J. Craig Venter Institute at UCSD – San Diego, California
With Andropogon Associates of Philadelphia, PA.
This world class, state of the art facility is California’s first truly sustainable laboratory facility, the first carbon neutral addition to the UCSD campus, and of course, is rated LEED Platinum. The new Venter Institute building is the site of the latest in genomic focused research.
As Landscape Architects of record (with Andropogon Associates of Philadelphia), an all native landscape was planned, with intensive and extensive roof gardens covering 12% of the building area. Magnificent views of the Pacific Ocean and public access to the Skeleton Canyon Ecological Reserve were preserved. All supplemental irrigation is from collected rainfall, stored in cisterns below the building and site. Several major, existing Torrey Pine trees were successfully transplanted.
Our firm provided extensive design support for all planting, all irrigation design and some assistance with hardscape development, and complete Construction Administration.
After construction, we completed the revegetation of the adjacent 4-acre site with native plants and temporary irrigation.