Kaiser Bellflower Medical Office
Best Decorative Glass Application
Nominating company: Aragon Construction Inc.
Location: Bellflower, CaliforniaWinning team
- Contract glazier: Aragon Construction
- Glass fabricator: Glasswerks
- Glass manufacturer: Vitro Architectural Glass
- Metal system manufacturer: Kawneer
- Architect: The SLAM Collaborative
- General contractor: Turner Construction Co.
- Glass artwork design: EGG Office
- Photo credit: Tom Bonner Photography
Kaiser Permanente, a national health care provider, recently opened a 33,000-square-foot radiation oncology center in Bellflower, California. This all-electric, LEED Gold outpatient facility boasts a unique, decorative façade featuring a tree foliage design that welcomes visitors, patients and employees. The fritted glass pattern design was inspired by the local “Belle-fleur” apple tree, grounding the building in local context.
The glass artwork pattern was created through digitally printed ceramic frit custom patterns, insulated into low-emissivity insulating glass units to create the pattern across the segmented radius of a unitized curtain wall enclosure. The glazing system featured the use of four-sided structural silicone butt joints to minimize any interruptions to the artwork.
“This building design offers a unique visual presence in both natural daylight and when backlit at night,” says Glass Magazine Awards judge Tara Brummet. “This structure stands out with the innovative use of the printed glass.”
This project incorporated many unique glazing features aimed at delivering a wholly beautiful decorative façade, say officials. The four-sided structural silicone glazing butt joints were chosen to allow the expression of the artwork right up to the edge of the outboard lite. To maintain the four-sided SSG butt-joint appearance, a unitized curtain wall system was required due to the seismic zoning of the project location. Immense coordination was also required to ensure the hundreds of custom art files were fit to each glass size to ensure perfect alignment across the mural façade.
