Chevron/Texaco

Chevron’s pending merger with Texaco made the timing of the move into their new 145,300-square-foot headquarters building crucial to achieving successful integration of the employees into the new corporate culture of newly formed company. Tilt-Up was selected for its speed and lower per square foot cost compared to alternative methods.

Judges were impressed by the proejct’s progressive design, which included the large ground floor windows that are typically difficult to achieve in Tilt-Up construction, but were made possible by casting structural steel supports into the panels behind the window frames.

Keeping with the trend of a more open corporate environment, no employees, including administrators are enclosed in office spaces, but rather work in ergonomically designed workstations. Private conversations occur in a series of conference rooms situated along the spine of the building.

A series of horizontal reveals at the base of the building created by utilizing liner panels provide a textual “base.” Further, this same liner pattern was used at two corners of the building in conjunction with a curved metal roof to break up what would have otherwise been a very long façade. A section of the upper floor Tilt-Up wall was omitted to allow a glass wall to be installed between adjacent concrete panels to further break down the length of the building.

The exterior walls were designed as an exterior skin covering only and did not resist seismic forces. A series of interior braced steel frames that resist seismic forces serve as the structural system, which allowed the exterior wall to be purely decorative elements.