PROTECTIVE LIFE CORPORATION HEADQUARTERS
Giattina Aycock Architecture Studio, Inc. designed and orchestrated the two major expansions of the national headquarters campus for the Protective Corporation. The first expansion, Annex 2, was completed in 1984, adding to the campus a 215,000sf, 4-story office building and 1,000-car parking deck. 18 years later, Annex 3 nearly doubled existing capacity with a 315,000sf, 7-story office building, and more than doubled existing parking with a 1,560-car deck.
Throughout growth phases, designers worked to create campus cohesion, preserve the secluded nature of the site’s forested terrain, and maximize connections between the buildings’ inhabitants and their surrounding landscape. Major site strategies served to enhance employees’ quality of life and to address issues of sustainability. Drilled pier foundations allowed preservation of hundreds of trees immediately bordering new structures. As a result, the 600,000sf campus is barely visible from the adjacent highway. And because careful design allowed such a large portion of the site to remain wooded, the vast majority of storm water is reabsorbed within the site, entering the off-site system only in a major storm event.
The campus buildings are designed with a material language that knits together new and old, complementing and reflecting the surrounding landscape and maximizing its experience throughout. The main vehicular entry sequence winds through the woods to approach Annex 2’s acute angle of mirrored glass, reflecting surrounding trees to camouflage the building within its landscape. Annex 3 is clad in slate and granite, which recall original campus buildings and ground the structure to its site; reflective glass recalls Annex 2 and reflects surrounding woods; and stainless steel panels set the building apart, while maintaining the quiet dignity of its campus neighbors. Within each building, the core is located in the center of the structure, allowing the majority of interior space to be open to natural and planted vistas on all sides. The campus concept encourages users to engage in the landscape. Visitors enter through a transparent lobby which links the annex buildings and overlooks a central fountain court with river birch trees. A bamboo garden was built above a service area, and a secluded courtyard was created between buildings where meals and meetings take place under Pistache trees.
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