Spanning 783,800 sf across its 11 stories, Zurich’s new North American headquarters in Schaumburg, Ill., houses almost 3,000 employees and contractors in a “stacked bars” office complex. Designed by Goettsch Partners, with Clayco as the developer and design-builder, the LEED Platinum-certified building breaks free from the typical center-core suburban office form with a trio of rectangular boxes that are offset and stacked. The top bar is 500 feet long, spans 180 feet between the bottom two bars, and cantilevers out 60 feet to the east, directly on axis with downtown Chicago, 28 miles to the southeast.
The HQ’s unusual arrangement offers numerous benefits, including optimal views of the surrounding landscape, improved solar orientation for amenities, and programmatic flexibility for Zurich. It also creates multiple spaces and amenities to encourage collaboration and wellness among employees, including green roofs, outdoor terraces, and a system of walking trails.
The project’s interior designer and workplace strategist, CannonDesign, led an extensive workplace pilot program and employee survey project (1,300 responses were recorded) to optimize the design scheme. More than 150 employees spent three weeks testing four uniquely configured office neighborhoods, each with different styles of desks, chairs, enclaves, conference rooms, and informal meeting spaces. The final design, which incorporates adjustable sit/stand desks, a variety of formal and informal meeting spaces, and decentralized break areas, was selected based on performance and feedback, including increased interaction among teams, decreased waiting times, and more flexibility.
Also on the Building Team: JLL (client’s rep.), WSP/Halvorson and Partners (SE), V3 Companies (CE), Thornton Tomasetti (sustainability consultant), and Hoerr Schaudt Landscape Architects.
©James Steinkamp Photography
©James Steinkamp Photography
Related Stories
Office Buildings | Nov 10, 2023
3 important early considerations for office-to-residential conversions
Scott Campagna, PE, Senior Director of Housing, IMEG Corp, shares insights from experts on office-to-residential conversion issues that may be mitigated when dealt with early.
Laboratories | Nov 8, 2023
Boston’s FORUM building to support cutting-edge life sciences research and development
Global real estate companies Lendlease and Ivanhoé Cambridge recently announced the topping-out of FORUM, a nine-story, 350,000-sf life science building in Boston. Located in Boston Landing, a 15-acre mixed-use community, the $545 million project will achieve operational net zero carbon upon completion in 2024.
Giants 400 | Nov 6, 2023
Top 100 Government Building Construction Firms for 2023
Hensel Phelps, Turner Construction, Clark Group, Fluor, and BL Harbert top BD+C's rankings of the nation's largest government building sector general contractors and construction management (CM) firms for 2023, as reported in the 2023 Giants 400 Report. Note: This ranking includes revenue from all government building sectors, including federal, state, local, military, and Veterans Affairs (VA) buildings.
Giants 400 | Nov 6, 2023
Top 90 Government Building Engineering Firms for 2023
Fluor, Jacobs, AECOM, WSP, and Burns & McDonnell head BD+C's rankings of the nation's largest government building sector engineering and engineering architecture (EA) firms for 2023, as reported in the 2023 Giants 400 Report. Note: This ranking includes revenue from all government building sectors, including federal, state, local, military, and Veterans Affairs (VA) buildings.
Giants 400 | Nov 6, 2023
Top 170 Government Building Architecture Firms for 2023
Page Southerland Page, Gensler, Stantec, HOK, and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill top BD+C's ranking of the nation's largest government building sector architecture and architecture engineering (AE) firms for 2023, as reported in the 2023 Giants 400 Report. Note: This ranking includes revenue from all government building sectors, including federal, state, local, military, and Veterans Affairs (VA) buildings.
Office Buildings | Nov 2, 2023
Amazon’s second headquarters completes its first buildings: a pair of 22-story towers
Amazon has completed construction of the first two buildings of its second headquarters, located in Arlington, Va. The all-electric structures, featuring low carbon concrete and mass timber, help further the company’s commitment to achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2040 and 100% renewable energy consumption by 2030. Designed by ZGF Architects, the two 22-story buildings are on track to become the largest LEED v4 Platinum buildings in the U.S.
Adaptive Reuse | Nov 1, 2023
Biden Administration reveals plan to spur more office-to-residential conversions
The Biden Administration recently announced plans to encourage more office buildings to be converted to residential use. The plan includes using federal money to lend to developers for conversion projects and selling government property that is suitable for conversions.
Office Buildings | Oct 30, 2023
Find Your 30: Creating a unique sense of place in the workplace while emphasizing brand identity
Finding Your 30 gives each office a sense of autonomy, and it allows for bigger and broader concepts that emphasize distinctive cultural, historic or other similar attributes.
Biophilic Design | Oct 29, 2023
Natural wood floors create biophilic experience in Austrian headquarters office
100% environmentally friendly natural wood floors from mafi add to the biophilic setting of a beverage company office in Upper Austria.
Government Buildings | Oct 27, 2023
A spurt in public spending bolsters AEC firms' government building practices
Nonresidential public construction spending, while only about a quarter of private-sector spending, has been growing at a much faster clip lately. In June, it was up 13.8% to $411.4 billion, with commercial and manufacturing the biggest subsectors, according to Commerce Department estimates.