CTBUH

Technical Paper
http://technicalpapers.ctbuh.org
Subject: Building Case Study; Architecture/Design
Paper Title: Tree House Residence Hall, Boston
Author(s): B. K. Boley and Tamara Roy

Aliation(s): ADD Inc

Publication Date: 2014
Original Publication: CTBUH Journal 2014 Issue I
Paper Type: 1. Book chapter/Part chapter
2. Journal paper
3. Conference proceeding
4. Unpublished conference paper
5. Magazine article
6. Unpublished
Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat/Author(s)
Tall buildings: design, construction, and operation | 2014 Issue I
CTBUH Journal
International Journal on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat
Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat
S.R. Crown Hall
Illinois Institute of Technology
3360 South State Street
Chicago, IL 60616
Phone: +1 (312) 567 3487
Fax: +1 (312) 567 3820
Email: info@ctbuh.org
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About the Council
ISSN: 1946 - 1186
The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban
Habitat, based at the Illinois Institute of
Technology in Chicago, is an international
not-for-prot organization supported by
architecture, engineering, planning,
development, and construction professionals.
Founded in 1969, the Councils mission is to
disseminate multi-disciplinary information on
tall buildings and sustainable urban
environments, to maximize the international
interaction of professionals involved in creating
the built environment, and to make the latest
knowledge available to professionals in a useful
form.
The CTBUH disseminates its ndings, and
facilitates business exchange, through: the
publication of books, monographs,
proceedings, and reports; the organization of
world congresses, international, regional, and
specialty conferences and workshops; the
maintaining of an extensive website and tall
building databases of built, under construction,
and proposed buildings; the distribution of a
monthly international tall building
e-newsletter; the maintaining of an
international resource center; the bestowing of
annual awards for design and construction
excellence and individual lifetime achievement;
the management of special task forces/
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forums; and the publication of the CTBUH
Journal, a professional journal containing
refereed papers written by researchers,
scholars, and practicing professionals.
The Council is the arbiter of the criteria upon
which tall building height is measured, and
thus the title of The Worlds Tallest Building
determined. CTBUH is the worlds leading body
dedicated to the eld of tall buildings and
urban habitat and the recognized international
source for information in these elds.
Tree House Residence Hall, Boston
Skyscrapers and Skylines: 18852007
The Social Sustainability of High-Rises
Midcentury (un)Modern
A Year in Review: Tall Trends of 2013
Talking Tall: Rem Koolhaas
New Yorks New Delirium
Inside | 3 CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I

We are not contextualists in the sense of feeling obliged to be similar,

but we are contextualists in the sense that every one of our buildings is a
comment on its context. Sometimes a comment is critical; sometimes it
is supportive in enlisting that context into a greater whole.

Rem Koolhaas, page 48
News and Events
This Issue
Dennis Poon, Trustee
CTBUH Latest
Antony Wood,
Executive Director
Debating Tall:
Antennas vs. Spires
Global News
Highlights from the CTBUH
Global News archive
02
04
05
06
Case Study
Tree House Residence Hall,
Boston
B. K. Boley and Tamara Roy
12
Research
Skyscrapers and Skylines:
New York and Chicago,
18852007
Jason Barr
Improving the Social
Sustainability of High-rises
Suruchi Modi
Midcentury (un)Modern
Bill Browning, Alice Hartley,
Travis Knop, Christopher
Starkey & Curtis Wayne
A Year in Review:
Tall Trends of 2013
18
24
32
40
Features
Tall Buildings in Numbers
2013: A Tall Building Review
Talking Tall: Rem Koolhaas &
David Gianotten
The New Context of Tall
38
48
CTBUH
52
54
59
59
60
61
62
63
Inside
18
24
40
New Yorks New Delirium
Daniel Safarik
CTBUH 12
th
Annual
Awards Events
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Richard Witt
CTBUH Organizational
Member Listing
18 | History, Theory & Criticism History, Theory & Criticism | 19 CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I
Introduction
Since the late 1880s, NewYork and Chicago
have been two of the worlds premier
skyscraper cities. By 1929, NewYork and
Chicago contained 68%of the nations
buildings of 20 stories or greater in height
(Weiss 1992). Of the 10 current tallest
buildings in the United States, four are in
Chicago and four are in NewYork; six would
be in NewYork, if the TwinTowers had not
been destroyed (Skyscraper Center 2013).
Ever since the telegraph and railroad createda
national market in the mid-19th century,
businesses and residents have had much
greater mobility and locational choices. Given
the ability of labor and capital to go where the
returns are greatest, we would expect this to
generate some competition between leading
cities. If residents of one city see its rivals
growing rapidly, they may feel compelled to
respond.
Historically, skyscrapers have embodied two
types of competition. The rst is regional
competition for employment and industrial
growth. Economic activity must be housed
somewhere; if developers dont provide the
space in one location, developers in another
place will. As the economy evolves, buildings
age and become functionally obsolete. The
needs of businesses and residents change,
and, again, if one city doesnt supply these
needs, then another city will. Thus,
Skyscrapers and Skylines:
New York and Chicago, 18852007
This paper investigates skyscraper competition between NewYork City and
Chicago from1885 to 2007. Skyscraper rivalry between these cities is part of
U.S. historiography, yet little work has explored the veracity of this belief. Using
a newly created data set on skyscrapers, a series of statistical tests were
performed to see whether there is, in fact, competitive interaction across
cities. First, the results show that each city has positively responded to
decisions in the other city, suggesting that residents in each city have a desire
to build more and taller than the other. Second, height regulations for each
city have periodically reduced the size of each citys skyline, and have spurred
increased building activity in the other city, providing evidence that
skyscraper space is substitutable across cities.
Figure 1. Home Insurance Building, Chicago, 1885.
History, Theory & Criticism
Jason Barr
Author
Jason Barr, Associate Professor
Department of Economics
Rutgers University
Newark NJ 07102, United States
t: +1 973 353 5835
f: +1 973 353 5819
e: jmbarr@rutgers.edu
www.rutgers.edu
Jason Barr
Jason Barr is an associate professor of economics
at Rutgers University, Newark, and the Director of
Graduate Studies for the economics department. He
received his Bachelors degree from Cornell University
in 1992, and his PhD from Columbia University in
2002. His research interests include urban and real
estate economics. In particular, Dr. Barr studies the
economic determinants of skyscraper height since
the late 19th century. His work has appeared in
prominent economics journals, such as the Journal
of Regional Science, the Journal of Economic History,
and Real Estate Economics. He is currently writing a
book on the history of the Manhattan skyline.

