When you’ve designed a building for one thing, how do you repurpose it for something entirely different?
When you’ve designed a building for one thing, how do you repurpose it for something entirely different?

350 Rhode Island Street Office Complex

Originally designed for dot com tenants, this 260,000 s.f. two-building office complex on a Potrero Hill site was later remodeled to accommodate the California Culinary Academy.
 
Customized Solution
  • Forell | Elsesser provided structural engineering services for both the design and repurposing of these two, 4-story multi-media office buildings which are connected by a long-span, steel pedestrian sky bridge. Two different cladding techniques create architectural variety and give the impression of four separate buildings.
  • The state-of-the-art post-tensioned beam and slab gravity system designed to accommodate various future floor openings and mechanical equipment requirements proved necessary when the California Culinary Academy moved into the space. The repurposing required drilling 3,000 cores into existing floor slabs and the careful placement of a large freight elevator.
  • With two levels of below-grade parking for 490 cars, the difficult, transitional Potrero Hill site required extensive foundation design and the drilling of piers and rock anchors to prevent building movement and sediment buildup due to subterranean water flow.
CATEGORIES

Developer/Commercial/Corporate


HIGHLIGHTS
  • Architect: Pfau Long Architecture/Gordon Chong (STANTEC)
  • Owner: SKS Investments, LLC
  • Concrete shear walls with post-tension floors
  • Sustainable features include natural ventilation, exterior sunshades, and a concrete frame regulating thermal mass