Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta

April 7, 2008

   However, fitting that building into a campus with facilities dating back almost 100 years, rich with Georgia marble, didn’t necessarily dictate a modern look – especially when the new structure would appear between two buildings from 1917.
   The solution: Construct an edifice with up-to-date labs and classrooms on the inside, with an updated façade of the same Georgia marbles.

"A HUGE PROJECT”
   University architect Jen Fabrick says it’s not even fair to refer to the building as the new School of Medicine building, since the university never really had a true School of Medicine structure.
   “We’ve had a School of Medicine for more than 150 years, but it always existed in many different places,” she says. “It encompassed as many as five or six different buildings.
   “Lab classrooms were in one building and auditorium classrooms were in another building and the basement level of one building was home for administrative staff and student lockers. That’s why this was such a huge project for us.”
   Fabrick, whose job involves campus planning for everything from buildings to landscaping to donations of art, says the trustees began looking at different options for a new building at the start of this decade. Initially, another area of the campus was considered.
   “The other site we were considering became unfavorable politically, and everyone agreed the existing building (where the new building now stands) was dated and dysfunctional,” she explains. “That allowed the School of Medicine to say, ‘Let’s use this site and take this ugly old building down.’ It was definitely the right way to do it.”
   Joseph League, the Atlanta-based principal of the Glastonbury, Conn.-based SLAM Collaborative, says the previous building on the site had been constructed in the 1970s, and was “architecturally inappropriate to the campus and inadequate for its use.”
   Both Fabrick and League explain that SLAM Collaborative was chosen to design the new School of Medicine building following the university’s normal process of starting with a long list of applicants, reducing that to a short list, and then doing interviews.
   “They had designed the renovation and addition to the Candler Library prior to this and other university projects before getting this commission,” says Fabrick.
   “We had done two other projects with them,” League agrees. “The SLAM Collaborative specializes in college and university work, health-care work and what we refer to as science-and-technology. Recently we’ve done a lot of work at academic health-care centers, such as Emory.”
   Given the location of the new building, Fabrick says the instructions to League and his colleagues were quite clear.
   “Because of the existing historical buildings, we told them we wanted to create an integral complex,” she says. “We told them that it shouldn’t look like a building that is different and just a link between the two other buildings.
   “The whole composition of the buildings together needed to have a sense of integrity; they needed to look like they belonged to each other.”

SOLVING A PUZZLE
   Architect League describes the project as “quite a puzzle.” Along with needing to link to the two existing Anatomy and Physiology buildings, the new structure also had to complement the Health Sciences Administration building adjacent to the site.
   “There were certainly campus design issues having to do with the scale of the new building,” says League. “We couldn’t overpower the two historic buildings, and we couldn’t be architecturally incompatible with the newer building, so it was quite a feat.”
   The Anatomy and Physiology buildings have their own history. Emory was founded in Oxford, Ga., in 1836; when the decision was made to move the school to Atlanta right before World War I. The hilly setting in Atlanta reminded New York architect Henry Hornbostel of an Italian town, and he designed the buildings with that in mind.
   Today, his structures, which incorporate Etowah Pink and Pearl Gray versions of Georgia marble in an ashlar pattern that’s described as “quilt-like” or “calico,” are on the National Register of Historic Places.
   “You don’t see this anywhere else in the country,” says Fabrick. “Not this patterning. That was Hornbostel’s architectural statement.”
   League notes that the two buildings were, “adaptively reused.” At approximately 25,000 ft(2) each, they were gutted inside, and their roofs and windows replaced. The SLAM Collaborative then came up with a new building of approximately 160,000 ft² on five levels to fill space between them.
   While Georgia marble might have seemed like the natural first choice for the façade, that wasn’t the case. Part of the problem, League says, is that the quarry that had supplied the Etowah Pink (owned by Quebec City, Que.-based Polycor Inc., as part of its Georgia Marble Dimension Stone division) was no longer active.
   “I knew the supply of it was fairly limited,” he says. “They had several existing blocks of it, but the quarry had been flooded and closed, and there wasn’t much interest in reopening it.”
   Because of that, he doubted the new building could be clad in marble for any reasonable budget.
   “Obviously, we couldn’t replicate the existing ashlar of the two buildings,” League says. “Our initial reaction was to find comparably colored gray granite that would complement both the gray and the pink.”
   However, when the granite was presented to the school’s trustees, everyone agreed it wasn’t the best solution.
   “They realized they really wanted marble, and they were able to assist us in making sure the marble was affordable for our needs,” says Emory’s Fabrick. “It was a negotiation.”
   Helping the situation was Polycor’s decision to reopen the Etowah quarry near Tate, Ga., to provide enough material for use on the building. The SLAM Collaborative then came up with a proposal that gives the new School of Medicine building a look that complements – rather than mimics – the two historic buildings.
   “We used the Etowah Fleuri for trim and accents,” explains League. “Otherwise, the building is the Pearl Gray and Cherokee White (a white marble with gray veining). The balance between white and darker gray goes toward the dark, and that’s used in the base. Then, the main body of the building is a lighter gray, but it’s all essentially the same stone.”