Architects consider each city to have its own

style, its own way of shaping its local
environment, its own individualistic
contributions to the history of architecture. Yet
these contributions were not developed in
isolation. There is a considerable amount of
competitive interaction between architects,
contractors, and developers in both cities.

competition is about luring businesses and
residents, and promoting job growth and
prots.
However, because of their symbolic and
aesthetic nature, skyscrapers can also be used
to express psychological or sociological
needs. A tall building can be a monument to
local pride or a work of civic art that enhances
citizens sense of place. The skyscraper can
advertise the city, as a formof urban
boosterism, drawing tourists, and placing it
within the national and international
conversations on cities.
Additionally, tall buildings can be used to
express developers desire to engage in
conspicuous consumption (or investment) to
project economic strength, and achieve a
higher social status. But the need for pride-,
ego- or advertising-based construction is also
a competitive process, since the height and
size of these projects mainly serve their
purposes only relative to the height and size
of other projects.
The two forms of competition can lead to two
dierent outcomes. On the one hand, if
developers in City 1 go on a building spree, it
will reduce the price of building space. If
developers in City 2 see a falling price, the
rational response is to hold o on
construction because of declining revenues
fromnewprojects. Thisnegative response by
builders means that skyscrapers in the two
cities arestrategic substitutes: if City 2 sees
that City 1 is heavily engaged in construction,
builders in City 2 nd that reducing
construction is the most protable response.
In general, markets in which a handful of rms
all produce a similar commodity will exhibit
this strategic-substitutes property.
Companies, for example, are frequently
moving their corporate headquarters, based
on which city provides the best bundle of
o ce space, employees, and access to
markets and suppliers (Strauss-Kahn &Vives
2009). If these companies see an opportunity
to move to a city with newer o ce space,
they will do so.
However, if building height has non-expressly-
economic purposes, such as advertising, local
pride or ego satisfaction, then relative height
is an important strategic variable. If developers
in one city go particularly tall, builders in the
other city will respondpositively by adding
height to their buildings. In this case, building
heights can be calledstrategic complements,
in the sense that heights in the two cities
move together. Since Chicago and NewYork
were the rst skyscraper cities in the United
States and were linked economically, we can
look to these two cities to test these
competition theories.
Chicago and New York
With the completion of the Erie Canal in 1825,
and the settling of Chicago in the 1830s, New
York and Chicago became trading partners.
Capital, imports, and settlers owed west, while
agricultural goods owed east. But as the
relationship developed, they also became rivals.
In 1871, Chicagos Great Fire destroyed much of
the citys o ce space, and gave it the chance
to build a modern, reproof business district.
The Home Insurance Building, completed in
Chicago in 1885 (see Figure 1), was the rst
to incorporate an iron-skeleton structure to
bear the load of the building; it paved the
way for the citys early skyscraper boom.
Architects, engineers, and builders whocut
their teeth on Chicagos rst generation of
skyscrapers were later employed in NewYork
as well. This interaction has lead John
Zukowsky to write: Chicago and NewYork
these are often thought to be the two
great superpowers of American architecture.
Architects consider each city to have its own
style, its own way of shaping its local
environment, its own individualistic
contributions to the history of architecture.
Yet these contributions were not developed
in isolation. Throughout the 19th and 20th
centuries there has been, and still is, a
considerable amount of competitive
interaction between architects, contractors,
and developers in both cities (Zukowski
1984:12).
The list of past and present interactions is
long, but here are a fewimportant examples.
In the early period, Louis Sullivan, arguably
Chicagos most famous skyscraper architect,
designed one of his signature buildings in
NewYork the Bayard-Condict Building, in
1899 (see Figure 2). Builder and skyscraper
pioneer George Fuller and his rmbuilt
skyscrapers such the Monadnock (1893) and
the Rookery (1888) in Chicago, and the New
York Times (1904) and Flatiron (1902)
building (see Figure 3) in NewYork, the latter Figure 2. Bayard-Condict Building, New York, 1899.
Antony Wood
Figure 3. Flatiron Building, New York, 1902. Marshall
Gerometta
40 | AYear in Review: Tall Trends 2013 AYear in Review: Tall Trends 2013 | 41 CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I
01 JW Marriott Marquis Hotel Dubai Tower 2
Dubai, 355 m/1,116 ft
02 Mercury City Tower
Moscow, 339 m/1,112 ft
03 Modern Media Center
Changzhou, 332 m/1,089 ft
04 Al Yaqoub Tower
Dubai, 328 m/1,076 ft
=05 The Landmark
Abu Dhabi, 324 m/1,063 ft
=05 Deji Plaza
Nanjing, 324 m/1,063 ft
07 Cayan Tower
Dubai, 307 m/1,008 ft
=08 East Pacic Center Tower A
Shenzhen, 306 m/1,004 ft
16 East Pacic Center Tower B
Shenzhen, 261 m/856 ft
=08 The Shard
London,
306 m/1,004 ft
10 Dongguan TBA Tower
Dongguan, 289 m/948 ft
11 United International Mansion
Chongqing, 287 m/942 ft
12 Chongqing Poly Tower
Chongqing, 287 m/941 ft
Small Increase in Completions
Marks Return to Upward Trend
AYear in Review: Tall Trends of 2013
Report by Daniel Safarik and Antony Wood, CTBUH; Research by Marty Carver and Marshall Gerometta, CTBUH
Note: Please refer toTall Buildings in Numbers 2013: ATall Building Review in conjunction with this paper, pages 3839
By all appearances, the small increase in the
total number of tall-building completions
from2012 into 2013 is indicative of a return to
the prevalent trend of increasing completions
each year over the past decade. Perhaps 2012,
with its small year-on-year drop in
completions, was the last year to register the
full eect of the 2008/2009 global nancial
crisis, and a small sigh of relief can be let out
in the tall-building industry as we begin 2014.
At the same time, it is important to note that
2013 was the second-most successful year
ever, in terms of 200-meter-plus building
completion, with 73 buildings of 200 meters
or greater height completed. When examined
in the broad course of skyscraper completions
since 2000, the rate is still increasing. From
2000 to 2013, the total number of 200-meter-
plus buildings in existence increased from261
to 830 an astounding 318%. Fromthis point
of view, we can more condently estimate
that the slight slowdown of 2012, which
recorded 69 completions after 2011s record 81
was ablip, and that 2013 was more
