Located in the city of Juarez, Mexico, the counselors of the Chihuahua region’s Businessmen Foundation (FECHAC) wanted to use the design of their new office building to create a positive image for their region, which is often associated, by outsiders, with the drug trade. Designed by Juarez and Mexico City–based Grupo Arkhos, the building’s primary façade is clad in four tessellated Reynobond Composite aluminum panels. At night, these panels are illuminated with color-changing LED fixtures. In addition to an award in the Walls category, the jury also selected the FECHAC Regional Office as the winner of the Building Green Award because of the many sustainable strategies employed in the project. Green roofs, sun shades, double-pane glazing, a variable-air-volume HVAC system, and low-maintenance materials were used throughout the building to significantly lower utility and construction costs.
Jury Quotes
“I thought it was really beautiful. It’s just a simple folded plane, a series of metal screens, a building that disappears into a landscape. It’s a great example of the use of metal as a design element and to create architecture and iconography.” —Andre Kikoski
“I like the different colors and shading you see during the day, but the evening photographs were beautiful, as were the different surfaces that you see in the wall relief, and in the shading areas. I really loved how they almost simulated the palm tree with the use of metal along the wall. I loved it. It’s a great use of metal. They seemed to have green in mind from the very beginning.” —Scott Kriner
“I like the sunshades a lot, the natural light, and how they broke up the two main volumes. I loved the fact that the LED lighting really does well by them, and that you get different tones at different times of day. It seemed like they really took into consideration sustainability, and putting together sustainability with great design, it was my favorite of all of them.” —Sylvia Botero
Project Credits
Project FECHAC Regional Office, Juarez, Mexico
Client Fundacion del Empresariado Chihuahuense
Architect Grupo Arkhos, Juarez and Mexico City, Mexico—Ruben Escobar-Urrutia, Ricardo Pacheco-Lopez (co-principals)
General Contractor Constructora MAYAB
Metal Product Installer Grupo Arkhos
Size 15,600 gross square feet
Metal Product
Cladding Alcoa (Reynobond composite metal panels, Silver Duragloss 5000 finish) alcoa.com