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From Power Generation to
Regeneration with Adaptive Reuse
The Battery, Strada, United States
The Battery, USA | Strada, stradallc.com | Photo: © Jeffrey Totaro
Estimated reading time: 16 minutes
Summary
With team-led BIM, Strada transformed a derelict, historic landmark into a mixed-use commercial, residential and hospitality venue.
Originally built in the early 1920s as The Delaware Generating Station, the adaptive reuse challenge was to convert a huge industrial facility into a human-scale space. Archicad and BIMcloud were critical to the project’s success. Digital tools enabled the team to understand, visualize, test and explore multiple options for an extremely complex project, ultimately adapting the building into a striking destination enjoyed by all.
The Practice
People-centered design
Established 26 years ago, Strada is a cross-disciplinary design studio focused on creating engaging places by combining architectural, landscape and interior design.
Since its inception, Strada has grown to almost 60 employees across three studios in Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and Chapel Hill. Projects include designs for education, workplace, retail, science & technology, hospitality, museums and exhibition space, residential and community.
The studio’s ethos is ‘Design with People in Mind®’, creating spaces that are human-centric and inspiring.
Strada places people at the center of their practice, creating meaningful experiences across the settings and environments they design. They bring a cross-disciplinary approach, broad technical expertise, and a profound commitment to expressing each client’s culture and aspirations.
Project: The Battery
Project
Location: Philadelphia, United States
Firm: Strada
Project Type: Residential, Commercial, Renovation
Project Size: 46,450 sqm / 500,000 sqf
Year of Completion: 2024
Software used: Graphisoft Archicad, Graphisoft BIMcloud, Twinmotion
Archicad has been critical to Strada’s growth, enabling us to compete against much larger studios and win a series of substantial, long-term projects.
Mark Hensler, Senior Associate, Strada
Archicad
Growing with Archicad
An early adopter of BIM and designing in 3D, Strada has worked with Archicad since the practice was founded in 2000.
The ability to design, render, and document from the same model was key to Strada’s early success.
Architects, landscape designers and interior designers use team-led BIM workflows to collaborate in the same model, and the ability to easily migrate projects to the latest version of Archicad is a key feature for many of Strada’s long-term projects.
Graphisoft has been keeping us on the leading edge of innovation for the last 25 years…The fact that we don’t have to lock a project into an old version of Archicad allows us to develop long-term projects while taking advantage of all the innovations that come out in each new version of Archicad.
Mark Hensler, Senior Associate, Strada
Discover how Archicad supports creative design thinking and collaboration while boosting productivity.
The Story of Strada through Archicad
Register here to watch Strada Senior Associate Mark Hensler’s presentation to learn how Archicad empowers Strada to fulfill its core mission of Design with People in Mind®.
The Project
Adaptive reuse for an industrial-scale challenge
One of Strada’s most successful cross-studio projects is The Battery, located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Originally built in the early 1920s as The Delaware Generating Station, the challenge was to transform a huge industrial power station into a human-scale space.
When Strada joined the project, available documentation for the original building was very limited. The team needed to understand how it could be transformed, while preserving the fabric, volumes and historic structure of the original power station. Meanwhile, working with a historic building set within city parkland, the team had to negotiate complex approvals and permissions across buildings, infrastructure and landscape, while simultaneously progressing the project design.
Project Gallery
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com, Photo: © Jeffrey Totaro
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com, Photo: © Jeffrey Totaro
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com, Photo: © Jeffrey Totaro
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com, Photo: © Jeffrey Totaro
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com, Photo: © Jeffrey Totaro
The Battery, USA, Strada, stradallc.com, Photo: © Jeffrey Totaro
Point clouds
Developing an accurate BIM model
To gain a better understanding of the existing building, Strada relied on point cloud scanning, both inside and out, to gather building information to millimeter accuracy. These scans were used as underlays to develop the BIM model in Archicad.
