Sonoma State University, which opened its Rohnert Park, Calif., campus in Sonoma County in 1961, embarked on a sustainability program in 1998. After completing four projects, it now has its first major sustainable facility: a two-story, 53,000-square-foot Student Recreation Center completed in July 2004.

The university wanted a new state-of-the-art Student Recreation Center that would also serve as a comfortable campus community center for all students. It wanted to use this building to begin “re-imaging” the campus of mostly nondescript 1960s concrete buildings using natural building materials that better reflect the rural central Sonoma County environment. Finally, it wanted to demonstrate its commitment to sustainable design by using the criteria set by the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system in the design and construction of the Recreation Center. Plus, the university wanted to do all of this on a budget of just $10.8 million, the typical cost in California for this kind of building.

To meet those goals, the university hired LPA Architects, an early member of the U.S. Green Building Council and one of the largest architectural firms in California with offices in Irvine and Roseville, to design the Student Recreation Center and to oversee construction and construction administration.

Fixing the mistakes of the past

Sonoma State University's state-of-the-art student recreation center applies sustainable design techniques. Cristian D. Costea Photography.

Sonoma State University is located at the eastern edge of suburban Rohnert Park, Calif. It is bordered by residential suburbs to the south and west, and by the primarily undeveloped green-clad Sonoma Mountains to the north and east, providing a dramatic natural backdrop for the campus. The Recreation Center, planned as a major gateway to the campus, is adjacent to the university’s primary pedestrian pathway and opens onto the Central Quadrangle. The University Center, a planned future building to the south also designed by LPA, will share the campus’ Entry Courtyard with the Recreation Center.

“The school’s 1960s buildings were designed as statements of the moment and statements of style, not as a reflection of their location and how they would be used,” says Bruce Walker, the university’s senior director of capital planning, design and construction. “They have, for example, small windows that don’t open, that don’t bring in plenty of natural light, and that don’t provide views of the beautiful surrounding environment. These buildings created a could-be-anywhere college campus. Now that they are nearing the end of their useful lives, the university is replacing them with new buildings that reflect the region’s topography, landscape and culture, and that create a memorable sense of place and identity. The location and design of the recreation center very much helps to create that new image for the school and the campus.”

The design theme for the natural and contextual stone, wood and glass recreation center focused on an indoor environment that reflected the lively physical activities of its users. Thus, LPA created an exposed interior building structure of Glu-Lam (a glue laminated engineered structural wood product) beams that also maximized ceiling heights, while the use of sunlight and natural building materials created a warm, welcoming space for all students.

The recreation center has a 2,000-square-foot main lobby with a central gallery that connects all of the spaces. To the east of the lobby is a 35-foot-tall rock-climbing tower that serves as a landmark public space on the campus. The building program also includes a 5,500-square-foot single court gymnasium and indoor soccer space to the west of the lobby, an 11,000-square-foot two-court gymnasium with an elevated running track on the northwest side of the center, two multi-purpose studios, fitness rooms, lockers, offices and support spaces.

The recreation center’s palette of natural building materials — Alaskan yellow cedar, stone, glass and a standing seam metal roof — replicate materials used elsewhere on the campus, while also complementing the university’s natural setting. The sunlit two-story lobby, for example, which was designed to be an extension of the Central Quadrangle, has a tongue-and-groove cedar ceiling and exposed Alaskan cedar Glu-Lam beams, a natural slate floor, and a certified cedar wood check-in desk. Wood trellis canopies on the southern façade create patterns of shade and shadow against the glass lobby façade and solid gym walls, minimizing solar gain and helping to break up the large building masses.

A green recreation center

The recreation center’s palette of natural building materials replicate materials used elsewhere on the campus, while complementing the university’s natural setting. Cristian D. Costea Photography.

Sonoma State University recognized that green design is the right thing to do for the campus, the community and the planet. Green buildings are also, by definition, educational buildings that teach their users about the environment and the benefits of green design. LPA enhanced those benefits with a green building design and construction that cost no more than for a typical recreation building on any other California college campus.

The recreation center is oriented on a north-south axis that promotes natural daylighting and solar control. Approximately 85 percent of the building’s interior receives natural light from the lobby’s and gallery’s southern glass façade, skylights, including an 80-foot-long skylight over the center of the main gymnasium, operable windows, and clerestories. A state-of-the-art lighting control system monitors the amount of daylight in the interior and adjusts the artificial lighting system accordingly.

Nearly 70 percent of the recreation center is naturally ventilated and cooled through skylights, operable windows, vents in the façade’s built-in seating, and a night flush of all hot air, which helps to moderate the building’s temperature. An indirect evaporative cooling system serves the offices, multi-purpose, and fitness rooms. The small gymnasium has a destratification ventilation system that brings in air low to the floor. The warming air rises and displaces through the space without mechanical ventilation.

The windowless western façade, wooden trellises and other solar shading devices, translucent skylights that bring in daylight without solar gain, and a highly efficient exterior skin and window glazing, in conjunction with the building orientation and HVAC and lighting systems, make the recreation center 40 percent more efficient than required by California’s Title 24 energy code, the most stringent in the nation.

Green materials used throughout the recreation center include recycled content carpeting, natural linoleum made from linseed oil, recycled glass tiles, wood from certified forests, and recycled materials for the solid surface counters. All of the furniture also has a high recycled content.

A signature building

The signature element of the Student Recreation Center is the 35-foot-tall glass and rock-climbing tower, which provides exercise for students and — thanks to views through the southern glass façade — terrific entertainment for passersby and people using the Central Quadrangle. At night, the illuminated tower becomes a lantern for the university and its students.

“This building, as hoped, has become a center of campus life, and it also generated a great sense of pride throughout the university,” says Bruce Walker. “Thanks to the recreation center and the four earlier sustainable projects, the university is developing sustainable policies and becoming a leader within the Cal-State system.”

Sidebar: Sonoma State University student recreation center

The recreation center's design promotes natural daylighting and solar control. The building’s interior receives natural light from the lobby’s and gallery’s southern glass façade, skylights, operable windows, and clerestories. Cristian D. Costea Photography.

Location: Rohnert Park, Calif., campus in Sonoma County

Size: 53,000-square-foot

Completed: July 2004

Design team: LPA Architects

GREEN MATERIALS:

Carpet: C&A floorcoverings — minimum 82 percent industrial reclaimed content climbing wall

Flooring: Surface America Playbound — recycled tires – purchased on California integrated waste management board grant

Linoleum: Forbo Marmoleum — renewable natural raw materials with lowest environmental impact

Miscellaneous furniture: Danko persing recycled seatbelts

Office furniture: Baltix — uses sustainable natural materials that contain no harmful adhesives, formaldehydes or VOCs

Reception counter: Avonite — uses reclaimed solid surface materials

Tile: Terra Traffic – 58 percent recycled glass

Toilet partitions and lockers: Trespa (recycled resin)

Wood sports floor: Robbins — Smartwood certified

Additional environmental features:

• 60 to 70 percent of existing buildings were recycled during demolition
• 40 percent over title 24, based on an energy model by PP&G
• Radiant floor heating system
• Insulated glazing system
• Tinted glazing
• Indirect evaporative cooling system for office and multipurpose and fitness rooms
• Destratification/ventilation system for the small gymnasium (fan coil units draw the hot air down and blow it at head level to keep the upper portion of the building cooler)
• Natural ventilation of lobby includes: operable doors along entire building face; vents in skylight and under built in seat to assure air movement; and at night they will flush the building of all hot air and use it to moderate the temperature of the building.