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IBM Corporation

1989

$

18 months

Corporate Marketing & Training Center

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INTERIOR ARCHITECTURE - Corporate Training Center Solana, which means ''sunny place'' in Spanish, is 850 acres of former ranch land and is quite rigorous in its design. And for all its elaborate landscaping and lively architecture it actually has more of the qualities of a true village than almost any other suburban development of the last few years. This is a place whose design begins to address the critical problems of suburban office parks everywhere: how to deal honestly with the infuriatingly necessary automobile, and how to create a convincing and meaningful sense of place. The complex, which is eight miles northwest of the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, was built as a joint venture between Maguire/Thomas Partners, a Los Angeles development firm that has established itself as one of the nation's most aggressive builders of serious architecture, and the IBM Corporation, which has leased most of the office space built in Solana's first phase, as a computer and marketing center. IBM, a longtime architectural patron in its own right, worked closely with the architects from the start.
Solana was planned by a collaborative team of architects, planners, and landscape architects including Legorreta Arquitectos, Mitchell / Giurgola Architects, Leason Pomeroy & Associates, HKS Architects, Barton Myers & Associates, and PWP Landscape Architecture. Additional consults included engineers Carter & Burgess, and Howard Fields & Associates and Harlan Glenn & Associates fountains & water feature planners. This team was responsible for planning the four-phase development of a village-and-recreation center, a marketing center, and an office complex, eventually to contain some 7 million square feet of office space for 10,000 to 20,000 employees.
Driving down the highway ramp and entering the complex becomes a real architectural experience: a passage from the outside, which is the highway, through a vestibule, which is the space between the bridge and the gateways, to the inside, which is the rest of Solana. Here, being in a car does not destroy architectural experience, as it usually does; it heightens it. For this experience has been designed in recognition of a blunt reality that is too often denied: people will receive their first impressions from inside their cars.
Where Latin American architect Ricardo Legoretta’s Village Center and campus style buildings, known as the IBM Southlake, are casual, almost rambling structures reminiscent of a Mexican village, Romaldo Giurgola's Westlake Campus buildings are formal and ordered, if rather too mannered, typical of a western strip city.
The site included office, hotel and retail developments. Neville Lewis Associates, Inc., The PHH Design Group became involved with IBM on several previous projects of smaller scale before joining forces with IBM on this major effort of designing the interior architecture of the Regional Marketing & Training Center known as IBM Southlake. In response to Legorreta’s “enclosed wall” concept and colorful obelisk, a polished, avante garde interior design became the silence behind the walls that speaks out as the Mexican concept of ideal order. Neville Lewis was also responsible for furniture selection and artwork selection. This was a very challenging and rewarding experience especially in the dining and cafeteria areas.

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