UCH Outpatient Pavilion Earns CBC Award

CENTERBROOK, Conn. – The UConn Health Outpatient Pavilion, a collaborative design by Centerbrook Architects & Planners, has garnered top honors from the Connecticut Building Congress.

The 306,000-square-foot facility on UConn Health’s campus in Farmington was recognized for first place in the “New Construction” category at CBC’s 20th Annual Project Team Awards.

Opened in February 2015, the Outpatient Pavilion and Garage was designed by Centerbrook and HDR Architects of Princeton, New Jersey. New Haven’s Fusco Corporation and Clark Construction of Bethesda, Maryland, were also part of the design-build team that handled the shell and core of the project.

This marks the 371st time a Centerbrook design has been honored but the first CBC Project Team recognition for the firm.

“We are proud that the Connecticut Building Congress has awarded this collaborative effort,” said Centerbrook partner Chad Floyd, the firm’s lead architect of the Outpatient Pavilion. “It is a transcendent facility for UConn Health that works seamlessly with the campus environment while exhibiting unique characteristics of its own.”

The eight-story building presents a glass curtain-walled façade that curves gently in plan in acknowledgement of the nearby curving facade of UConn Health’s John Dempsey Hospital. A lower three-story glass element wraps along the curve of the entry drive to present a clear and distinctive gesture of welcome to those being dropped off. In sync with a protective canopy, the extended arms of the three-story lobby and its bridge to the 1,400-space garage symbolically embrace entering patients and their families.

This marks the second time the UConn Health Outpatient Pavilion has been honored. It garnered an Award of Merit at the Connecticut Green Building Council Awards in 2015. The facility is also slated for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Silver certification from the U.S. Green Building Council.

Each year the CBC recognizes projects whose team members have met or surpassed goals and achieved higher project quality through collaboration among project owners, architects, engineers, constructors and trades. This year’s awards banquet was held at the Homewood Suites by Hilton in Hartford on June 14.

“UConn Health is thrilled to have our Outpatient Pavilion honored as the very best new construction in Connecticut,” says Tom Trutter, associate vice president of Campus Planning, Design, and Construction at UConn Health who accepted the award. “This award reinforces the new era at UConn Health with the physical transformation of our Farmington campus to match our daily excellence in patient care, research and education.”

The Outpatient Pavilion and Garage is one of three recent projects on the UConn Health campus that Centerbrook has been associated with. Centerbrook designed the Jackson Laboratory, opened in 2014, as well as an expansion and renovation of the UConn Health Academic Building that is slated for completion later this year.