Philip Morris USA
Operations Center (1982)
Richmond, Virginia

570,000 SF • 53,000 SQ M

This two-story Operations Center is composed of three main volumes devoted to administrative offices, engineering laboratories, and a pilot manufacturing plant. A three-story skylit atrium running along the diagonal axis of the two office blocks functions as the main interior circulation route, which allows those walking along it to see and learn about activities outside their own departments. Outside, the spine becomes a covered portico or link with the pilot plant.

These public spaces are the fixed elements around which the open plan office scheme can change at will. Most employees occupy open plan work stations that are rectangular for administrative staff and square for engineers, based on equipment needs. Though the complex provides work space for over 1300 employees, a feeling of intimacy was established by placing enclosed offices in the interior spaces in parallel rows diagonally crossing the diamonds to limit the expanse of any one open plan space while preserving views of the outdoors and the atrium.

Clear anodized aluminum panels and one-inch thick insulating glass clad the 1000-foot-long building in a high-tech, energy efficient, envelope. Computerized sunscreens control sun exposure at all windows, while wall panel louvers beneath each window allow for four air changes an hour should the central air system be shut down.

(Photography by Wolfgang Hoyt / ESTO)