Lab Design Conference Welcomes Attendees to San Diego
The 22nd annual Lab Design Conference has begun! Architects, engineers, lab planners, equipment vendors, laboratory management professionals, and others have come to San Diego for an intensive two-day program featuring educational events, networking session, and the opportunity to interact with the industry’s top suppliers and manufacturers.
Make it stand out
The program opened with a general session, “Spontaneous Collisions or Interdisciplinary Discovery? Lab Design for the Future We Need,” delivered by Brian Kowalchuk, global design director at HDR, Inc. In his keynote, Brian discussed the importance of interdisciplinary research and how thoughtful lab design leads to innovative thinking and research. He offered simple design diagrams to help lead lab planners and designers to creative solutions, and gave insight into how to develop planning and design solutions to reinforce wellness and encourage social interaction.
Attendees then had their choice between three concurrent tracks throughout the day to address all aspects of lab design, engineering, sustainable lab planning, and more. Jennifer DiMambro and Heather Rosenberg of Arup spoke on “Balancing Sustainability & Resilience in the Life Science Industry,” and how thoughtful lab design can help make the life science industry more sustainable and resilient. “The Labs of Scientific Fiction: From Imagination to Space Realization,” a session given by Roberto Morfin of CannonDesign and Dr. Joseph Bocchiaro of NV5, asked the audience to consider the ethics behind a collective imagination of the scientific endeavor from optimistic to dystopian views.
RWDI’s Aimée Smith continued the sustainable lab discussion with her session, “Balancing the Three Pillars of Climate & Sustainability for Office to Laboratory Conversions,” which detailed how to mitigate climate change impacts through energy use reduction and how to enhance occupant wellness through healthy building design. The team of Brian Richard of Kirksey, Scott Sanders of Harvey Builders, Josh Meyer of Jacobs, and Isabel Mandujano of LPA spoke about current lab design issues in their session, “Current Perspectives: Trends, Hurdles, Solutions, and Forecasting of Laboratory Projects and Design.” Jacob Knowles and Jonathan Chan of BR+A Consulting Engineers gave a talk on “Fossil Fuel Free Labs—From Higher-Ed to Big Pharma,” offering a look at what is possible for the electrification of lab buildings.
Brandon Fortier of IMEG Corp.’s presentation, “Optimizing Air Handler Efficiency for the Laboratory Environment,” examined at the four main drivers of airside HVAC system efficiency and provides recommended approaches for appropriately designing each component. “Next Level Incubators for Series B Tenants,” by Priya Shah of Gensler detailed a helpful checklist of manager and operational input needed to design an effective incubator space. A case study was presented by Chris Grotbeck of the University of New Mexico, Leslie Sims of AECom, and Michael Borowski of VHGA in their talk, “Recent Laboratories and Research Facilities (New Construction) at University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center.” Advice on how to make timely decisions was given by Roy Delgado of Kirksey and Scott Sanders of Harvey-Cleary Builders in their session, “Designing and Building Laboratories to a Construction Budget using the Design-Build Delivery Method.” A local case study was presented in “Conquering the Climb—Lusk Life Science Campus Design Expedition,” by Scott Potter of Longfellow and Joseph Marshall of Flad Architects.
As the Lab Design Conference is now part of LabX Media Group, one of the tracks offered on the first day of the event is a special Lab Manager track, featuring advice on how lab design/build teams can collaborate and interact with lab managers and facility owners to bring a project to a successful conclusion. Scott Hanton, editorial director of Lab Manager, opened this track with his session " Collaboration from the Perspective of the Lab Manager,” with personal insight on the things that lab managers are concerned about when beginning a lab build or renovation project. Jeff Talka and Keith Fine of The S/L/A/M Collaborative spoke on “Setting the Roadmap for a Successful Lab Design,” with a discussion on the proper criteria to use when selecting a design professional or construction professional. “We Don’t Talk Anymore: Communication Strategies for Lab Design,” given by Jinhee Lee and Clay Stafford of HERA Laboratory Planners, offered an explanation on how to communicate wants vs needs with site users, and helpful strategies to fully understand a problem before planning a solution. Rebekah Gandy of Gensler spoke on “Building a Strong Foundation with Good Project Planning,” which detailed key standard procedures that should be used to document the development of your lab from early design to construction. SmithGroup’s Sandro Bressi, Alex Munoz, and Suzanne Napier discussed strategies for managing users' expectations throughout a project, especially concerning budget and time constraints, in “Working with Management to Create an Award-Winning Lab.”
The first day of the Lab Design Conference also featured an award ceremony for the three winners of the fourth annual Design Excellence Awards, a program established by Lab Manager to recognize and celebrate the best new and newly renovated projects within the lab design community. Representatives from the project teams behind these three unique lab facilities were invited to receive their awards in front of an audience of their peers. The Excellence in Innovation prize was given to SmithGroup with Mark Cavagnero Associates for the Joan & Sanford I. Weill Neurosciences Building. Honorable Mention—Innovation was awarded to Page Southerland Page, Inc. for the Materials Characterization and Processing Lab, Johns Hopkins University. The Excellence in Sustainability award went to SmithGroup for the Promega Corporation Kornberg Center.
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