ARCHITECTURE
The Greenest Building in Connecticut
HMTX World Headquarters is being billed as the greenest building in the State of Connecticut. Designed around the Living Building Challenge, the building is on track to achieve all the petals of the LBC excluding water, while still being exemplary in that area as well. The project is a mixed use facility with offices, a product design innovation and fabrication maker facility, artist in residence housing units and space that serves as an art gallery for the company’s private art collection. Powered completely by renewable energy on-site -the project focuses on art, technology and industry product creation and shows that you can balance modern design inspired by Bauhaus design principles where form is derived by function, within a deeply biophilic and deep green philosophical framework. The project just won top State honors in Energy and Health by the Connecticut Green Building Council.
The building sits perched lightly on ancient granite on pilotis, and is affectionately called the “house upon the hill” by the client and visionary behind the project. Simple in plan, simple in section and elegant in execution, the building is designed to nestle into its landscape. Modern in its aesthetic, yet deeply biophlic in its experience. Every interior space is connected to the outside from at least three orientations. The senses are engaged with the sound of water, green walls, carefully controlled daylight and a feeling of prospect and refuge.
Photo by: Anton Grassl
AWARDS
• CTGBC 2022 Green Building Awards, Health Award of Honor
• CTGBC 2022 Green Building Awards, Commercial Energy Award of Honor
• Metropolis Planet Positive Award, 2023
• Interior Design BOY Award Finalist, 2023
HMTX World Headquarters
Norwalk, CT
Size: 23,000 sf
Architect: McLennan Design
Civil: McChord Engineering
Structural: Silman
MEP: Integral Group
Low Voltage: Cerami & Associates
Lighting: Derek Porter Studio
Geotech: Haley & Aldrich
Surveyor: Ryan & Faulds
Photo by: Paul Godwin
From the outset, the HMTX World Headquarters project set its sights on truly ambitious sustainability goals, targeting 6 of the 7 Living Building Challenge (LBC) petals. The most stringent green-building program in the world, LBC requires projects to approach design with a holistic framework, addressing physical aspects such as Energy, Water, and Materials with the same degree of intentionality as more ephemeral concepts such as Beauty, Equity, and the Health + Happiness of all building occupants. The HMTX HQ is equipped with a wide variety of sustainability approaches to meet these ambitious requirements, and has been lauded as the Greenest Building in the state of Connecticut for its efforts.
Perched delicately on top of a rocky outcropping, the building is carefully situated to respond to its unique site conditions. The simple parti consists of two primary building blocks elevated above the landscape on piloti columns and linked by a long briding corridor. Oriented north-south, these two blocks optimize views out into the landscape and provide ideal solar exposure, with each of the generous south-facing windows shaded by solar canopies above. Western facades were left opaque to block the noise and unsightly views of the adjacent highway, while the glazed east facades are protected by vertical shading elements to minimize glare and heat gain. Preserved between the two building blocks, a central courtyard highlights the natural rock outcroppings and facilitates access to daylight and views for every space within the building.
Photo by: Anton Grassl
Photo by: Anton Grassl
Photo by: Anton Grassl
Photo by: Jonathan Hillyer
Photo by: Anton Grassl
Photo by: Anton Grassl