Meredith Corporate Expansion and Interiors
Des Moines
Herbert Lewis Kruse Blunck Architecture

An airy and cohesive corporate campus resulted from this sensitive expansion

© Farshid Assassi

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The expansion of the corporate headquarters for this large publishing/media company includes a four-leveled, 180,000 square-foot office building, a two-leveled parking garage, a 230-foot skywalk connecting the new facility to an existing building, and two city blocks of landscape development. The project extends the corporate complex, which had been growing steadily since the early 1900s and was extensively remodeled in the late 1970s.

The building is located at the confluence of three major arterial streets, prominent within the fabric of the city. The company hoped to create a cohesive corporate campus consolidating all of its employees into a single location. As a result, the building was designed to be a cooperative part of a larger complex, working with the existing building to create a unified urban space. A central courtyard is the primary, identifiable space for the company, serving as a drop-off and entry for both buildings. A 230-foot long skywalk further unifies the campus by allowing employees to move freely from one facility to another at all times of the year.

The building employs a number of energy efficient strategies, primary among these is the extensive use of daylighting. The indirect lighting is equipped with sensors that dim lights to compensate for the daylight contribution, thus maintaining a consistent level of ambient illumination. The result is a 30 percent energy savings over more conventional office buildings. The building strives to achieve a balance between serving the needs of the company, its employees, and local residents.

Formal name of Project:
Meredith Corporate Expansion and Interiors

Location:
Des Moines

Gross square footage:
180,000 sq. ft. office space
90,000 sq. ft. parking

Total construction cost:
$25.8 million

Owner:
Meredith Corporation

Architect:
Herbert Lewis Kruse Blunck Architecture
218 Sixth Avenue, Suite 202
Des Moines, Iowa 50309 USA
Tel: 515 288 9536
Fax: 515 288 5816
E-mail: arch@hlkb.com
www.hlkb.com