Program: A 10,500-square-foot open-plan office with team rooms for group work, a conference room, a lounge, and a kitchen. This office is one of the seven floors the National Resource Defense Council (NRDC) owns in a 12-story building in Manhattan’s Flatiron District. The NRDC currently uses the top five floors as its headquarters, reserving the other two for possible expansion. More than 20 years ago, Croxton Collaborative Architects designed the first few floors of the NRDC headquarters, and the office became known as an early example of green architecture in the U.S.

Design Concept and Solution: Treating this new expansion (which spans the entire eighth floor) as a prototype for future offices for NRDC’s locations across the U.S. and in China, the architects conceived it as a model of sustainable design. Because this floor has exposures on the north, south, and west sides, the Croxton team was able to make the most of natural light. The architects sloped the ceiling up toward the windows and pulled the workstations away from the windows to create a circulation space around the perimeter. This more democratic arrangement—no corner offices that soak up all the light—helps bring daylight into the core, as do low-partition workstations. Doors, walls, and partitions that reach full height (particularly those that line up with windows) are frequently glazed clear or, where more privacy is needed, translucent. On the upper portions of the windows, white aluminum blinds with solid slats are oriented to reflect light into the room; lower down the slats are perforated so that the blinds can be adjusted. A light and bright palette that includes reflective non-VOC paint in white and pale green, FSC-certified maple veneers, and white light fixtures with daylight dimming controls also contribute to the sustainability of this LEED Platinum project.