Kuwait International Petroleum Research Centre (KIPRC)

The story of the oil industry in Kuwait is central to the country’s history and national identity. With the establishment of the Kuwait Oil Company in the 1930’s, and a subsequent series of significant reserve discoveries, Kuwait quickly established itself as a global leader in oil and gas production. From its earliest origins, the company has prided itself on a spirit of technology, innovation and discovery. Pace in collaboration with SOM, were asked to reimagine a new home for KOC's Kuwait International Petroleum Research Centre (KIPRC) to represent a cutting-edge manifestation of these values for modern times. At its most basic, ‘petroleum research’ is concerned with the exploration, extraction, and refinement of hydrocarbon resources from beneath the earth’s surface. It is a science, in short, of the earth itself. The nation of Kuwait and the oil industry that it has cultivated are indebted to the country’s physical landscape in a profound way. The proposal for KIPRC celebrates this connection, creating an icon that is both futuristic and forward thinking, but ultimately rooted in the land from which it is born. Whether flying overhead, or arriving to the campus from the surrounding context, a visitor will see an iconic structure hovering slightly above the ground. Rippling concentrically away from the buildings, a series of earth berms rise from the desert floor and then are echoed in the roof profile of the buildings themselves. Landscape and architecture ascend in a unified gesture to frame the symbolic heart of the campus: a web of interconnected collaborative spaces. The new KIPRC will provide a 21st century research facility that symbolises the values and aspirations of KOC and creates an unparalleled environment for work, research and collaboration. Architecture has a profound impact on how people interact and exchange ideas and an overriding goal of the KIPRC will be to cultivate innovation. The concept is engineered to leverage spaces that facilitate and, indeed, provoke the types of human interaction that leads to problem solving and innovative collaboration. To achieve this, the design considers the campus as a complex and sophisticated ecosystem where lab researchers and scientists are routinely advancing the discipline through a range of activities.