AEG Project Wins National AIA Award

American Enterprise Group (AEG) Project Wins National AIA Award

The American Institute of Architects (AIA) has chosen the American Enterprise Group (AEG) National Headquarters Renovation Project to receive the 2016 AIA Institute Honor Award for Architecture.  This is the profession’s highest recognition of works that represent excellence in architecture. The project was among 11 projects selected to receive awards for Architecture out of roughly 350 entries from across the county.

The American Enterprise Group (AEG) corporate headquarters is an eight-story office building in downtown Des Moines, Iowa. The venerable building, designed by SOM’s Gordon Bunshaft, was completed in 1965 and received an AIA Institute Honor Award for Architecture in 1967. In 1966, it was featured in LIFE magazine and deemed “the talk of the Midwest.”

This is an invisible rehabilitation. The building’s original MEP systems were meticulously integrated with the building architecture but worn out and not up to current life safety and comfort standards. The rehabilitation required obsessive attention to detail in order to replace and add systems to elegantly integrate the new systems into the original design concepts.

The original building meshed together workplace and AEG’s significant art collection — a museum within an office. The renovated space addresses human efficiency and evolving workplace standards with both systems and a minimal, modern office design that enhances human productivity while making the art an integrated part of the experience.

Design Engineers is privileged to have collaborated with BNIM and AEG on this significant project and heartily congratulate them on this significant award!

Check out the AIA awards page for other great projects.