representative of the general upward trend.
Of course, each year is extraordinary in its own
way. Here are some of 2013s key milestones:
2013 was the second-most successful year
on record for completion of buildings 200
meters or greater in height. In 2013, 73 such
buildings were completed, second only to
the 81 completions of 2011 (see
completions graphic on page 39).
For the fourth year running, nine supertalls
were again completed in 2013. These 36
supertalls, built over the last four years,
comprise nearly half the total number of
supertalls that nowexist (77).
Across the globe, the sumof heights
of all 200-meter-plus buildings completed
globally in 2013 was 17,662 meters also
the second-ranked in history, behind the
2011 record of 21,642 meters (see graph on
page 38).
Of the 73 buildings completed in 2013, 12
or 16% entered the list of 100 Tallest
Buildings in the World.
For the sixth year running, China had the
most 200-meter-plus completions of any
nation, at 37 located across 22 cities.
The tallest building to complete in 2013
was the 355-meter JWMarriott Marquis
Hotel Dubai Tower 2 in Dubai, UAE (see
image on opposite page).
Three of the ve tallest buildings
completed are in the United Arab Emirates,
for the second year in a row.
Figure 1. The tallest 20 buildings completed in 2013.
13 Shimao International Center O ce Tower
Fuzhou, 273 m/896 ft
14 Suzhou Center
Suzhou,
268 m/879 ft
15 Bicsa Financial Center
Panama City, 267 m/876 ft
=18 Radisson Plaza Hotel
Xiaoshan Tower 1
Hangzhou, 258 m/846 ft
17 Jing An Kerry Centre Tower 2
Shanghai, 260 m/853 ft
=18 Garden Square
Shanghai, 258 m/846 ft
=18 The Metropolitan O ce Tower
Tianjin, 258 m/846 ft
The city of Goyang, Korea, has debuted on
the world skyscraper stage with eight
200-meter-plus buildings completing in
2013.
Europe has two of the 10 tallest buildings
completed in a given year for the rst time
since 1953.
Panama added two buildings over 200
meters, bringing the small Central
American nations count up to 19. It had
none as recently as 2008.
Of the 73 buildings over 200 meters
completed in 2013, only one, 1717
Broadway in NewYork (see image bottom
right), was in the United States.
Key Worldwide Market Snapshots of 2013
Asia
Asia completely dominated the world
tall-building industry, at 74%of worldwide
completions with 53 buildings in 2013 (see
region pie chart on page 39), against 53%
with 35 buildings in 2012. Asia nowcontains
45%of the 100 Tallest Buildings in the World.
China remained the heavyweight and overall
undisputed champion of tall-building
construction in 2013. A total of 37 two-
hundred-meter-plus buildings were
completed 50%of the global total up
from24 in 2012. The sumof heights of all
200-meter-plus buildings in China in 2013 was
8,876 meters, compared to 5,823 meters in
2012, an increase of 52.4%.
These buildings were spread across 22 cities.
Shenzhen proved to be the most active
skyscraper city, doubling its number of
completions fromthe previous year, fromtwo
to four. It was closely tailed by Chongqing and
Shanghai, which tied at three. Nanjing,
Shenyang, Suzhou, Hefei, Tianjin, Nanning,
Xiamen, and Guangzhou each claimed two
completions. Of these, Hefei and Xiamen are
rst-timers; these cities have never completed
buildings of 200 meters or more until 2013.
The tallest building to complete in China in
2013 was the 332-meter Modern Media
Center in Changzhou.
Korea had the next-largest number of tall
completions in the Asian region, though its
gure of nine buildings was almost entirely
due to the opening of an eight-building
complex, the Tanhyun Doosan project, whose
subtitle, appropriately enough, is Weve the
Zenith. Goyang, a city of 1.5 million near
Seoul, is nowon the world skyscraper map, in
2013Tallest #40: 1717 Broadway, NewYork City, North
Americas only 200 m+ building in 2013. Tectonic Photo
2013 Tallest #1: JW Marriott Marquis Hotel Dubai
Tower 2. JW Marriott Marquis Hotel Dubai
24 | Social Issues Social Issues | 25 CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I
Recent trends of urbanization have caused a
dramatic increase in the worldwide urban
population. The failures of the tower block
schemes of the 1960s made living in
high-rises unpopular in Europe and North
America. For much of the last century,
developers have historically found tall
buildings appropriate only for o ce and
commercial uses. However, limited buildable
land resources have inevitably changed city
growth patterns fromoutward horizontal
spread to vertical growth. The re-emergence
of the high-rise as a housing typology
presents the opportunity to consider the
mistakes of the past and address the
demands of a wider population.
The current trends of residential living in the
sky reveal that home buyers today hold a
dierent perspective on high-rise living. They
expect a vibrant urban setting. They are
moving to developments that require little
maintenance and provide communal space
for recreation and socializing. As these shifts
occur, designers and developers have a
mission: to understand these needs and
desires and translate theminto sustainable,
integrated residential places.
Improving the Social Sustainability of High-Rises
There appears no good reason for people to move to suburbs in search of a
better life. If cities can offer themsubstantial reasons to keep coming back,
such as jobs, entertainment, and amenities, the city should be able to provide
a socially sustainable habitat. With adaptations fromlow-rise environments,
tall buildings would soon be a desirable format to live in. This paper studies
the social benefits of horizontal neighborhood communities, and explores the
difficulty of transferring theminto a vertical format.
Figure 1. Urbanization trends. Source: UN, Department of Economic and Social Aairs. 2012.
World Urbanization Prospects, the 2011 Revision.
Social Issues
Suruchi Modi
Authors
Suruchi Modi, Associate Professor
Sushant School of Art & Architecture
Ansal University
Sector 55, District Gurgaon
122 003, Haryana, India
t: +91 7838 332 206
e: suruchimodi@ansaluniversity.edu.in
www.ansaluniversity.edu.in
Suruchi Modi
Suruchi Modi is currently an Associate Professor
and Assistant Dean at Sushant School of Art &
Architecture, India. She is a gold medalist with a
double masters in Urban Design from Cept University
and Tall Building Design from the University of
Nottingham, United Kingdom. She has received
the Sir Patrick Geddes Award for her innovative
project revival of the mixed land-use concept as a
tool to develop a sustainable city model. She is also
an international award winner of the Passivhaus
skyscraper design for New York City, facilitated at the
University of Prague. Modi has worked on large-scale
masterplanning and urban revitalization projects
throughout India, and has been actively involved in
academia and research on sustainable architecture
for over 10 years. Her work aims to extend the realm
of sustainability to the real estate-driven high-rise
development of todays cities.

