Jeff and Judy Henley Hall: Institute for Energy Efficiency

The Institute for Energy Efficiency at UC Santa Barbara was founded with a mission to develop breakthrough technologies that save energy while advancing the standard of living worldwide. It requires a headquarters as forward-thinking as its mission: one to serve as a home for dynamic collaboration that has extended beyond high-quality laboratory spaces. Henley Hall, a 49,900 sq. ft., LEED platinum-aspiring laboratory and education building, provides highly functional laboratories, offices, and collaborative space in a long-lived building. Henley Hall’s massing is bifurcated along programmatic lines to optimize comfort and operational cost impact and minimize energy use. This innovative approach to program organization allowed the designers to create something new: a research building that breathes. The split massing gathers sensitive and tightly controlled laboratory spaces in the west wing, while orienting offices, classrooms, and gathering spaces around a three-story, open-air eastern atrium filled with natural light. The east wing features an automated natural ventilation system tied to operable windows, dissolving the boundaries between outdoors and in. Henley Hall seeks to forge a strong connection to its stunning natural surroundings. The fritted glazing is optimized and oriented to minimize heat gain and filter daylight to climate-sensitive research spaces while maximizing views to the Santa Ynez mountains, while operable windows in offices and indoor-outdoor collaboration spaces provide comfortable moments for respite. In the landscape are outdoor workspaces shaded by a deep umbra and flowering trees. Stormwater is absorbed on site while the landscape uses recycled water and efficient systems for irrigation. Henley Hall’s design, which separates sensitive laboratory environments from classroom and gathering spaces to help achieve the ambitious energy goals envisioned by the client, have proved uniquely suited to socially distant working and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. The building is physical and spiritual home for the vanguard of energy research that integrates energy-saving measures that minimize operational carbon without sacrificing comfort, quality or aesthetics.