Architects gain notoriety with sustainable business model

Nick Peckham moved to Columbia from Pennsylvania 35 years ago to teach architecture at Stephens College. Although the architecture program didn’t work out, Peckham has given the entire community practical lessons on sustainability and environmental stewardship in architecture.
When Peckham sought a partner who shared his vision, he found local architect Brad Wright. The two formed Peckham and Wright Architects in 1978,  and, after working on about 1,500 building projects since then, their company has been named one of the finalists for the 2009 Chamber of Commerce Business of the Year Award.

“I guess one of the best things about being nominated is it’s a result of the stuff we’ve done,” Wright said. “People take note after 32 years. It’s very meaningful.”
Both Peckham and Wright were years ahead of the curve in designing eco-friendly buildings. Only within the last decade or so has the general public begun to value buildings designed around the concepts of energy and water conservation, waste minimization and promoting the health of a building’s occupants.

More than 30 years ago, PWArchitects designed the master plan for The Meadows, Columbia’s first Planned Unit Development (PUD). Within The Meadows, Peckham and Wright designed the Trombe Wall Townhouses. A Trombe wall is a sun-facing wall, built from metal, stone, concrete or adobe, which acts as a thermal mass. The wall collects heat during the day, and the heated air flows via convection to the interior space through one-way directional vents. The Trombe Wall Townhouses earned PWArchitects a U.S. Department of Energy Passive Solar Award in 1978.

A year later, PWArchitects designed a solar home for the Peckham family on Westwood Avenue in Columbia.  The home was featured in the book Passive Solar Architecture. Also in 1979, PWArchitects built a second solar home in Columbia and three other buildings that used PWArchitecture’s Passive Solar Furnace.
“A lot of what has been done by architects was based on expediency or style. Only within the last 10-15 years has a real global appreciation between built environment and natural environment taken place,” Peckham said.

Like most start-up businesses, Peckham and Wright had expertise and ambition, but lacked a portfolio of projects to show potential customers. According to Peckham, most architectural firms specialize in specific types of buildings, such as medical facilities, sports facilities or residential homes.  “On day one, Peckham and Wright hadn’t done anything, so we had to use a different approach,” Peckham said.
The approach that Wright and Peckham started and have continued to fine tune over the years is similar to the Golden Rule: to do for the client what they would feel comfortable doing for themselves. The result has been that PWArchitects is broad-based in its expertise, designing schools, churches, recreational facilities, office buildings, health care facilities and residential homes.

Sustainable design projects in Columbia include the Rainbow House, Mizzou Credit Union and the state headquarters for the Missouri Conference of the United Methodist Church.
PWArchitects employs 16 people and works on approximately 50 projects annually. “I’d estimate that our work over the years has resulted in about 1,500 projects that resulted in $250 million, or a quarter billion, in construction,” Peckham said.
The majority of projects are within 50 to 80 miles of Columbia, with a secondary market including the remainder of the state. Less frequently, PWArchitects works in states that border Missouri and in California and Europe.
Located on Tenth Street, a block south of Broadway, PWArchitects is housed in a 3,500-square-foot ground-level office above a larger garage and storage area. “Below, there is off-street parking, a drawing room, a blue-print machine and hundreds and hundreds of blueprints that we’ve accumulated over the years,” Peckham said.
PWArchitects has continued to garner clients through repeat business and long-term relationships formed over the years.

At the University of Pennsylvania, Peckham was a student of Buckminster Fuller, world-renowned visionary, designer and architect. During an interview last year, when he won a CBT  Entrepreneurial Excellence Award, Peckham credited Fuller for giving great advice when he asked what he should do with  his life. “He told me, ‘Find a problem that no one else is solving, and you’ll solve it and never have to ask that question again.”‘
Peckham and his partner found themselves at the forefront of environmentally sensitive architecture locally, regionally and nationally. Wright and Peckham have accumulated a long list of affiliations, certifications, accreditations and leadership roles in numerous environmentally focused architectural organizations.
“We are really committed to sustainability and have been since day one,” Peckham said.
This vision for sustainability is one of the primary reasons that Sara Read, president of The Communication Center, nominated PWArchitects for the Business of the Year honor. “They’re not only very good at what they do, but also have a real concern for the community and building a better future,” Read said.
Beverly Borduin, principal of Grant Elementary School, also nominated PWArchitects for the award. Both women point to the ECO Schoolhouse, located on the Grant Elementary campus, as a visual monument to the philosophies embraced by PWArchitects.
“They support not just more use of environmentally friendly things, but the classroom offers an exciting educational opportunity for others,” Read said.
Peckham spearheaded the ECO Schoolhouse project when a trailer burned, leaving Grant Elementary short a classroom. The ECO Schoolhouse has won awards for both Grant Elementary and for PWArchitects. “We just won an award last week from Contract magazine, beating out HDK architects, the largest firm on earth,” Peckham said.
Peckham Wright
15 South Tenth Street | Columbia, Missouri 65201
Phone: 573 449-2683 | www.pwarchitects.com