INNOVATIVE SPACES
   Fabrick explains that the school hired the Atlanta offices of Whiting Turner Contracting Co., to serve as the general contractor for the project. She adds that Whiting Turner was selected using basically the same procedure used to hire the architect.
   That company, in turn, hired M. Garcia and Sons Inc., of Stockbridge, Ga., to contract to purchase the stone and do the installation. Although League says his firm had little input into the selection of either firm beyond sitting in on the interviews, the architects were familiar with their work.
   “Emory does all its work on an accelerated CM-at-risk (construction management at risk) contracting method, and Garcia was a sub of Whiting Turner,” League says. “Garcia had previously done a pretty good bit of stonework on the campus, and had worked on one of the buildings we designed.”
   Brad Shull, the project manager for M. Garcia on the School of Medicine job, says he believes his company got the job in large part because of its reputation and experience.
   “We really don’t need to advertise,” he says. “We get a lot of bid solicitations, and usually, as long as we’re in the budget, it works out and the contractor will recommend M. Garcia and Sons. A lot of work just comes to us.”
   He adds that the company is a specialist in larger commercial and institutional projects and doesn’t do residential work.
   Construction work began on the new $53 million building in 2005 and was completed in time for the 2007 summer term. However, everyone involved acknowledges it was a challenge – something Fabrick attributes to the uniqueness of the project.
   “Not too many people today have the opportunity architecturally to do a totally marble building in this day and age,” the university architect says. “M. Garcia was really the only group who knew what it took.”
   Substantial issues over shop drawings resulted in a significant percentage of the cut stone having to be recut at the jobsite.
   “When subcontractor drawings would come to the architects, the architects would realize how important significant dimensions were, and they’d change the measurements on the shop drawings,” says Fabrick. “When they went back to the contractor with the changed dimensions, the contractor didn’t necessarily catch the changes and do what they needed.
    “At Polycor, one project manager got shop drawings and made changes and made tickets for the stone,” Fabrick adds. “Then, that person left, and the next project manager couldn’t understand what was going on. Stone arrived at the site with the wrong dimensions.”
   Finally, because of the contractor’s inexperience with a project of this type, Whiting Turner didn’t know how to step in and deal with the situation, she says.
    “Some areas weren’t built within tolerance, and while they corrected them throughout the building, it slowed us down having to wait on chipping out of concrete and waterproofing block and filling cells in blocks that were supposed to be filled,” Shull says.
   As it was, Shull estimates it took a crew of 20 six months to do what he describes as a fairly straightforward installation of approximately 25,000 ft² of honed marble using stainless-steel mechanical anchors.
   “Once the stone was delivered, unloading it at the site and storing it were fine,” says Shull. “Those things went well.”
   The others involved in its construction agree. The SLAM Collaborative’s League calls it a great success.
   “The building was designed specifically to accommodate a brand new approach to curriculum, while at the same time reestablishing an emotional and sentimental home for students and alumni of the school,” he says. “This building provides all kinds of innovative student and teaching space.”
   Fabrick says just about everyone loves the building, and it’s very comfortable, both inside and out.
   “I’m so glad we went with marble,” she concludes. “The granite would have been completely wrong. The marble creates a cohesiveness with the two historic buildings, and even though it’s obvious it’s a newer building, you have to look twice. That’s wonderful.”

   Client: Emory University, Atlanta
   Architect: SLAM Collaborative, Atlanta
   General Contractor: Whiting Turner Contracting Co., Atlanta
   Stone Subcontractor: M. Garcia and Sons Inc., Stockbridge, Ga.
   Stone Supplier: Polycor Inc., Quebec City, Que.