The University of California San Francisco Housing at the Tidelands has been honored with the Precast/Prestressed Concrete Institute’s 2021 Sidney Freedman Craftsmanship Award. The prestigious annual award recognizes PCI-certified plants for excellence in manufacturing and craftsmanship of architectural precast concrete and glass fiber-reinforced concrete (GFRC) structures and individual components.

Judges selected Clark Pacific’s plant in Fontana, Calif., for its work on the two six-story buildings on the college campus. The innovative project features 545 flat precast concrete and sculpted glass fiber-reinforced concrete (GFRC) panels. To minimize solar heat gain, the buildings feature horizontal and vertical sunshades built directly into the GFRC panels on the sun-facing elevations, which will maintain temperatures consistently 2 degrees F to 4 degrees F cooler than a flat façade.

“This project displays Impressive attention to detail with formwork and forming material that translates to an elegant structure,” said one juror. “Color uniformity, especially on the red tones, stands out. Geometry and color differences from the exterior to the courtyard creates a welcoming contrast.”

“The Tidelands is a wonderful example of what can be created when we work together,” said Doug Bevier, project manager at Clark Pacific. “From the very start, working with the community to ensure the building aesthetically fit in with the Dog Patch neighborhood, architect KieranTimberlake conducting heat and sun studies, resulting in the billows being incorporated into the overall design to reduce the solar heat gain, to weekly design charettes to ensure the final design stayed within the owner’s budget, this was truly a collaborative effort.”

The award is named after retired PCI Director of Architectural Systems Sidney Freedman, who was a leading voice in precast concrete architectural design for more than 43 years with the organization.