Case Studies Institutional

The road paved with good intentions needn’t lead to someplace unpleasant. Quite the contrary, as long as good materials, state-of-the-art machinery and a capable work crew are included in the process. McAnany Construction Inc., an asphalt paving and construction company in Shawnee, Kansas, has long been noted for all of the above, and in the […]

It may be a building’s exterior that gives that all-important first—some say, lasting—impression, but the interior is equally as important. It’s where people spend a large portion of their day. When that building is part of the hospitality industry, it had better seem hospitable. That means that as business practices, employers and employees evolve, they […]

Today’s university students are said to expect more variety and depth of experience from dorm-room life, quite a contrast to students of the past, who might have been happy with a single-sized mattress and couch. This has motivated schools like Saint Michael’s College to provide a selection of suite and apartment-style residence halls, offering students […]

There’s life yet in The Foundry, a different kind of existence to be sure than when it was the foremost metal-casting facility in Kalamazoo, Michigan. But workplaces may have to change in order to be relevant and this one sure has, with the industrial work of another era giving way to 50,000-plus square feet of […]

Every day it seems general contractors expect more, especially when it comes to the types of technology their subs must use for submittals, shop drawings, monthly billing, change order tracking, cloud-based project management and much more. While some companies may buckle under this pressure, or just outright resist, one subcontractor believes this is simply the […]

Wichita, Kansas, is in the heart of Tornado Alley, the swath of south-central U.S. states especially prone to the most severe wind and hailstorms. According to the Tornado History Project, since 1950, Kansas has seen more than 4,000 tornados. Hundreds of those have passed through Wichita. Then, there’s hail. According to the National Oceanic and […]

After nearly 30 years of planning, and a mound of architectural concepts considered, rethought and reworked, Bennington College is preparing to renovate its historic flagship building, known as Commons. Located on the south side of the progressive Vermont liberal arts institution, the 45,000-square-foot, three-story red brick structure has been the center of campus life since […]

History buffs have long been drawn to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, site of the 1863 Civil War battle that so turned the tide in the Union’s favor and inspired Abraham Lincoln’s famous address. At, of course, a high price. The casualty count could have filled a modern baseball stadium. About 50,000 men, fairly evenly divided between those […]

In 1859, amidst acres of 400-year-old trees in what is now the Glen Helen Nature Preserve in Yellow Springs, Ohio, Antioch College’s first president, Horace Mann, addressed the graduating class with these infamous words: “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.” Not unsurprisingly, this expectation has bred a campus culture […]

Without realizing it, most consumers in the U.S. have seen the work of Destin Drywall & Paint Inc., a national drywall and painting contractor whose clients include major retailers like Walmart, Home Depot, Kohl’s, Gander Mountain, Lowe’s and Chase Bank. The company, which is headquartered in Cypress, Texas, just outside of Houston, was founded in […]