Adecit of social support, reduced exposure

to divergent views, the lack of ability to
consider opposing viewpoints and the gestation
of mistrust or general disengagement fromthe
community are all results of reduced physical
interaction.

Residential Tall Buildings Re-emergence
Today the world is facing escalating rates of
urbanization and exponential growth in the
use of energy and resources. The world
population presently stands at 6.9 billion a
gure expected to reach 10.1 billion by the
year 2100 (United Nations 2011). Furthermore,
statistics indicate that in developing
countries, the urban population is expected
to double from2.6 billion in the year 2010 to
5.2 billion by 2050. Developed nations show
an increase in urbanized populations from0.9
billion in 2010 to 1.1 billion in 2050. However,
during the same period the worlds rural
population decline is 0.6 billion(ibid). This has
been the principal cause of the ever-
increasing demand for homes a challenge
for all cities across the world (see Figure 1).
History has witnessed various planning
discourses intended to solve the problemof
housing, such asurban sprawl, which loosely
follows the principles laid down by Ebenezer
Howard and Le Corbusier. This single-use,
automobile-driven suburban development
had dominated the urban milieu in the latter
half of the 20th century, which has been
condemned due to its negative
environmental and social impact. By the
1990s, theCompact City model, based on
the principles of NewUrbanism, was
envisioned as a solution to urbanization. It
promotesmixed-use, high-density living,
based on e cient public transport systems,
walkable neighborhoods, increased
opportunities for social interaction and an
overall sustainable systemwith lowenergy
consumption and reduced pollution (Burton
et al. 1996).
Dense urban living proves better for the
people and the city in terms of retaining
countryside, saving time and money on travel,
reducing infrastructure, and allowing people
to enjoy the vibrancy of city life. However, a
challenge to architects and planners lies in
translating this urban compaction into a
sustainable future for our cities. In pursuit of
this goal, the beginning of the 21st century
sawplanners and municipalities choose
developments with smarter, more
community-focused plans. These movements
aimto achieve sustainable neighborhoods.
Smart growth does so by focusing on
regional characteristics to foster a unique
sense of place and community, oering better
employment, transportation, and housing
solutions. Urban inll focuses on development
of vacant, undeveloped, and underdeveloped
land parcels within an existing community
and organizing populations densely, and
increasing work and play opportunities
through adjacency.
Such trends, when combined with scarcity of
land and increasing need for aordable
housing, are pushing high-density residential
buildings to the forefront. Though the idea of
living in supertall buildings has gained
momentumwith the introduction of
high-end luxury apartments, the experience
of high-rise aordable housing has not been
as satisfactory. Despite the middle class
increasing di culty in purchasing homes, and
the fact that the designs of residential
high-rise solutions for this demographic are
not backed up by much research into the
actual experience of living in them. Many of
these projects still continue to resonate with
the fears and problems of the past; they are
considered to be socially unsustainable.
The Signicance of Social Sustainability
Today, social sustainability is regarded as an
important pillar of sustainability in general. As
per the 1992 UN Earth Summit and the 2000
Presidency Conclusions of the European
Council, social concerns will be taken up for
due consideration in the sustainability
agenda (United Nations 1993). Social
sustainability is dened as adevelopment
that is compatible with the harmonious
evolution of civil society, fostering an
environment favorable to the compatible
cohabitation of culturally and socially diverse
groups, while at the same time encouraging
social integration, with improvement in the
quality of life for all segments of the
population (Polese & Stren 2000). Also, social
communities are dened asplaces where
people want to live and work, nowand in the
future. They meet the diverse needs of
existing residents without compromising on
those of the future, by being sensitive to their
environment and contributing to a high
quality of life.
Social sustainability is nowof paramount
concern alongside mankinds withdrawal from
traditional social structures. This has
happened with the invasion of electronic
social networking and the diminishment of
outdoor spaces in which children can play
and adults can interact. Technology enables
leisure and work fromhome but is making
people less social in the physical world (Beld
2012). A decit of social support, reduced
exposure to divergent views, the lack of ability
to consider opposing viewpoints and the
gestation of mistrust or general
disengagement fromthe community are all
results of reduced physical interaction. A
