CSC Financial Services Group Headquarters
Austin, Texas
The two 350,000-square-foot CSC buildings on Lady Bird Lake in downtown Austin occupy one of the most critical sites in the recent revitalization of the city’s core. The six-story buildings create an appropriately scaled edge to the lake and the parkland alongside it.
On the south face of each block a courtyard is carved out of the building’s mass, opening views out to the lake and parkland and taking full advantage of the south light. The simple, modest massing of the buildings defers to the civic plaza and new city hall between them. The historic Schneider Building on the northeast corner of the westernmost block is carefully integrated into the ensemble of office buildings and open spaces.
The buildings accommodate the needs for easy ingress / egress of employees at all hours, high levels of security, frequent visitor access, large floor plates and proximity to outdoor spaces and recreation. The design solution creates direct connections between parking and office floors, large “loft” studios, a “village” of communal spaces on each floor, locker rooms with connections to Town Lake Park, and generous lobbies which can be used for internal as well as community social functions.
In the office spaces upstairs, two distinct zones were created – an active conference zone and a more private work zone. The main circulation, restrooms, break rooms and the teaming rooms were located in or near the buildings core, consolidating the noisy spaces. Wing walls were created to form buffers between the generous hallway and an open work zone at the building’s edges. To keep the view avenues open from the open office space, strict guidelines were set as to where closed offices could be located — in most cases, along the buffer walls of the interior. Where an office with an outside window was required, the design team placed it along the window wall facing the buildings courtyard. These ideas helped maintain the view to Lady Bird Lake and downtown for the rest of the open office.
Awards: AIA Austin-Honor Award; Austin Downtown Alliance IMPACT Award; Society of American Registered Architects Design Award of Honorable Mention; AGC Building of the Year
Publications: Architectural Record, June 2002; Contract, May 2003; Office Spaces (Australia), 2002; Texas Architect, November/December 2002