Best University Building
Description
TAMU College of Dentistry building for Texas A&M University Health Science Center in Dallas is a nine-story, 304,000 square-foot education facility. The building is clad in architectural precast, limestone, metal panels, and glass. There are 269 pieces of architectural precast concrete on the building providing over 31,444 square-feet of skin area.
Key design features
The architectural precast consisted of two different mixed designs. One of which utilized three different finishes, as well as a ribbed texture. The precast was colored to complement the natural limestone veneer. The lower levels of the building consist of parking with architectural spandrels acting as vehicular barriers. These barrier spandrels utilized multiple finishes of one mix design in a seemingly random pattern to add vibrancy and texture to the façade. The upper levels consist of a more traditional, uniform color and finish to complement the limestone features. Spandrels at each floor level are tied together with vertical filler panels that are offset from one another at each level to further refine the scale and visual presence of the
building.Precast concrete components
Due to a tight site with an adjacent building already in place the only option was to erect the precast using a tower crane. This necessitated close coordination and detailing to ensure panels were sized within the crane’s capacity and could be installed as efficiently as possible. Ultimately the panels were set overnight to allow the crane to be used for other trades during normal working hours.
- Precast Manufacturer – Coreslab Structures (TX) Inc – Cedar Park, TX
- Engineer of Record – JQ Infrastructure, LLC – Dallas, TX
- Structure Owner – TAMU Health Science Center Facilities– Dallas, TX
- General Contractor – Vaughn Construction – Irving, TX
- Architect – Brown Reynolds Watford Architects – Dallas, TX