generation conditioned to isolation could
have devastating eects on society.
Evolution of Social Spaces in Residential
High-rises
The practice of living in multistory structures
dates back to ancient Rome, where such
structures often appeared as mixed-use
buildings with shops for the rich on the lower
oors and housing for the lower-class
residences above. Medieval city skylines also
reveal such mixed-use towers. However,
purely residential tall buildings did not begin
to dominate the city skylines until after the
Second World War. In the years that followed,
social movements motivated architects to
conceptualize housing for the masses, as well
as the growing middle class in the cities. The
Modernist, Humanist, and Rationalist
movements laid out their visions of ideal
residential living, which reached their zenith in
the 1950s and 1960s. This period was followed
by the oil crisis of 1973, which resulted in loss
of public funding and stagnation in the
incomes of households, which had a direct
impact on the housing market. Such
situations provided little incentive for
12 | Tree House Residence Hall, Boston CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I
A Coat of Many Colors
B. K. Boley
Case Study: Tree House Residence Hall, Boston
The Tree House, a 20-story residential tower for 493 freshmen, is inspired by
Gustav Klimts painting, The Tree of Life. It is clad in more than 5,000 composite
aluminum panels of various widths and depths, resulting in an organic,
colorful expression along Bostons Huntington Avenue, also known as the
Avenue of the Arts. Opened in 2012, the new residence hall includes a ground
floor caf and living room, a second-floor health center, third-floor pajama
programs consisting of communal spaces, and 17 floors of suites with
lounges and studio workrooms.
Figure 1. Mirrored artwork at the caf. Lucy Chen
Tamara Roy
The Massachusetts College of Art and Design
Opening in 1873 as the United States rst
independent public college of art and design
and the rst art school to grant a degree
Massachusetts College of Art and Design
(MassArt)s mission is to educate tomorrows
ne artists, designers, and art educators in the
creative process. In 2007, the school found
itself woefully short of student residence halls,
and hoped to achieve the housing of 50% of
its student body through the construction of a
new building.
The MassArt campus sits along the Avenue of
the Arts (Huntington Avenue), near Symphony
Hall, the Museum of Fine Arts, and the Isabella
Stewart Gardner Museum. Housed in a series
of brick buildings punctuated by a 1960s
11-story black glass tower, the school was
ready for a new image. After doing an
extensive economic feasibility study for two
potential locations for the residence hall, it
was determined that a 21-story tower of
narrow footprint, snug to the rear of an
existing faculty parking lot and visible from
Huntington Avenue, was the best choice.


Good Timing for Funding
When the request for proposals went out to
qualied architect/contractor teams in 2007,
the US economy teetered on the brink of the
largest recession of the last 50 years. The
Massachusetts State College Building
Authority (MSCBA) develops residence halls
and other revenue-generating facilities for
the nine state university campuses; these
projects are funded through revenue bonds
whose debt service is oset by the student
rent and fees. The Commonwealth of
Massachusetts neither funds these projects
nor guarantees these bonds.
At the time, the Strategic Plan for MassArt
included the need for several hundred
additional beds to meet its recruitment and
retention goals. This was a signicant
opportunity to build required residence hall
capacity at a time of low-interest bond
nancing, competitive bidding, and tighter
pricing, which would provide better value for
the students who would live in the future
building. The available land for this project
was limited, and the only way to construct
an aordable residence hall on the very small
buildable footprint was to design a tall
building. Given the nancial constraints of
the project and the physical constraints of
the site, the Tree House Residence Hall
provided the campus with a cost-eective
and energy-ecient building that is a
Authors
B. K. Boley, Principal
Tamara Roy, Senior Associate Principal
ADD Inc
311 Summer Street
Boston, MA 02210
United States
t: +1 617 234 3100
f: +1 617 661 7118
e: bkboley@addinc.com; troy@addinc.com
www.addinc.com
B. K. Boley
B. K. leads projects with a passion for design excel-
lence and sustainability. As the Director of ADD Incs
Academic Practice, he creates inspiring environments
in which to live and learn. His recent work includes
residence halls for Westfeld State University, UMass
Lowell, the Massachusetts College of Art and Design,
and Worcester Polytechnic Institute. He has also led
the design of many of ADD Incs most innovative
residential projects including 315 on A, Pier 4, and
Parcel 24. B. K. received his Bachelor of Architecture
from Carnegie Mellon University and his Master of
Architecture and Urban Design from the Berlage
Institute.