Meanwhile, drone surveys were conducted, where possible, to examine visual defects and structural deficiencies, and provided access to areas that would otherwise have been difficult to reach.
By combining scans and detailed measurements with the limited historic documentation, Strada created an accurate representation of the building and its existing condition.
Master point cloud workflows in Archicad with our self‑paced online course, Work with Point Clouds in Archicad.
Historic documentation of the old structure was limited
© Strada, stradallc.com
Orthophotos of the existing facades were created using point cloud scans
© Strada, stradallc.com
Decisions in 3D
Using Archicad to Drive Design Decisions
Working with the Archicad model in 3D, Strada was able to show the client the many different possibilities for converting the space.
The original building is immense and was not designed for people. Instead, it was filled with machinery including boilers, turbines and switches. There were 12 boilers in each boiler house, each four stories high, with no floors. The building was also in bad disrepair, so exploring the space virtually was the safest option.
Many client meetings involved cutting through the Archicad model and looking for ways to reuse the structure and all its industrial parts. Working in 3D was the only way the team could make decisions on the conversion.
The Battery, USA | Strada, stradallc.com
With the help of Archicad, we were able to give the client a detailed understanding of what they had and what the options were. With Archicad at the center, we were able to use 3D views and sectional cuts to offer different solutions.
Mark Hensler, Senior Associate, Strada
The Strada team at the Delaware Power Station before it became The Battery
© Strada, stradallc.com
BIMcloud
Team-led BIM Workflow
Graphisoft’s Teamwork and BIMcloud enabled the Strada team to work across different locations through team-led BIM as if they were together in one place.
At the start of COVID-19, the team had just moved to BIMcloud and switched everyone to MacBook laptops. This meant they could transition straight away to remote work without any additional hardware or software, and without any downtime. The Battery project kept moving along with the team working virtually.
Moreover, the 3D workspace transformed into a virtual gathering space for the design team. This represented a shift in how Strada worked, with more time spent developing the 3D space and more detail added to the Archicad model.
Learn the foundations of Teamwork in Archicad and understand the benefits of this workflow for multidisciplinary projects. by completing our self-paced online course, Teamwork in Archicad.
Working across multiple offices was seamless in Archicad and BIMcloud. Despite a large Archicad file, loading times were fast. This was fast enough that even when we were doing live presentations, fly-throughs and cutaways, we were working in the live model.
Aaron Bell, Senior Associate, Strada
Visualization
Visualization for communication
To ensure economic viability, the developer wanted to add more stories to the boiler house to accommodate more apartments.
However, to gain planning permission, the City Park Service stipulated that the ‘over-building’ must not be visible from the public park.
To address this, Strada used Archicad and Twinmotion to create sight-line studies and renderings to demonstrate the impact of the extension and the view from the park.
The final solution was to reduce the height and set the overbuild back to avoid the sightlines, while maintaining two additional stories.
Moreover, by incorporating Twinmotion into their workflow, Strada could rapidly create images and animations that conveyed the design intent. The images were crucial in gaining community support and securing approval.
Project renderings made with Twinmotion
© Strada, stradallc.com
Sight-line studies
© Strada, stradallc.com
The combination of Archicad and Twinmotion was essential in enabling us to make the case to the Park Service to get the two-story addition approved. This was critical to the project in ensuring it was financially viable for the building owner.
Aaron Bell, Senior Associate, Strada
A transformation of space and place
Strada’s Battery project has transformed a derelict, historic landmark into a mixed-use commercial, residential and hospitality space, including apartments, a hotel and wedding venue, food and beverages, offices, co-working spaces and health and fitness facilities.
Moreover, the project has opened up the building and the surrounding area to the public realm, sitting next to a public park and incorporating walking, cycling and bus routes along the riverside.
An award-winning example of adaptive reuse in practice, Archicad and team-led BIM were pivotal in bringing this project to life.
Floor plan and 3D detail of the overbuild documentation
The Battery, USA | Strada, stradallc.com