Date Posted: 04.19.2017
Mithun is honored to announce that it has received an American Institute of Architects (AIA) Committee on the Environment (COTE) Top Ten Award for the design of Chatham University Eden Hall Campus.
Home of Chatham’s Falk School of Sustainability, Eden Hall Campus is designed to generate more energy than it uses, serve as a water resource, produce food, recycle nutrients, and support habitat and healthy soils while developing the next generation of environmental stewards. Linked buildings, landscapes and infrastructure support an active and experiential research environment. New building forms, outdoor gathering spaces and integrated artwork complement and interpret natural site systems, while making cutting-edge sustainable strategies transparent and explicit.
“Exemplary in its integrated water management and treatment systems, this project is an ambitious vision for a new sustainable campus. The design established aggressive energy thresholds for each of the buildings and integrated sustainable principles into a way of campus life,” noted the 2017 Top Ten Awards jury. “Both the spaces between buildings and the structures are put into service, fulfilling the mission of the curriculum for an education founded on sustainable principles and environmental stewardship.”
This is the sixth AIA COTE Top Ten Award for Mithun, placing it among the forefront of national practices with multiple COTE honors. The Top Ten Awards program, now in its 21st year, is the profession’s most rigorous recognition program for sustainable design excellence. It highlights projects that exemplify the integration of great design and great performance, delivering social, economic and ecological value.
“We are proud to collaborate with such visionary clients as Chatham University, who share our mission of making positive change in people’s lives and the health of our communities and planet,” said Mithun President, David Goldberg. “Chatham’s vision for Eden Hall Campus and the Falk School of Sustainability is an inspiration for us all.”
Additional information is available within two AIA reports that delve into the performance of projects and design firms honored by the awards program. “Lessons from the Leading Edge” is a comprehensive 2016 study of nearly 200 Top Ten Award winning projects over two decades, which determined that projects recognized through this program are outpacing the industry by virtually every standard of performance. The latest report, “The Habits of High-Performance Firms,” analyzes the organizational structure, demographics, leadership and culture of 10 frequent winners of the Top Ten Award—including Mithun—to find the connection between great, sustainable projects and overall firm excellence.
