This project is a revitilization of the exterior facade to enhance the marketing oportunities of an existing warehouse for potential life science space likely to house cGMP maufacturing, wet lab and office space. The facade plays with the geometry of opaque and perforated metal panels along with freshly painted brick to showcase the building from the exterior as well as create unique views from the interior.
The Faith & Liberty Discovery Center (FLDC) is a 40,000-square-foot new museum located on Philadelphia’s Independence Mall. The Center offers a highly interactive experience that allows visitors to explore the Bible as a cultural force and reflect on its influence on faith, liberty, and history. JacobsWyper worked in conjunction with Local Projects to craft the uniquely immersive environment that juxtaposes historical artifacts with cutting-edge technology. In addition to the design team, the client assembled a team of historians, religious experts, and legal scholars from across the nation to help create the stories through film, interactive media, imagery, artifacts, discussion, and reflection.
The Independence Visitor Center (IVC) renovation reimagines the building that serves as a gateway to Philadelphia’s rich historic attractions for a more informative and interactive experience for guests that use the facility annually as their access point to Independence Mall tourism destinations. This project grew out of the IVC’s goal to increase awareness and expand access to the center through building an identity that clearly communicates purpose and mission. This intention became intrinsic in the goals of this quite significant building renovation, ultimately using it as a brand asset through environmental graphic design and new exhibits.
This ambitious project transformed a windowless basement cafeteria into a vibrant, luxurious, light-filled food hall with nearly doubled seating capacity. Featuring an assortment of seating types and privacy levels, this amenity space is a practical “third place” for employees and visitors, creating an environment that emphasizes choice, flexibility, and comfort.
Johnson & Johnson Our Story at the Powerhouse is a new interactive experience at the company’s global headquarters in New Brunswick, NJ, designed to celebrate the company’s 130-plus-year heritage of transformative, global healthcare innovation. It is located within the oldest building on campus, a former powerhouse constructed in 1907, that has been thoroughly renovated and restored at the direction of JacobsWyper Architects. Visitors are welcomed by a new landscaped plaza and a 2,800 sf, glass-enclosed lobby addition, replacing the Powerhouse’s original office annex, that provides ADA-accessible entry into the main building.
As part of an ongoing sequential floor upgrade of an existing office tower, this new home for a corporate Human Resources department was transformed into a vibrant, hospitality-inspired workplace that sets a new standard for high-performance spaces that provide flexibility, comfort, and function across a wide range of daily office activities.
The project involved a thoughtful reimagining of the communal heart of the company’s landmark World Headquarters building, originally designed by Pei Cobb Freed (ca. 1975). The original space, located partially below grade, possessed sophisticated flourishes that the team worked vigorously to preserve and enhance from the outset, such as the thoughtful presence of natural daylighting, savvy and subtle acoustics and lighting characteristics, and a strikingly simple and authentic material and aesthetic palette.
This major renovation of Mars Drinks’ two-story Global Headquarters created an innovative activity-based workplace design. The look and feel of the workplace is dramatically changed by multiple architectural interventions designed to increase access to natural light and exterior views. A large portion of the second level floor plate is removed creating a dramatic double height space. The facade redesign increased glazing and improved aesthetics with considered details like electrochromic glass for uninterrupted views. With increased vistas to the outside the parking lot was replaced with vegetated area for true biofilic experience. The renovation was phased, allowing occupants to work in various areas of the space uninterrupted.
Building on the masterplan we completed for Moore College of Art and Design in 2020, JacobsWyper completed numerous facility changes in response to enrollment growth, pedagogical developments, and curriculum expansions. The main purpose of this project was to enhance the learning and gathering spaces on this level and to connect Wilson and Sarah Peter Halls via a physical walkway, along with a new student lounge located between buildings. The completed renovation to the lower level creates a new innovative space called the VAULT, short for Visual Arts Underground for Learning Technologies.
