Mission College Learning Resource Center

Tilt-Up allowed for the creation of the 38,500-square-foot Mission College Learning Resource Center (LRC) in Santa Clara, Calif. in only 420 days.

The Best in Class winner in the Education category, it was important that the LRC -- a digital-era information bank and an important point of campus interaction – complement the existing cast-in-place structures on campus.

Flexibility and visibility required a large, uninterrupted floor area, well-suited to Tilt-Up construction. Architecturally, the design team choose to embrace the Tilt-Up wall panel system as a genuinely interesting and environmnetally-sound material. Such a unique design approach resulted in the empowerment of interlocked joints (particularly the “log cabin” corner condition), interrupted profiles (at 25-feet, panel sizes are about the width of an urban lot, emphasizing the dimension by openings at the parapet, as well as joints introduced at appropriate scale and proportion without artifice), and illuminated connections (frosted glass panels are installed at panel joints).

A formliner was used to provide a strong graphic rhythm, while integral colored concrete matches the existing poured-in-place concrete structures on campus. Further, metal sunscreens and canopies provide daylight control and passive cooling.