The University of California, San Diego Conrad Prebys Music Center has been selected as the winner of the Best Higher Education/Research Facility in Southern California in 2009 by California Construction magazine. This is a very prestigious award, with hundreds of projects entered in this competition.
The Conrad Prebys Music Building is one of three completed sites designed by WRT within the University Center neighborhood following our campus planning work. Innovation in the landscape includes the use of gap-graded structural soil under the full width of the sidewalk, to both encourage growth of the street trees and detain stormwater below unit pavers. A simple bioswale daylights stormwater along the primary pedestrian route from transit to the center of the campus.
"Giant timber bamboo adds a thin, living, and noisy layer to the architectural composition—bringing a bit of music to the street," said WRT Principal Laura Burnett. "It will be interesting to see how the new street trees grow in the gap-graded structural soil compared with those we planted across the street ten years ago."
Hardscape and planting were laid out in geometries to reflect the architectural components of the building, such as column alignments, and to fit the urbane nature of the campus core. The utilization of native and drought tolerant plants, combined with subsurface drip irrigation, ensures efficient irrigation water use.
