BBH Wins Structural Engineering Excellence Award from STRUCTURE Magazine

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Click the image to view the December 2022 issue of STRUCTURE.

Congratulations to Forell Elsesser, the engineering firm contracted for the seismic retrofit that turned the former Berkeley Art Museum from a structural liability to the Bakar BioEnginuity Hub, a robust building home to the Bakar Labs incubator! They’ve won a Structural Engineering Excellence Award from STRUCTURE magazine. Here’s the BBH entry:

Category 7: Forensic/Renovation/Retrofit/Rehabilitation Structures over $20 Million | Award Winner
UC Berkeley, Bakar BioEnginuity Hub – Berkeley, CA | Forell Elsesser Engineers
Bakar BioEnginuity Hub transforms a historically-significant former art museum from a structurally-deficient inoperable space into a coworking life science lab. The design, including a glass-fronted addition, modernizes the highly irregular 1971 building while honoring its original brutalist design. The team converted the upper-level galleries into glass-fronted labs that overlook dramatic cantilevered ramps hanging in a sky-lit double-height space. The project included a full seismic retrofit using buckling restrained braces located several hundred feet from the active Hayward Fault.

The National Council of Structural Engineers Associations (NCSEA) is pleased to publish the winners of the 2022 Structural Engineering Excellence Awards. The awards were announced Thursday, November 3rd, during NCSEA’s Structural Engineering Summit, held at the Chicago Hilton. A video of the presentation can be found on the NCSEA website. The Awards are given annually; each year, the entries highlight work from the best and brightest in our profession.

A new award was introduced this year at the Summit – The Structure of the Year Award. This new award was created to honor the most innovative and creative project, regardless of category or budget. This award was determined by an independent group of past presidents whereby they ranked the eight Outstanding Structure Category Winners based on the judging criteria used in each category. The award went to Climate Pledge Arena – Seattle, Washington; Thornton Tomasetti.

Awards were given in eight categories, with eight Outstanding projects awarded. The categories were:

New Buildings under $30 Million
New Buildings $30 Million to $80 Million
New Buildings $80 Million to $200 Million
New Buildings over $200 Million
New Bridges and Transportation Structures
Forensic | Renovation | Retrofit | Rehabilitation Structures under $20 Million
Forensic | Renovation | Retrofit | Rehabilitation Structures over $20 Million
Other Structures

The 2022 Awards Committee was chaired by Carrie Johnson (Wallace Design Collective, PC, Tulsa, OK). Ms. Johnson noted: “The judging was conducted in two rounds. NCSEA Past Presidents performed the first round; the second round was done by the Northeast Chapter of the Florida Structural Engineers Association (FSEA). The judges were truly impressed by the quality, innovation, and creativity of the award submissions.” The judges selected the winning projects based on the following criteria:

the creativity of structural design
the complexity of criteria or unique problems
innovative application of new or existing material or techniques
efficient use of materials and labor
constructability challenges and solutions

Please join NCSEA and STRUCTURE magazine in congratulating all the winners. More in-depth articles on several of the 2022 winners will appear in the Spotlight section of the magazine over the 2023 editorial year. Visit the NCSEA website for more information at www.ncsea.com.