Award

Structural Engineers Associations Nationwide Award SOM Projects

Three chapters of the Structural Engineers Association—in Illinois (SEAOI), New York (SEAoNY) and Northern California (SEAONC)—presented SOM with awards that recognize outstanding achievement and innovation in structural engineering.

Structural Engineers Association of Illinois

At the SEAOI annual awards dinner on June 22nd, 2019, four SOM projects were announced winners. Glenstone Art Museum was named Best Project exceeding $150 Million. SOM structural engineers collaborated with Thomas Phifer and Partners, providing full structural engineering services for the new museum complex housing a modern art collection in Potomac, Maryland.

Manhattan Loft Gardens won Best Project among new buildings between $50 and $150 Million. The 42-story residential tower adds an arresting silhouette to London’s skyline with its sky gardens carved dramatically out of the building’s profile.

Sterling Bay’s first development at Lincoln Yards in Chicago, C.H. Robinson Midwest Headquarters, won an Award of Merit. SOM designed a central atrium that spans the height of the building and infuses the interiors with daylight, while aluminum sunshades control daylight light along the perimeter of the building.

Finally, SOM’s Kinematic Sculpture, a structural pavilion displayed in Mexico City at the exhibition “SOM: Arte + Ingeniería + Arquitectura” in the spring and early summer of 2019, also won an Award of Merit.

Structural Engineers Association of New York

During the SEAoNY awards ceremony on June 24th, 2019, SOM’s project for a major corporate headquarters in New York City was announced the winner in the category Forensic Analysis/Renovation/Retrofit and Rehabilitations of Structures. The project involved renovating and connecting two neighboring steel-framed buildings to create a unified headquarters building with a new atrium space and a lobby.

One Manhattan West, a 70-story office tower and part of the larger Manhattan West Development in New York City, was a finalist in the New Buildings category. The tower is located on a challenging site, rising above the underground train tracks approaching Pennsylvania Station. The design team turned this constraint into an opportunity by sloping in the perimeter columns to the core and creating a column-free lobby at the base of the supertall tower.

Structural Engineers Association of Northern California

SOM took home three Merit Awards at the SEAoNC annual award gala on May 7th, 2019. The new Superior Court of California in San Diego won a Merit Award in the New Construction category. SOM designed and engineered the 25-story courthouse to meet the Judicial Court of California’s enhanced seismic performance objectives.

The Dream Catcher, an installation at the Sunset La Cienega Hotel in West Hollywood created by artist Janet Echelman and engineered by SOM, won a Merit Award in the Special Use Structures category.

A final Merit Award in the Study/Research/Guidelines category went to Responsive Tendon Patterns, a new design methodology that addresses irregular support conditions. The proposed innovative design methodology enhances structural designers’ understanding of gravity framing through the employment of topology optimization.

Winners of the SEAoNC awards will proceed to the Structural Engineering Association of California’s statewide competition.