Responses by David Schwarz, founding partner, HUSH
Background: Our goal was to send a consistent, inspirational message to all United Therapeutics (Unither) employees, partners and guests about the mission of sustainability. This project created awareness about the symbiotic relationship between humans and buildings through real-time data-visualization installations. Ultimately, this is a building unlike any other—a living, breathing entity with its own consciousness and the employees and guests within it are a crucial part of the system.
Reasoning: Every design decision was driven by the net zero goal. Unither wanted to show that net zero reflects how sustainable can be beautiful and functional. We had to answer how could experience design elements integrated into the building’s interior architecture best communicate Unither’s vision? And how could we leverage interior/experiential spaces within the building to tell this audacious engineering story and motivate visitors?
Challenges: First, we had to understand and simplify complex systems, data and info into clear colloquial and engaging moments, and then develop the right design response. Second, we had to consider the building’s energy budget. And third, we had to identify and prioritize opportunities within a space that had already been fully designed.
Favorite details: The Energy Dial. We designed something that spoke to people in a gentle way and was iconic. Also, with just pure light and reflective metal fins, we were able to translate Unither’s data into giant, 40-foot rays that animate in sequence and demonstrate the building’s energy usage and consumption as part of the ebb and flow of net-zero forces. These large-scale visual changes created a north star for employees and visitors to rally around Unither’s net-zero ecosystem.
Specific demands: Unither’s CEO, Martine Rothblatt, had outlined a vision for her company’s new building on the Silver Spring, Maryland campus. Consistent with Martine’s audacious worldview and her desire to innovate and help the world, we knew that the building would have to be a design that accomplishes a similar audacious level of sustainable, environmentally, energy-conscious design.
Anything new: One of the insights gained from implementing data visualization in a net zero building is that robust, real-time data sets are merely a source. Schneider Electrics is an operational team foregrounding elements of the data that help functionality. Working alongside these deep data sources reminded us that the scale and depth of this kind of data is inaccessible to most people. From our collaboration on the Unither building, we learned that we needed to bring understanding and clarity to these systems.
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