting a film between the two panes of the windows achieved a similar efficiency to creating triple-pane windows. After glazing thousands of windows, the workshop was being disassembled on the day of the tour.
Emily Nemens
Skanska uses their USA Flagship office as a model for clients to encourage more green building. They anticipate a payback on their retrofit after five years of their 15-year lease. All of their employees have views from their desks.
Emily Nemens
As tourists queue up to head to the observation deck, they pass a number of informational panels on energy conservation in buildings. The Empire State Building hopes to reduce their energy use by 38%.
Emily Nemens
Paul Rode, of Johnson Controls, took the tour to the chiller room, the water pump, and the steam room. The pump behind him sends water to the building’s highest floors.
Emily Nemens