This adaptive reuse project transformed an existing 29-story office building into an apartment community offering 418 units and many indoor and outdoor amenities in San Francisco’s Mid-Market neighborhood. The new design replaced the precast concrete wall system with a unitized curtain wall, which had the effect of softening the previously harsh appearance of the building. The new design also included extensive reorganization of interior floors to create open, airy living spaces with expansive views of the city.
Removing 1,600 concrete precast panels presented significant safety challenges due to the building’s height, the weight of the panels—from 7,000 to 14,000 lb—nearby historic buildings and the extremely busy downtown location. After demolition crews chipped away concrete from the precast anchor plates, they rigged each panel to the tower crane, at which point welders torched the bolts to sever the connection. Then, a mini-excavator pushed the panel away from the building and the tower crane lowered it onto a waiting truck for recycling.