During the month of April, we have shared our commitment to carbon neutrality, announced new and completed projects, and celebrated awards.
HGA Commits to Carbon Neutrality
This month, HGA announced a specific firmwide commitment to achieving net carbon neutrality. The three goals establish clear, time-stamped benchmarks for achieving carbon neutrality in all internal business operations:
1. By the end of 2023, we will measure/verify our own carbon footprint
2. By the end of 2024, we will achieve carbon neutrality using third-party, verified carbon offsets.
3. By 2030, we will have reduced our carbon emissions by 50 percent below 2019 levels, regardless of growth.
Read more about the commitment here.
Awards
HGA has won an American Institute of Architects (AIA) Committee on the Environment (COTE®) Top Ten Award for Westwood Hills Nature Center in St. Louis Park, Minnesota. This is the architecture industry’s highest honor for sustainable design, honoring projects for their significant achievements integrating design excellence with environmental performance. HGA worked with the City of St. Louis Park and allied partners to design the Net Zero Energy / Net Zero Positive building as an educational teaching tool, demonstrating passive and active strategies for energy efficiency and sustainability. Learn more about this accolade here.
Capital One Hall in Tysons, Virginia was selected as the winner of the Entertainment Category in the 2023 Interior Design Competition hosted by the International Interior Design Association (IIDA). Opened in Fall of 2021, Capital One Hall is part of a mixed-use urban redevelopment anchored by Capital One corporate headquarters, featuring a 1,600-seat performance hall, 225-seat black box theater, atrium and event spaces, conference rooms, and rooftop garden and public park. Learn more here.
New Projects
HGA has been selected to partner with CentraCare and the University of Minnesota in the planning and design of a new medical campus focused on rural health, in St. Cloud. With data that suggests that individuals trained in rural settings stay in rural settings, the campus will help to fill a growing shortage of physicians in rural Minnesota, due to reasons including retirement and post-pandemic burnout. HGA has a longstanding relationship with CentraCare and the University, including work on more than 70 critical access hospitals, clinics, and specialty clinics in rural Minnesota. This will be the state’s first new medical campus in 50 years. Read the full project announcement here.
Marquette University’s Green Ash Grove serves as a link between buildings, spaces and destinations where purposeful design brings the Marquette University community together. HGA is engaging with Marquette University representatives through a visioning exercise to gather the needs and voices of Marquette’s staff, faculty, and students to develop X.SPACE, a landscape experience replacing the Green Ash Grove. The new project will strengthen community and enhance innovation through art and expression. Through both serendipitous and intentional overlap, the new X.SPACE will serve as the crossroads to conversation and belonging for Marquette University.
Completed Projects
HGA’s structural expertise is behind a new scoreboard for the Minnesota Twins’ Target Field. A massive, edgeless, high-definition scoreboard now overlooks the left field stand. At 178-feet wide, the scoreboard is 76% larger than before. Through a design build partnership with Mortenson, HGA provided important coordination on the $30 million off-season visual renovation, working with Walter P Moore, Daktronics, and Dimensional Innovations. Read full story here.
In Sacramento, California, HGA completed a full-scale modernization of the public-facing spaces within the iconic Renaissance Tower located at 801 K Street in downtown. The firm was brought in by leading U.S. alternative asset management company, The RMR Group, to redesign the building’s main entrance, common area and expanded lobby to better complement its neighboring community and offer a fresh, welcoming experience for its corporate occupants and local visitors alike. The local landmark was reimagined into an inviting space that better engages the tenants and other visitors who will be returning to Renaissance Tower. Read full story here.
HGA recently completed the renovation of the new Employee Health Clinic for Beth Israel Lahey Health (BILH) at Lahey Hospital & Medical Center in Burlington, Massachusetts. This renovation is part of a series of upgrades for BILH that span public and clinical spaces. The new Clinic provides a safe and welcoming environment for employees. It is strategically located near the Hospital to improve access to care for staff, help with employee satisfaction and retention. The Clinic includes a comfortable waiting room, exam spaces, as well as shared and private offices. Floor-to-ceiling windows provide natural daylighting, and biophilic elements soothe and evoke the outdoors.
About HGA
HGA is a national interdisciplinary design firm committed to making a positive, lasting impact for our clients and communities through research-based, holistic solutions. We believe that great design requires a sense of curiosity—forming deep insight into our clients, their contexts, and the human condition. We are a collective of over 1,000 architects, engineers, interior designers, planners, researchers, and strategists. Our practice spans multiple markets, including corporate, cultural, education, local and federal government, healthcare, and science and technology. Visit HGA.com or follow on LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.