8 Very Cool Things about CSHQA Boise



CSHQA Boise Entry and Front Desk

We've settled in, learned the ropes and nearly dialed in the control systems for heating, lighting, ventilation and even the alarm system. What an amazing space of sophisticated and sustainable design and brilliant engineering. Here’s a quick tour of my favorites:

1. Cool foyer.
2. All of our work stations are on one floor in a big, open, collaborative space. Makes you feel truly connected and part of the energy.

3. Our ‘deli’ is bright and sunny and a nice place to eat lunch or take some time away. Come spring the patio will be extra nice.

4. The Big Kahuna – CSHQA Conference Room. It’s the largest of 5 meeting spaces.

5. Cool, filtered water that tastes great! A counter shows how many plastic bottles we have saved from a landfill.

6. Lavender plants – still blooming in November! Along the western wall of the access ramp.

7. Green and then some! This is one of five greens to be found on the northern interior wall. It's our own custom color. 2b is shorthand for Second & Broad Streets.

8. My total geek out room – the Mechanical Room. These five pumps help circulate glycol through 4.6 miles of pex under the concrete slab floor to warm or cool our space.

Thank You to Our Partners on 200 Broad St.

Almost one year ago to the day (9.27.12) Kent Hanway invited the CSHQA staff to meet at an old warehouse about three blocks east of our then current location. It wasn’t much to look at – concrete floors, warehouse doors and a few odd walls, pink insulation and bare light bulbs hanging from the ceiling, and concrete columns encased in banged-up bumpers. He explained the decision to make this space our future office and told us “This is our opportunity to transform a space and show what we can accomplish with our skills and creativity.  It's up to us.”

Today we still have concrete floors and columns, but WOW! 2│b has come a long way!  As we finish the final touches, we have many people to thank.  This very cool, very sustainable office is the result of a lot of hard work by CSHQA designers and staff, plus our construction and vendor partners led by general contractor Jordan-Wilcomb Construction, Inc. Thank you all! –

Reducing Our Footprint II - Space Planning Decisions Focus on Daylight and Collaboration

The CSHQA space plan is driven by three organizing factors:  (1) The most advantageous entry sequence originates on the corner of 2nd & Broad Streets.  (2) Workstations take first priority in natural and day-lighting considerations.  (3) Everything has to fit within 19,100 sf.

The covered patio doubles as an entry sequence and outdoor space for staff.  Adjacent spaces (lobby, front desk, conference rooms, break room, restrooms, and interior design library) radiate from this corner to take advantage of natural light from south and east.

In a decision made by the full ownership, only corporate officers have private offices – and they’re not aligned along windows as one might expect in outmoded, hierarchical thinking.  The row of three offices and two conference rooms serves to delineate ‘front of house’ public spaces and the main working area.  Skylights, clerestory windows and glass walls ensure these spaces have ample natural light.

The second entry/egress near the windowless west wall [lower left on plan] became the second jumping off point for adjacent spaces.  Non-occupied storage, equipment and restroom spaces hug the west wall.  The plan/archive room totals about half the size of our former copy/storage space in the basement of CW Moore. 

The final part of the space plan, about which everything revolves, is the open work space.  Natural light flows through the entire space.  Openness and stimulating collaboration were high priorities for the design team.  The ownership determined that all workstations would be one size, reducing the space of about 40% of our current cubicles.  This choice enabled the plan to accommodate a build-out of 80 cubicles, five informal meeting tables and a hoteling station that accommodates up to 12.  It was also decided to eliminate the overhead bins to further strengthen the open work concept. –

'2|b' Space Plan Legend

Work Stations—80 work stations, 5 informal meeting spaces (tables for 6), hoteling station (plug & play for 12)

Offices/Conf. Rooms—Offices and conference rooms, interior design library with meeting space

Main Entry—Patio, entry, front desk, lobby

Amenities—Staff break room, secure bike storage, restrooms, lockers, showers, telephone rooms

Support Spaces—Mechanical room, telecom/electrical room, covered trash, storage, print and archive

How CSHQA is Reducing Our Footprint Part I

If your office went (almost) paperless, how many trucks of recylable paper might you fill?

