The Edith Green-Wendell Wyatt (EGWW) Federal Building was an existing 18-story, 512,474 square-foot (47,610 square-meter) office tower, completed in 1974. The building no longer met the functional or the energy and conservation requirements of the contemporary US government, so a major renovation project was undertaken. A mechanical upgrade was paired with a full replacement of the building envelope with a distinctive shading facade, affording better energy performance and a new lease on life.
This project achieves operational sustainability that would be admirable in a brand-new building, let alone a retrofit of a 1970s “energy hog.” The building has been transformed from a bunker-like, concrete-encased mass into a trellised volume that seems more lightweight by an order of magnitude, yet affords more floor space than the previous version.