Tamara Roy
Tamara is an architect and urban designer working
at the forefront of innovative housing. Tamaras
recent academic projects include the Tree House
Residence Hall at the Massachusetts College of
Art and Design, described as the most interesting
high-rise in Boston, as well as new housing at UMass
Lowell and Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Tamara
received her Bachelor of Architecture from Carnegie
Mellon University and her Master of Architecture and
Urban Design from the Berlage Institute. Tamara was
the recipient of the BSA Women in Design Award of
Excellence in 2012.
Tree House Residence Hall, Boston | 13 CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I
dynamic addition to the skyline, as well,
according to Edward Adelman, Executive
Director of the MSCBA.


A Hyper-Collaborative Design Process

The rapid schedule and highly competitive
economic climate demanded an integrated
approach to decision-making a way of
working together through pre-construction
pricing, planning, design, and construction
that involved weekly uid sharing of
computer models between architects,
engineers, and sub-contractors, rarely seen
outside the design/build industry in projects
of this size. The project opened three months
ahead of schedule and came in under
budget. Much of this can be attributed to
ecient information management.
The design of the new residence hall is the
result of an interactive and exible process.
The architects sought a vision that could
harmonize the aspirations of college
professors, administrators, students,
trustees, alumni, and the buildings owner.
The team conducted in-depth
benchmarking and hosted focus groups
with students, residence assistants (RAs),
and facilities managers. The stakeholder
involvement culminated in an 85-person
design charrette that focused on four areas:
open space, exterior design, common
space, and typical oors/units.
Out of the exterior design group arose the
idea of realizing the building as an artistic
landmark.
In September 2012, the incoming student
residents voted to nickname the building
The Tree House.
Many of the participant comments were
woven into the nal planning and design:
The open space should be primarily a
place for sitting, in variously sized
groups, clearly identified as MassArts
public plaza.
The green design approach should not be
accomplished through gadgetry, but

MassArt wanted the building to stand out in

the Boston skyline and meaningfully identify
them as an art college It was the students idea
that the building look like a painting and that it
be just as colorful and vibrant as they are.

Figure 2. Windows confgured in response to the passive daylighting techniques. Chuck Choi
14 | Tree House Residence Hall, Boston CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I
through time-tested approaches to proper
solar orientation, reduction in glass faade
area, highly insulated faades, etc.
The students should be able to express
individual artistic statements along the
corridors.
Common spaces should be co-located to
allow for synergy, including the common
kitchen, lounge, game room, laundry,
tness, and vending machines
The shared foyers for each semi-suite
should not have sinks in them which
would turn these spaces into bathrooms
instead, the sinks should be in a separate
alcove beside the foyer
The collaboration did not end there, however.
The owner funded specic art installations
throughout the building, chosen through a
competition open to MassArt alumni. The
nal commissions fulll MassArts mission to
promote art that fundamentally changes and
enhances the experience of space. A
30.5-meter-long painted glass work lls the
lobby with reections of students and light.
An interactive composition of round mirrors
jiggles when one sits on the caf banquette
(see Figure 1). A colorful mobile depicts the
history of MassArt, enlivening a two-story
space leading up to the university health
center. A backlit photo of a cruise ship
brightens the third-oor common spaces.
To better understand the space, the architects
built a full-scale foam-core mock-up unit for
students and sta to experience and critique.
Complete with mock beds, desk and bureau
alternatives, closets, and electrical outlets, the
demonstration room generated invaluable
feedback. Making
sure that the size and
proportion of the
room was adequate
was foremost in the
designers minds.
Requests for larger
desks, stacking
bureaus, deep closet
shelves for portfolio
storage, and a wall of
homasote for
pinning up photos
and art projects all
represent the importance of designers
reaching out to future occupants.
Lastly, MassArts architecture and interior
design students helped shape the design
and functioning of the ground oor caf.
Students wanted it to serve primarily as a
nightspot for those too young to go to clubs
or lounges. In addition, the caf is open to
the public. They also suggested a central
communal table that glows like a re on cold
winter evenings to help draw students in
and create opportunities for conversations
between Wentworth Institute of Technology,
Massachussets College of Pharmacy, and
MassArt students (the three institutions share
dining and health center facilities). Students
from MassArts graphic design studio named
the caf Spoon and developed the logo.


Massing and Program
The curved base the proverbial trunk of the
tree was designed to accommodate an
underground tunnel that swerves through
the site, requiring the ecient rectangular
building to cantilever above (see Figure 3).
The ground oor contains the security desk,
caf, mail room, and lobbies (see Figure 4). It
is an extension of the landscaped plaza. The
second oor is dedicated to a student health
center, and the third oor called the
pajama oor because the students use it in
their pajamas has all the common spaces
of kitchen, lounge, laundry, and group study
spaces. Above this are 17 oors of four- and
ve-person semi-suites with independent
sink, shower, and toilet facilities, but without
kitchens (see Figure 5). Each typical oor has
two lounges at either end of a corridor to let
in natural light, and beside each suite
entrance is a marker board wall for student
artwork.


