Mid-America Transplant Services Corporate Headquarters

Having outgrown their current space in Creve Coeur, Missouri, Mid-America Transplant Services (MTS) jointly constructed a new building at The Highlands, a City of St. Louis mixed-use development.  The new building serves as MTS’s headquarters.  Mid-America Transplant Services coordinates the procurement of vital organs, tissues and eyes in hospitals throughout eastern and southern Missouri, southern Illinois, and northeastern Arkansas.

The relocation allowed the organization to move closer to area hospitals, as well as make a financial commitment to the community.  Occupying two of the four stories in the building, the new headquarters serves to centralize staff, expand meeting and clinical simulation facilities for educational programs, and have room for further expansion.

The lower level houses three state-of-the-art transplant organ recovery operating rooms, Cath lab/OR, laboratory space, as well as office and physician support areas.  The main level is home to the corporate office functions including a flexible training facility, board room, hotelling office spaces, conferencing and an extensive open office environment.  Architectural elements define the circulation path throughout the open office and support the visual display of the cultural communication program of MTS.

AIA St. Louis Office St. Louis, Missouri

For over 12 years the AIA St. Louis Chapter had been located on the second floor of the Lammert Building in downtown St. Louis.  Long committed to remaining downtown, it was time to restore AIA’s accessible presence in the community.  The Board elected to move to the first floor of the Lammert Building in a prominent 1,600 square foot suite on Washington Avenue.  OWH was selected to design the new space which includes an office, conference room and a growing bookstore.  For better street visibility, the design included restoring the large exterior windows to their original size permitting views into the bookstore.  The AIA St. Louis Chapter won a Downtown St. Louis Partnership City Streetscape Award in 2003.

Sisters of Mercy Health System Corporate Headquarters
     
Relocating to an existing office building in west St. Louis County, the new corporate headquarters for this health care organization would consolidate departments from three different locations in the metropolitan area.  The corporate offices were planned to allow for departmental flexing (both up and down) and to provide adequate space for future, as yet unidentified, department growth.  The overall design was intended to bring as much light into the center interior of the floor plate as possible while retaining a largely enclosed private office environment.  Strategically placed between perimeter and interior enclosed offices, administrative support workstations are positioned at the ends of "public streets" adjacent to the upper management whom they support.

Housed on an adjacent floor, the Conference Center is a 4,000 square foot series of fixed and flexible rooms that can accommodate small 6-10 person meetings or flex to 50-person training sessions.

Adjacent to the reception lobby space is a small catering kitchen that serves the large multi-functional boardroom.  Finally, there is a small chapel for individual and group meditation and services.

RehabCare Group Corporate Offices

OWH has provided design services for this national corporation who specialize in providing health care institutions with staffing for rehabilitation, long term acute and skilled nursing services.  RehabCare moved into their current headquarters location occupying a single floor of a 23-story Class A office building.  Over the years, RehabCare has expanded its business through acquisition and their offices now occupy four and one half floors. Recently, RehabCare elected to remain in their current location after an extensive search of possible locations in the St. Louis area.  As a result of this decision, one entire floor was totally renovated to provide additional open office space, hotelling space for their traveling employees and to provide a state-of-the-art training center.  Each of the remaining floors was renovated to improve workstation layout, interdepartmental location, and communication.

Winner of the 1997 AIA-CPC Merit Award for Interiors, OWH established its identity with this 7,500 square foot interior office renovation. To embody the firm’s aesthetic and to provide flexible, open office systems, the final design required a total renovation of the existing floor area. The separation of spaces and functions was accomplished using a large existing mechanical shaft and a series of 13 canted walls. The shaft separates the public area from the studio area. The wall geometry separates work areas from public view, yet allows visibility between work areas and the design studio. To intensify the openness of the design studio, the steel joist and gypsum roof deck structures were left exposed.