Cary Francis Group Office and Warehouse, Franklin
 Cary Francis Group Office and Warehouse Franklin, WI 2004 WCMA Finalist Award Winner |
Cost:$2.14M
Size: 27,600 sq.ft.
Completion Date: April 17, 2003
Architect: Wahlgren Schwenn Inc., Menomonee Falls, WI
Mason Contractor: Marriott Construction Corp.
CMU Producer: County Materials Corp.
Scope of Project:
Cary Francis Group is a promotional products order fulfillment company providing services to Fortune 500 companies worldwide. The new office and a warehouse facility, located in the Franklin Business Park, was designed to provide a strong sense of security and privacy to Cary Francis Group's employees and clients, and to strengthen its corporate identity. An additional, equally important design criteria was the need to create interior spaces that showcase Cary Francis Group's creativity and responsiveness to their clients' needs.
The structure of their organization and processing needs required an office area of 10,400 sq.ft. and a warehouse shipping room of 17,200 sq.ft. The entire building is constructed of "Charcoal Grey" split-faced CMUs with half-high, smooth-faced CMU bands in the same color to break up the mass of the 24' high warehouse walls. The office area is organized around and 8'-8" grid that is used to set up placement of the split-faced CMU piers. Architectural precast bull-nosed bands, along with panels and medallions, accent the piers. The medallions over the canopy areas serve as lighting fixtures and are perfectly duplicated as matching precast concrete sculptures where lighting is not needed.
The exterior CMU walls and sentinel-like CMU piers, with decorative lighting fixtures or precast concrete sculptures, admirably achieve the desired security and privacy.