JWA worked with Princeton University to transform existing buildings into a new, collaborative research space for robotics to support the increase in faculty, students, and researchers in the field. Originally constructed in the 1960’s, F-Wing previously spanned two stories at the northern end of the EQuad building. F-wing previously served as an Engineering Library and student workspace. In its new form, the Robotics Lab includes an aerial drone space, a mobile robot area, a “living lab” furnished like a home, and a prototyping area, as well as faculty offices, grad student desks, and space for robotics lab managers and technical specialists. Exterior facade and roof modifications were made to provide new apertures to the outdoors creating new daylighting opportunities deep into F-Wing.
The 4th Floor Moffett Renovation at Princeton University was a full floor demolition and redesign for the Molecular Biology Department. The existing floor was comprised of concrete block walls with a messy layout, outdated finishes, and minimal light penetration. The new design simplified the layout with an open lab concept on one side of the bisecting corridor and support labs, equipment storage, and cold rooms on the opposite side. Demountable glass partitions were liberally applied to allow natural light to reach as far into the interior as possible. An adjacent graduate student open office was also implemented with updated finishes, amenities, and views to the exterior.
The iconic Lang Music Building on the Swarthmore College campus, designed in 1973 by Mitchell Giurgola Architects, was ready for renewal. The centerpiece of the renovation was the reimagining of Presser Rehearsal Room, a fully enclosed concrete box with concrete stepped seating originally designed for choral rehearsals. In the 50 years since, there has been a significant diversification of users of the space, and the room not only needed broad acoustical flexibility, it needed to be an environment that supported joyful music making. By piercing the 12” concrete walls with a large window, natural light streams into the space, enlivening the wood finishes which in turn help to make beautiful music.
The new Innovative Design Engineering Applies Science Hub is outfitted with leading-edge tools including robotics and drone stations, additive manufacturing and more. This project reflects a shifting emphasis on space usage in the College of Engineering, and it involves creating a variety of new lab spaces for teaching and research use. The new uses required new building system designs including a ventilation system for the research labs and new rooftop equipment. The renovated lab space is designed to be open and flexible, with most elements on casters, allowing for the College to reconfigure the space on a regular basis as the coursework and research dictates while the Computer Lab is also designed as flexible space, with the ability to transition between Computer Lab and Lecture Hall in a few short hours.
JWA worked with UArts to relocate their School of Music from the Merriam Theater to Terra Hall with over 40,000sf of interior fit-out renovations on seven floors of the seventeen-story high-rise in the heart of Center City Philadelphia. Careful spatial analysis and structural augmentation were completed to create the best plan for a phased reconfiguration to allow the building to continue to operate through construction. Involving multiple academic departments and complex programmatic requirements, the project realized a re-envisioned and enlarged School of Music while providing greater space utilization through interior upgrades and new furnishings. The transformation includes new recording studios, administrative offices and meeting rooms, teaching and practice spaces, an instructional circuitry lab, and relocation of the Music Library.
JWA completed a master plan for the transformation of the historic Gershman building into a new student center for the University of the Arts. The new program envisions student life and wellness services, collaboration spaces, and performance venues sensitively integrated into the historically significant architecture of this landmark building. Phase I of this work accommodates student life spaces into the first floor of the building, including a lounge, gallery, cafe, and university store. This work required new finishes to complement the historic building fabric, reconfiguration of the building’s plumbing and HVAC systems, and coordination of cafe equipment to fit it within limited existing space. Future phases envision a new fitness center and dining facility and the renovation of the upper floors into offices of student-serving departments such as health and wellness and residential life.
Blossom Hill, completed in 1916, was the summer home of Wawa’s founder Grahame Wood and the latest expansion of the Red Roof campus as part of an overall masterplan. The historic property has been renovated and restored for its new use as a conference center to support the company’s continued growth as well as an exterior gathering place for the Wawa Associates to meet under a tent. Site improvements include a hardscape terrace area, and a hardscape for a temporary tent structure that can accommodate 900 associates for meetings, a new vehicular access road and turnaround area will connect Blossom Hill to the Wawa Campus parking lot with a pedestrian path and lighting.