CREJ - Building Dialogue - March 2015
Our Shipping Container building at 2500 Larimer St. in Denver is one of our more interesting projects. The concept of re-purposing shipping containers is far from novel, but using 29 containers to create an infill mixed-use development was somewhat pioneering for our team at Gravitas. We were interested in exploring a shipping container building specifically for a parcel of land we had in Denver’s emerging River North neighborhood. The neighborhood has industrial roots, but has recently become fertile ground for established and emerging arts and artists, as well as start-ups and creative businesses. A mixed-use building made entirely of shipping containers seemed the perfect complement to RiNo’s mix of art and utility. To begin exploring the concept, we looked to a few successful container projects in London and New Zealand for inspiration, but we quickly learned that Instagram photos and articles in The Telegraph could only take us so far. Lucky for us, our general contractor, Sprung Construction, had a large lot a few blocks north of our site in RiNo that would serve as our concept testing ground. For the first-generation model, we built a two-story office space. The layout was simple: We placed two 8-by- 40-foot containers side by side, and mirrored that layout directly on top of these two ground-level containers (just as you would see them stacked on a cargo ship). In order to see how efficiently we could build a habitable office space out of these containers, we tested a litany of variables that would impact its success. This included everything from wall insulation (spray foam vs. batt), roof insulation (interior vs. exterior), heating and cooling (electric vs. forced air), drips and leaks, to metal expansion and contraction, floor treatment, the smells the containers emit when they heat up, what size openings we could cut in the container walls before they needed to be structurally reinforced, and more. After observing how this double-decker office space fared throughout winter, spring and summer, we used our education from the various tests to proceed with a more formalized set of plans. While the field research proved valuable, the project we envisioned was vastly different from the four dented containers with small windows and limited interior openings that we had just built. While this first generation was beautiful in its simplicity and efficiency, we were interested in creating a dynamic mixed-use project, which added to the cost and complexity. We stacked and oriented the containers with micro retail and office space in mind, along with open floor plans that would appeal to a variety of businesses. Playing with Legos proved to be a more effective resource than AutoCAD during the design development phase, and through that, we ultimately honed in on a program we thought would work. This plan of attack called for 29 containers comprising 8,200 square feet and demised into 10 suites. Needless to say, this is a much different endeavor than working with a wide-open 8,200-sf core and shell delivery. Once the infrastructure improvements were completed, each container became its own “mini-project” with welders, electricians, framers and other trade workers competing for space to complete their jobs, as there wasn’t much to go around. As anyone in construction knows, obstacles surface every day during a project no matter how tight the planning and design, but we attempted to maintain a well-choreographed dance throughout. We had a great choreographer in Sprung Construction but, due to the size constraints, our music was continually being interrupted and sometimes the song would change mid-step. Despite some of the unknowns we encountered during the job, we always had a very specific vision for the tenant mix, which helped us plan ahead for the mechanical, electrical, plumbing and penetrations required for each mini-project within the development. Some of the defined uses include: Suite 100: 640-sf fast-casual restaurant (two 40-foot containers) Suite 101: 1,280-sf full-service restaurant (four 40-foot containers) Suite 102: 640-sf clothing boutique (two 40-foot containers) Suite 103: 800-sf coffee shop (five 20-foot containers) The finished project cost more than we thought and took longer than we anticipated, but it’s the most fun I’ve ever had researching and designing, working the job site, and now watching the development thrive. The 29 containers transported textiles, spices and supplies during their past life (some for as long as 13 years), but are now filled with people and pets, backpacks and boots, local coffee, craft beer, duck confit, oysters and wood fired pizza – a testament to the power of adaptive re-use.