Institutional

Best of Year 2009 Winner: WOHA

Best of Year -- Interior Design, 12/1/2009 12:00:00 AM

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Best of Year > 2009 > Project Design > Institutional

Best of Year Winner, Institutional: WOHA: Genexis Theatre, Singapore

At this theater, WOHA directors Wong Mun Summ and Richard Hassell worked with acoustical input from Arup to integrate art and technology—the overall mission of the mixed-use complex of which this 27,500-square-foot space is a part. Among the immediate problems to overcome was the lack of height for a fly tower, needed for a traditional proscenium configuration; instead, a retractable seating unit and multiple rigging and lighting options lend themselves to experimental stagings as well as to lectures and private events. To improve acoustics, 400,000 wooden beads handmade in Java were mounted on panels; the beads scatter sound waves while concealing acoustical foam behind. Drama in the front-of-house comes courtesy of the plywood ribs that ripple across the walls and ceiling. Angular seating, in plywood and vinyl, plays a supporting role.

WONG MUN SUMM; SCHIRIN TARAZ-BREINHOLT: PROJECT TEAM.

Best of Year Merit Awards, Institutional

AC Martin: Leo J. Trombatore State Office Building, Marysville, CA
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The four-story atrium's conference room of Douglas fir slats stands in the middle of recycled-nylon carpet tile that abstracts an aerial view of the surrounding Sacramento Valley.

Butler Rogers Baskett Architects: Trinity School - Johnson Chapel, New York, NY

Johnson Chapel encourages Episcopalian spirituality via a minimalist aesthetic, with a single skylight in the floating ceiling and a blackened-steel cross rising from a bed of river rocks.

Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP: The Cathedral of Christ the Light, Oakland, CA
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Sunshine streams past louvers of Douglas fir and tri-angles of anodized aluminum or through tiny holes laser-cut into aluminum panels to produce a 12th-century image of Christ.