Structure
The site contains a large network of
underground culverts that carry waste to a
Massachusetts Water Resource Authority
(MWRA) wastewater treatment plant, which
serves a large percentage of downtown
Boston buildings. The MWRA has a large
easement through the site and,
consequently, the tall, slender building
curves around and cantilevers over the
easement. The structural design had to
ensure that the MWRA could construct a
7.6-meter-deep excavation to those pipes
without impacting the building or its
foundation. Furthermore, the width and
height of the building itself posed structural
challenges, requiring a deep pile foundation
and specialized bracing for support, as well
as the careful coordination of the resultant
additional structural framing with other
building systems.
The engineers modeled the existing culverts
and designed rows of protective soldier piles
on both sides of the sewage lines. The team
then used those model elements to design
the building foundation, strategically
locating the building piles to carry the load
of the building without impacting the
culverts. If the MWRA ever needs to excavate
the culverts in the future, the soldier piles will
protect its sewage lines as well as the
building foundation and the surrounding.
The team used the Revit Structural design and
3DS Max software to create a range of design
visualizations sections, cutaways, renderings,
and even animations that helped everyone
gain a better understanding of the structure
and ultimately expedite the nal approval
process. These visualizations were particularly
useful during the sewer-easement review
cycle. The team was able to demonstrate to
MWRA that the building could be built safely
while protecting its easement.
Figure 3. Main entrance. Chuck Choi
Tree House Residence Hall, Boston | 15 CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I
Figure 7. Multi-colored faade panels. Chuck Choi
Figure 4. Ground foor plan. ADD Inc
An Artful Landscape
The new landscaped open space was an
exciting opportunity for MassArt to re-craft
its public identity, create a new center of
outdoor student life, and reect the
expressive design qualities of the college.
Fronting onto the Avenue of the Arts, the
landscape capitalizes on the public life of
the street and college and serves as a
prominent landmark for the school. This
being an art college, the seat-walls go a bit
mad, extending beyond the archetype,
undulating both in plan and in section to
create seating for individuals, small groups,
and class gatherings. Custom wood
benches inset with glowing colored
polycarbonate lights complement the
curves of the seat-walls (see Figure 6).
Highly visible from the residence hall above,
the paving pattern shadows the expressive
form of the planters. Cleverly hidden
between the planters are the three sewer
manholes that need to be serviced twice a
year by large vacuum trucks. The planting is
primarily native, with swaths of evergreen
groundcovers and owering perennials
beneath a canopy of Amelanchier trees.


Digitally Expressive Skin
One of the reasons the architects chose Klimt
as an inspiration was the artists technique of
placing slightly contrasting colors beside one
another, creating richness in his paintings
that resembled tapestries with gold and
brown hues. Each of the 5,500 metal panels
that comprise the faade was considered as
a singular brush-stroke that could help build
a strong background (see Figure 7).
To reinforce the Tree of Life concept, a
total of 16,236 square meters of
4-millimeter-thick metal panels were
ordered in seven custom colors, which were
Figure 5. Typical foor plan. ADD Inc
Figure 6. External landscaping. Chuck Choi
further dierentiated with ve gloss levels to
create a shimmering composition. An
extensive color study resulted in the browns,
greens, and golds of a tree in autumn, which
were then organized from dark to light as
they ascend toward the sky.
The variety of panel depths and widths
allows the building skin to resemble the
bark of a tree. These dimensional patterns
repeat every two floors to create budget-
friendly fabrication and installation
efficiency, but are combined with an overlay
of varying panel colors to prevent the
repetition from being easily recognized.
The double-insulated metal panels are made
of aluminum-composite material. The wall
assembly is a pressure-equalized rainscreen
system that meets the NFPA 285 multistory
re test and the Massachusetts State Energy
Code. The buildings faade includes areas of
curtain wall and low-e windows that have a
solar tint to reduce heat gain.
1. TV Lounge & Snack Kitchen
2. 2 Person Semi-Suite
3. 3 Person Ra-Suite
4. 4 Person Semi Suite
5. 5 Person Semi-Suite
6. Cell Phone Lounge
7. Trash & Recycling
1. Lobby
2. Caf
3. Mailboxes
4. Security
5. Art Installation
6. Health Clinic Entrance
16 | Tree House Residence Hall, Boston CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I
Building Information Modeling (BIM)
The constrained footprint mandated that
every square inch of space had to be utilized
eectively in order to meet the program
goals and requirements within the
constraints of the site. BIM modeling of all
components and systems enabled real-time
visualization and coordination by all team
members, allowing the team to recognize
conicts early in the design phase. Full
modeling of major MEP and re protection
systems provided assurance to the design
team, contractor, and owner that early
design decisions were workable, reducing
the risk as the project design progressed.
BIM facilitated the high level of coordination
that was required to integrate the building
architecture and mechanical systems with
the structural system, and produce the
comprehensive and complete set of
construction documents required for a
public bid process. All major design team
members (architecture, structural, and MEP
engineers) used the Revit design platform to
enable more accurate and faster cross-
disciplinary design coordination and
proactive clash avoidance.
To improve model delity between structural
design and fabrication, the structural
engineer shared the Revit Structure design
models with the steel fabricator, which
imported them into its steel detailing
software. This resulted in zero revise-and-
resubmit requests during the steel shop
drawing process a factor unheard-of in a
high-rise structure.
During construction administration, the
design teams exported their Revit les, and
the contractor combined those les using
Navisworks software. Each sub-contractor
was required to generate 3D shop drawings,
which were integrated into the federated
Navisworks model for use by MassArt
facilities personnel post-construction.


