The Chrysalis Building at Houston’s Monarch School is a three-story, 24,700-sq-ft educational facility that includes classrooms, observation rooms, diagnosis areas and community spaces for students with mental and social differences. The project represents the first phase of the multibuilding Monarch campus.
The project’s LEED-gold designation meant the project team faced unique design requirements such as inverted roofs, specialized materials and air-quality controls. The jobsite had been hit by Hurricane Ike, which delayed construction and damaged installed items.
Mission Constructors, the general contractor, helped push the project from LEED silver to gold by exceeding requirements for onsite waste recycling and the use of local and recycled materials.
Crews diverted 89% of the project’s waste from a landfill. Recycled materials on the project amounted to 35%, and 26% of the materials were harvested or manufactured within 500 mi of the project site.
Mission also enacted an indoor air-quality plan, in which workers kept dust and other intrusive particulates out of the HVAC system by covering air ducts with plastic before use and keeping the site as clean as possible. This, and the use of low-VOC materials, helped the new building pass indoor air-quality testing before classes began.
Key Players
Submitted by: Mission Constructors Inc.
Owner/developer: The Monarch School, Houston
General contractor: Mission Constructors, Houston
Construction manager: BPM Group, Houston
Architect: Jackson Ryan Architects, Houston
Structural engineer: Matrix Engineering, Houston
MEP engineer: Wylie Consulting Engineers, Houston
