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VAN BUREN U.S. LAND PORT OF ENTRY

Van Buren, Maine

The Van Buren US Land Port of Entry design fuses an abstraction of the cultural and landscape context with concepts essential to port operations: surveillance and camouflage. The St. John River valley has roots in the Acadian culture, visible in Van Buren’s original town plat of long narrow plots oriented toward the river carved from the Maine forests. As the repetition of forest trees provides camouflage, a patterned repetition of joints, columns and mullions provide the officers with concealment combined with visual site surveillance. The building envelope is conceived as a taut wrapper of the simple building form. Warm colored walls add a glow to the interior spaces, enhancing visitor’s passage through the port while offering the officers a warm work environment in an often cold and hostile climate.

2016 AIA Honor Award

2014 GSA Design Excellence Award

2014 American Architecture Award, The Chicago Athenaeum Museum of Architecture & Design

2013 Highly Commended, WAN Sustainable Building of the Year Award

2013 Annual Design Review Award, ARCHITECT Magazine

2013 AIA MN Honor Award

2011 P/A Award, ARCHITECT Magazine

2011 Holcim Bronze Award for Sustainability in North America

2010 US GSA Design Excellence Award, On the Boards Award in Architecture

Holcim Bronze Award

Architect Magazine P/A Award

Holcim Project Summary

2016 Institute Honor Awards Announced

Architecture MN – MAR/APR 2014

Construction Canada – OCT 2013

Architecture MN – NOV/DEC 2013

Eco-Structure – MAR/APR 2011

MORE INFORMATION

Download a PDF of our project sheet.

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