On the eve of our move to new offices at 2^nd & Broad I am both excited and amazed.  The choice to remodel a 50+ year-old warehouse was gutsy – kudos to our leadership.  But the steadfast commitment to this sustainable choice and all its ramifications borders on the epic.  Walking the talk involves three stages:  Reduce what you have, design for smaller, work smarter.

Reducing What You Have

Purge the archive.  When you’re pushing 125 years old you have some stuff in storage.  We wish it could have been a treasure trove of antiques.  It was a behemoth of paper.  Files, drawings, documents.  Sorting, scanning and shredding these documents was a nearly full time job for two people for more than a year.  2 man years.  That didn’t include the paper in everyone’s desk or personal flat file.  We each worked on that bit-by-bit for several weeks.

Recycle.  We have a paper-recycling cart nearly the size of a Mini Cooper.  At the peak of the office purge it was full every day for a month.  A typical dump truck holds 27 cubic yards of material.  I think it’s safe to say, including the archives, we filled the equivalent of three or four dump trucks with recyclable paper, magazines, files and drawings collected over several decades.  I think it’s also safe to say we will never repeat this feat.  Digital applications, storage hardware and the cloud are finally catching up with the reflexive tendency to hit the print button.  We truly are thinking twice.

Repurpose.  Admin set up a give-away table.  The only caveat – the new owner had to take it home, NOT to the new office.  House plants, dishes, paper goods, carpet samples, books, binders, jewel cases, small lamps, foot rests, posters, pictures, funky awards, and a crock pot(!) all found new homes.  Excess furniture, chairs, desk lamps, shelves, monitors, old computers…they found new homes too, by donation or contribution to the party fund.

Go paperless.  For some time CSHQA has made a concerted effort to print only when needed, edit in digital, store final copies on the server, and skip in the in-house copies on everything from timecards to proposals.  More software, more training?  Perhaps.  Greater efficiency?  Absolutely.

It’s been a liberating experience, seeing the nearly ‘empty’ desks poised for moving day.  It’s a good thing, too, because space-wise our new office definitely has to do more with less.  Today we have a staff of 70 in about 18,800 sf, plus an additional 12,000 sf of shared building amenities that include bike storage, lockers, trash room, server room, conference center and penthouse patio.  So, roughly 30,000 sf of accessible space.  The new office of 19,100 sf will accommodate up to 90 and still include conference, bike, trash, server, and patio amenities.  Learn how we designed for this smaller footprint in Part II. 

Design Leaders for 2nd & Broad Office are on the Move!



Design Leaders for CSHQA's new Boise office at 2nd & Broad



Project Leaders for the New CSHQA Office:  Mandie Brozo, Architecture; Nicole Cecil, ASID, Interior Design; Ted Isbell, AIA, Project Architect; Dan Pirc, Electrical Engineering; Jeff Ward, PE, Civil Engineering; Jay Romlein, RCDD/OSP, Telecommunications Engineering; Russ Pratt, PE, Mechanical Engineering.  Not pictured:  Kyle Hemly, ASLA, Landscape Architect, Tim Higley, PMP, Project and Relocation Manager Extraordinaire!

Moving day is almost here.  Our scheduled day is Friday, July 19 and the people pictured above are very busy seeing to the last details.  A six-month retrofit schedule is coming down to the wire with experienced builders, vendors, utilities employees and permitting authorities all doing their part.

We started with a rough and ready warehouse with good bones and now we’re less than a month away from a high performance office building with outstanding features.  Cosmetic surgeons have nothing on this team!  I asked the design leaders what element they are most looking forward to seeing and using in the new building:

Ted – The daylight, the environment and bringing everyone together in one space.

Mandie – Daylighting, and a more open space for collaboration.

Russ – Radiant heating and cooling!

Dan – Daylighting and dimmers on lamps for every-day energy efficiency.

Jay – The ‘El Commo Cave’, the electrical and telecom room to delight any engineer!

Jeff – Permeable pavers that improve drainage on Broad Street and reduce water added to the public sewer system.

Nicole – The opportunity to showcase creative materials and work in a sustainable, healthy environment.

Kyle – Indoor bike storage, showers and locker room.

Tim – 90 fully functional work stations with nothing more to move, store, stage, archive, auction or give away… –

Retail Trends, Part III – Hispanic Shopping Malls



Hispanic Shopping Malls provide event spaces as well as entertainment and shopping experiences.

