Driver SPG’s KISS Tolman-Bacher Compound Project at Caltech in Pasadena was recently named the Best Small Project (Under $10M) in ENR’s National Best of the Best Project Awards!
The Best of the Best Project Awards is the culmination of a seven-month effort put forth by dozens of industry judges and the ENR editorial team to identify the pinnacle of design and construction achievement in the U.S. among projects completed between June 2013 and June 2014. The competition began in May 2014 with a call for entries to the construction industry, which resulted in over 700 project teams submitting their best work to the regional Best Projects competitions. In each of the 10 regions, the editors assembled panels of judges to select the regional winners in 20 categories.The KISS Tolman-Bacher Compound won the Best Small Project (Under $10M) in the ENR CA Regional Best Project Competition. Once the regional winners were chosen, the top winners in each category from each region moved up to the national competition. A brand new set of judges from across the country and from all walks of the industry examined each project in an effort to distinguish the best from the best in terms of teamwork, safety, overcoming challenges, innovation, and quality. The Caltech KISS Tolman Bacher Compound was then selected as the Best Small Project (Under $10M) in the United States for 2014. The winning projects will be featured in more depth in the March 16, 2015 issue of ENR.
The KISS Tolman Bacher project included renovating the Historic, Mission-style Tolman-Bacher house into office space and a student lounge, as well as the addition of a LEED Platinum Certified conference center with administrative offices. The 25,000 SF compound provides space for the Keck Institute for Space Studies and the Caltech Board of Trustees and also serves as a venue for aerospace/engineering seminars and conferences. The project has also won the City of Pasadena’s Historical Preservation Award for 2014.