Program: Multi-Tenant Office

Location: Oklahoma City, OK

Client: Archipelago

Size: 5,772 square feet

Completion Date: Jan 2014

The SLIVR is a 25’ wide by 130’ long 50-year old vacant building located in the heart of Historic Film Row in Oklahoma City, a revitalized area situated within a seven-minute walk from the heart of the central business district. The unadorned loner is dwarfed by more provocative warehouses constructed by Paramount, Columbia, United Artists and Twentieth Century Fox Pictures. These neighboring structures were built between 1925 and 1949, and have recently been rehabilitated using historic tax credits offered by the United States Department of Interior. The deadCenter Film Festival has also established itself in the re-born Historic Film Row. The SLIVR is the sole non-historic building in the district and is the last to be redeveloped.

The SLIVR accommodates three design practices in the renovated existing building while providing expansion or leasable office space on the new second floor. The inhabitable space will grow from 3250 square feet in the existing slice to a new total of 5580 square feet. A courtyard of permeable paving provides space for 14 visitor spaces and embraces the entrance to the proposed redevelopment. In addition to the re-use of the existing shell, sustainable strategies employed by the proposal are, among others, the placement of shaded operable windows on the north and east facades, the employment of a rain screen façade system on the entire addition and portions of the existing structure, the use of recycled structural materials (steel and engineered lumber), and the installation of a geothermal comfort system.

Inspired by the film reels that were stored in neighboring historic buildings, the design proposal explores the architectural and tectonic implications of film projection and the camera obscura. The perforated steel rain screen serves as the layer through which activities within the building or at its urban edges are projected. The centrally located three-story entry space provides the fulcrum around which the linear massing of the existing building is rotated and flipped to inform the placement of the new second story massing. Interior circulation along the x-y-z axes provides a comprehensive mapping of the overall architecture and the consistent engagement of its skyline views

photographs by Tim Hursley

*Completed as Butzer Gardner Architects