Kansas City’s new Sobela Ocean Aquarium is a world-class facility home to nearly 8,000 animals in 34 habitats ranging from small tanks to a giant 400,000-gallon shark tank.
The 65,000-sf facility takes visitors from a shallow tropical shore, following a “warm current into the melting pot of the deep ocean, and is carried via a cold current from the depths, through the ocean’s forests, emerging at a cool Pacific coast,” according to a news release.
Exhibit designs by Spacehaus integrate with architectural cues such as changing light quality, spatial variation, and physical descent. The experience augments unique exhibit designs “to engage visitor’s emotions, spark their curiosity, and build in them a passion for the ocean.”
“This project creates that opportunity for all, introducing visitors to our global ocean by using the concept of marine currents as an interpretive framework,” according to lead architect EHDD.
“Despite holding nearly 650,000 gallons of water in total, the aquarium has obtained a LEED silver certification,” says David Dowell, AIA, principal of El Dorado who led the support architecture team. “Some of the sustainability goals include capturing stormwater on site, significantly reducing water and energy use, and maximizing natural light while also bird-safing the structure through fritted glass.”
The aquarium is the first project in the Kansas City area to use CarbonCure technology, which introduces captured CO₂ into fresh concrete to reduce its carbon footprint by 22%.
The aquarium is now the largest building on the zoo campus. It opens to the zoo’s main pedestrian promenade with an image that is welcoming in scale, and warm in materiality. Located in Swope Park in Kansas City, Mo., the Kansas City Zoo & Aquarium, founded in 1909, spans 202 acres and receives about one million visitors per year.
Owner and/or developer: Sobela Ocean Aquarium at the Kansas City Zoo and Aquarium
Design architect: EHDD and El Dorado
MEP engineer: Antella
Structural engineer: Leigh & O'Kane
General contractor/construction manager: JE Dunn
Related Stories
| Nov 16, 2010
Brazil Olympics spurring green construction
Brazil's green building industry will expand in the coming years, spurred by construction of low-impact venues being built for the 2016 Olympics. The International Olympic Committee requires arenas built for the 2016 games in Rio de Janeiro meet international standards for low-carbon emissions and energy efficiency. This has boosted local interest in developing real estate with lower environmental impact than existing buildings. The timing couldn’t be better: the Brazilian government is just beginning its long-term infrastructure expansion program.
| Nov 10, 2010
$700 million plan to restore the National Mall
The National Mall—known as America’s front yard—is being targeted for a massive rehab and restoration that could cost as much as $700 million (it’s estimated that the Mall has $400 million in deferred maintenance alone). A few of the proposed projects: refurbishing the Grant Memorial, replacing the Capitol Reflecting Pool with a smaller pool or fountain, reconstructing the Constitution Gardens lake and constructing a multipurpose visitor center, and replacing the Sylvan Theater near the Washington Monument with a new multipurpose facility.
| Nov 9, 2010
Designing a library? Don’t focus on books
How do you design a library when print books are no longer its core business? Turn them into massive study halls. That’s what designers did at the University of Amsterdam, where they transformed the existing 27,000-sf library into a study center—without any visible books. About 2,000 students visit the facility daily and encounter workspaces instead of stacks.
| Nov 3, 2010
Park’s green education center a lesson in sustainability
The new Cantigny Outdoor Education Center, located within the 500-acre Cantigny Park in Wheaton, Ill., earned LEED Silver. Designed by DLA Architects, the 3,100-sf multipurpose center will serve patrons of the park’s golf courses, museums, and display garden, one of the largest such gardens in the Midwest.
| Nov 3, 2010
Sailing center sets course for energy efficiency, sustainability
The Milwaukee (Wis.) Community Sailing Center’s new facility on Lake Michigan counts a geothermal heating and cooling system among its sustainable features. The facility was designed for the nonprofit instructional sailing organization with energy efficiency and low operating costs in mind.
| Nov 3, 2010
New church in Connecticut will serve a growing congregation
Tocci Building Companies will start digging next June for the Black Rock Congregational Church in Fairfield, Conn. Designed by Wiles Architects, the 103,000-sf multiuse facility will feature a 900-person worship center with tiered stadium seating, a children’s worship center, a chapel, an auditorium, a gymnasium, educational space, administrative offices, commercial kitchen, and a welcome center with library and lounge.
| Nov 2, 2010
Cypress Siding Helps Nature Center Look its Part
The Trinity River Audubon Center, which sits within a 6,000-acre forest just outside Dallas, utilizes sustainable materials that help the $12.5 million nature center fit its wooded setting and put it on a path to earning LEED Gold.
| Oct 13, 2010
Editorial
The AEC industry shares a widespread obsession with the new. New is fresh. New is youthful. New is cool. But “old” or “slightly used” can be financially profitable and professionally rewarding, too.
| Oct 13, 2010
Biloxi’s convention center bigger, better after Katrina
The Mississippi Coast Coliseum and Convention Center in Biloxi is once again open for business following a renovation and expansion necessitated by Hurricane Katrina.
| Oct 13, 2010
Tower commemorates Lewis & Clark’s historic expedition
The $4.8 million Lewis and Clark Confluence Tower in Hartford, Ill., commemorates explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark at the point where their trek to the Pacific Ocean began—the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers.