In Part I Craig Slocum, AIA covered general trends; in Part II I introduced the fastest growing segment – Hispanic Shopping Malls.  In Part III we delve deeper into how successful developers are responding to the Hispanic trend.

Demographics.  Smart developers study the local demographic and adjust days and hours of operation to reflect the culture.  In Hispanic culture extended family units spend time together and of the 50 million Hispanics in the US today 25% are under 18.  The younger population especially enjoys "domingeo" or hanging out.  Hispanic malls are open late, until 9 or 10 pm, and definitely on Sundays.

Culture.  Mall owners pay for entertainment and host community events.  They observe and celebrate Latin holidays and customs in plaza spaces built for entertainment, music, dancing and participatory activities.  Pool tables, foos ball and big slides entertain multiple generations, and ample benches and chairs are provided for customers to sit and linger.

The right retail mix.  In Phoenix, Arizona at the Desert Sky Mall Hispanic-centric stores are mixed with major retailers with training available for mainstream retailers to learn more about Latino preferences and purchasing styles.  An empty 77,000 sf Mervyns was re-purposed into a traditional Latin Mercado housing 220 small shops.  These shops include fast-food and bakeries, beauty salons and flower shops, carnicerias or meat markets, and many other retailers.  Short-term and temporary leases are offered and the Mercado acts as an incubator for new stores to get their footing before moving to the regular mall.  The mainstream theater company was replaced with Cinema Latino.

Ideal locations.  Many Hispanic malls have been situated in older malls where the previous management failed to acknowledge changing demographics and then lost market share.  These ‘distressed retail’ locations may not be poor locations after all.  Sometimes all they need is the right vision.  –

Jorge Pierson, AIA, LEED AP is an Associate with CSHQA and Regional Manager of CSHQA's Phoenix office.  He has practiced architecture in Phoenix for over 30 years providing planning, design and project management of retail, resort, residential and industrial projects throughout the Southwest.

Retail Gold Rush – Hispanic Purchasing Power Becomes a Major Player

Eduardo's Reception Hall hosts its first event at Desert Sky Mall, Phoenix, AZ 

ICSC has been on this kick for a few years now.  A couple of years ago I was lucky to attend the first National Hispanic Initiative event in San Antonio, Texas.  The site was packed with everyone wanting to know what it was and what to do about it.  We were flooded with statistics that all boiled down to this:  Hispanics are the next Baby Boomers.  Those who study markets understand what this means - money. Like all businesses retail must go where the customers are to be successful.

At RECon last month the session ‘The Retail Gold Rush’ reinforced the reality that the Hispanic market is large and growing and our businesses need to plan to take advantage of it. The panelists Chiqui Cartagena, Maria Contreras-Sweet and Colin Crawford stressed that the Hispanic buying power is growing due to increasing affluence, larger family size and continued immigration.  

In Phoenix, Arizona the Desert Sky Mall, with the help of José De Jesús Legaspi, is one of the first malls modified to address this growing market.  José’s strategy was basically very simple:  he made changes that he knew would appeal to Hispanic shoppers.  It also helped that the demographic surrounding this mall is highly Hispanic.  He knows retail dies if you do not accommodate those close to you.

By happenstance CSHQA was able to add to the Hispanic flair at Desert Sky through our client Jaime Martinez who purchased an empty shoe retail building on the mall perimeter.  Jaime and his father Eduardo, successful businessmen from Mexico, saw the potential of this vacant building and converted it to Salon De Fiestas or otherwise known as Eduardo’s Reception Hall. This turned out to be a good addition to the mall offering a great rental space for family and community events.

To wrap up: The next big wave is the Hispanic market and those who can ride it will have fun and make some money on the way.  –

Jorge Pierson, AIA, LEED AP is an Associate with CSHQA and Regional Manager of CSHQA's Phoenix office.  He has practiced architecture in Phoenix for over 30 years providing planning, design and project management of retail, resort, residential and industrial projects throughout the Southwest.

The Legaspi Company is a full-service retail real estate firm focused on the Hispanic market.  Founded by José De Jesús Legaspi, the firm identifies and capitalizes on untapped opportunities to revitalize depressed retail malls and serve the Hispanic community.  www.thelegaspi.com

In the third and final part of this Retail series we will take a closer look at elements that contribute to a successful Hispanic Shopping Mall.