Lean Construction Means Teamwork
MassArts new residence hall has become the
rst example of the use of lean construction
techniques in New England. Begun on the
West Coast, this method of planning breaks
the job down into ecient, repeatable
batches that benet from using the same
small group of laborers from each sub-
contractor, who follow each other in a logical
order, then move on to the next batch.
After a dicult winter construction season,
the lead contractor invited the interior
sub-contractors to attend an in-house
workshop that included a Lego team-building
exercise. Each team competed to build Lego
airplanes: at rst, without a clear strategy,
teams only built three planes. But after
developing a clear sequence of responsibility,
they could build up to 30 planes within the
same time limit. It was a telling indicator of
how each team member (whether
responsible for studs, plumbing, drywall, paint,
etc.) could move quickly through the task if
preceding members fullled their
responsibilities in the right order.
This method involved all the sub-contractors
in the creation of a pull schedule, in which
foremen contributed their expertise to
planning the work sequence and established
buy-in for the time allotted to each task. This
schedule provided better communication on
the job site, since every sub-contractor and
installer knew the work plan, which was
posted in the trailer and reviewed daily. The
result of implementing the work plan was
that construction nished two months
ahead of schedule, with fewer interruptions,
a cleaner job site, and improved safety.


Organic Sustainability
The owner had clear sustainability goals for
energy and water eciency, as well as a
desire to create healthful environmental air
quality in all of its buildings. The MassArt
building is designed to a minimum LEED
Silver certication from the US Green
Building Council, and its energy usage is 22%
more ecient than code mandates. In
keeping with the simple organic nature of
the project concept, the team focused on
passive solar and daylighting techniques,
rather than high-tech triple-skin faades and
active approaches. The team chose to
explore a super-insulated skin with smaller
punched windows, reserving the use of large
glazing panels for the studios and
workrooms that faced north, away from the
direct sun (see Figure 2). Windows were
positioned at the ends of corridors and in
stairwells, so the use of electric light could
be reduced. Windows in the bedrooms were
placed closer to the north wall of the room,
rather than centered, so natural light would
bounce o the wall, making the room
brighter, instead of getting lost on the oor.
Figure 8. Typical lounge with view to the Boston skyline. Lucy Chen Figure 9. Main lobby. Lucy Chen
Tree House Residence Hall, Boston | 17 CTBUH Journal | 2014 Issue I
Other green features include low-e glass
engineered to solar orientation, double-
insulated metal panels, closed-cell spray
insulation in the cavity wall to reduce
inltration, and low-ow plumbing xtures
that reduce the amount of potable water
usage by 33%. More than 50% of the material
used in the residential hall has recycled
content, 20% from local sources, and 70% of
the wood is certied by the Forest
Stewardship Council.
Clear windows on the towers north faade
provide light favorable to artists work and a
view to the Boston skyline (see Figure 8), while
the south sides fewer windows are solar-
tinted to help reduce heat gain. The windows
are operable, and a green signal lamp tied
into the building management system and
located near the elevators, lets students know
when its advisable to open the windows.


Interior Design Wood and Color
On the ground oor, a ceiling of variegated
wood slats hovers over a swirling yellow sofa,
capturing the whimsy of the Klimt painting
at the base of his tree (see Figure 9). At the
third-oor common areas, light wood
paneling with bright paint reveals provides a
backdrop of warmth and richness to the
graphic lm used elsewhere in the project
(see Figure 10), such as the purple bubbles in
the laundry room.
On every oor, a charcoal carpet with threads
of gold, orange, and green provides a neutral
backdrop for brightly colored walls and
corridors. The architects interiors team used a
palette that ranged from deep blues to bright
orange, green, and yellow, making every two
oors appear dierent, and giving art students
a reason to travel to other levels of the building.
This is especially apparent at the typical oor
lounges, which are the rst areas visible to
those emerging from the elevator lobby.
With color-coordinated sofas, swivel chairs,
and ottomans, each lounge color gives a
unique identity to the community of
students and residential assistants living
there. Each lounge is an essay in how color
aects the perception of space; every
student has a favorite color oor, and each is
distinct and special.
Within the semi-suites, color is used sparingly
to allow the students to personalize their
Figure 10. Third-foor common area. Lucy Chen
own spaces. Yet even in the mundane spaces
of shower rooms and toilets, a vertical strip
of colored tile is added as if to say, Dont
forget this is an art school.


Expressive Urbanism
Art urges us to think, reect, and speak.
MassArt has trained generations of artists to
speak out and engage others, but their
physical campus, inherited from the Boston
Normal School, has lacked an ability to
represent the place of MassArt in the culture
of urban planning and architectural design.
The Tree House, now open for almost a year,
has allowed the school and the students to
announce their position along the Avenue of
the Arts and to articulate their belief that Art
matters, that Architecture matters, and that
city building and expression is everyones
business and responsibility.


Project Data
Completion Date: June 2012
Height: 85 meters
Stories: 21
Area: 13,519 square meters
Use: Residential
Owner: Massachusetts State College
Building Authority
Architect: ADD Inc
Structural Engineer: Odeh Engineers, Inc.
MEP Engineer: WSP Flack + Kurtz
Main Contractor: Suolk Construction
Other Consultants: Ground Inc. (landscape);
Lerch Bates (vertical transportation); Nitsch
Engineering (civil); SGH (faade); C3 (code)

To reinforce the Tree of Life concept, a total

of 5,500, 4-millimeter-thick metal panels were
ordered in seven custom colors, which were
further differentiated with fve gloss levels to
create a shimmering composition. An extensive
color study resulted in the browns, greens, and
golds of a tree in autumn, which were then
organized from dark to light as they ascend.