Commercial Architecture

Works in Progress

3 Parkway – Philadelphia

To make their newly acquired office tower more attractive in a competitive, commercial rental market, the owners of 3 Parkway sought to reimage the Center City property quickly and economically. The existing building was clad in brown granite and black glass, as was typical of many anonymous high-rise structures built in the mid 1970’s – imposing, dark and insular.

The architectural solution sought to mitigate these characteristics at both street/pedestrian level as well as the scale of city icon. This goal was accomplished by limiting work to the ground floor entry sequence and the existing exterior arcade.

The granite and black glass skin on the ground floor was replaced with edge lit panels of undulating clear and etched glass. Obsolete interior spaces such as an auditorium and company cafeteria were transformed into retail space with direct access and visibility to the street. A continuous canopy ‘blade’ of stainless steel unites the ceiling of the arcade with the ‘bar of light’ at the building’s base. Powerful exterior flood lights, recessed within the blade are placed tight up against the exterior façade and upwash the entire face of the building, providing a modern, architecturally distinct, citywide identity to what was once an easily forgotten address.