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Project News

APEX Tops Out in San Diego

Perched along Towne Centre Drive in San Diego, CA, the new APEX commercial office building has impressive views of Sorrento Valley to the east. Largo topped out with general contractor Rudolf & Sletten on the 345,000gsf structure which has been leased to Apple. Designed by Perkins & Will architects and Coffman Structural Engineers the building has two levels of below grade parking with five levels of above grade including the roof.

Designers attempted to integrate modern architecture with the surrounding biodiversity to enhance the user well-being. Exposed concrete walls blend with extensive glass and steel accents on the exterior façade. The concrete roof deck is also exposed and cantilevers toward the canyon sheltering the outdoor terrace on level four. There is a total of 37,000sf of exterior architectural concrete on the project which includes feature walls, columns, and sloped soffits. All exposed elements were designed with dimensioned seam plywood layout for a consistent special finish. A computer generated solar study was used to determine the most effective placement of sunshade elements to maximize daylight and visual connections to the environment.

Amenities include a fitness center, an outdoor workout area, volleyball court and game area with horseshoe and corn-hole space. A cafe, amphitheater and flexible workspaces round out the amenities and blend with the architectural features to produce a unique creative space. In total Largo pour over 27,000CY of concrete over the 10.5 month schedule.

Project News

Hawthorne Elementary Tops Out and 701 Magnolia Ramps Up

The Hawthorne Elementary School topped out this month in Dallas, TX earlier this month. The low-rise project is two levels above grade totaling 81,500gsf with a 6′ tall mini basement or crawl space below. The first elevated deck above the void is cast-in-place with level two being a combination of concrete and slab-on-metal-deck. Largo is also doing the site concrete scope for the facility scheduled to open during the Fall of 2021. This is our first project with Imperial Construction, Glen Partners Architects and Alpha Consulting Engineers and we look forward to many more in the future.

701 West Magnolia
Forty miles to the west in the Near Southside district of Fort Worth, Largo is beginning construction on the 701 W Magnolia development with general contractor Muckleroy & Falls. The four level creative office building has retail on the ground floor which runs along an open-air mall. On the opposite side of the mall features historic buildings dating back 100-years . A three level parking structure is also included in the development designed by VLK Architects and L.A. Fuess Partners structural engineers. Largo is scheduled to be poured out by October 2021.

Project News

San Mateo County Parking Structure Tops Out

Largo Concrete recently topped out at the San Mateo County Parking Structure 2 project with general contractor Truebeck Construction. Located on the southwest corner of Veteran Blvd. and Brewster Ave., the structure will serve employees and visitors of the government services facility in Redwood City. Watry Design acted as the architect and structural engineer on the project and designed the structure to accommodate future parking demand.

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Project News

345 4th Street Tops Out

The eight level commercial office development on 345 4th Street topped out in San Francisco this month with GC Stoer Construction. The building will be occupied by WeWork, one of the leading space-as-a-service platforms providing flexible real estate options to businesses of all sizes. Designed by Stanton Architecture and DCI Engineers, the building provides 50,000sf of office space and retail storefront at street level. Located in the South of Market (SoMa) District, the downtown skyline will be visible to the north from the vegetated rooftop terrace.

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Project News

Natiivo Tower Tops Out at 48 East Avenue

Largo Concrete topped out at the Natiivo tower in downtown Austin, TX earlier this month. Located at the edge of the rapidly growing Rainey Street District, the 442,668gsf building is 33 levels all above grade. The first nine levels of the building are dedicated to parking with 24 levels of residential above holding 248 units.

All units come fully furnished with hotel licensing and can be offered as short-term rentals with building management providing hotel-like services and amenities. In addition to on-site concierge, housekeeping and laundry services the building also features a 18,000sf open air terrace on the 10th floor and a rooftop pool with cabanas and fireplace seating areas.

In total Largo poured 20,000CY of concrete over the course of 15 months with 130,000 manhours. The building is designed by STG Design and Cardno Haynes Whaley structural engineers and general contractor AECOM Hunt expect to have the project complete during the summer of 2021.

Project News

First Major Structural “Bubble Deck” Project on the West Coast Tops Out at Entrada in Culver City

The Entrada Creative Office in Culver City, CA is truly a unique structure combining state-of-the-art design with cutting edge engineering. The building is 13 levels tall including the roof with six levels of commercial office space above six levels of parking, one of which is below grade. The podium level is dubbed the “Sky Deck” and features a 14,000sf landscaped amenities space with a fitness center, conference room and open space for all tenants to enjoy. The 815,000gsf building along Centinela Avenue is clad in glass and metal screens with exposed concrete interior columns and walls. Drivers along I-405 will be drawn to the open-air private balconies stepping up the commercial levels on either side of the building. The rectangular office levels are rotated with respect to the lower parking floors creating a substantial corner cantilever at the west face of the building making a strong architectural statement.  The load of the cantilever deck is carried by a massive structural post-tensioned upturn beam located on the West edge of the roof.

Beneath the surface the Entrada development began with three mat foundation pours averaging 4,500CY. Two of the mass concrete pours at the elevator cores required a thermal control plan to ensure temperatures did not exceed 165 degrees during placement. Parking levels hold 1,044 stalls and 695CY of shotcrete walls line the perimeter of the basement.

Elevated decks are concrete voided slabs or “bubble decks” supported by high-strength cast-in-place columns and walls. Voids are created using hollow spheres made of recycled plastic and arranged in 8’x10’ wire mesh grid prefabricated offsite. Once on site the grids are placed on a layer of two-way rebar installed on the plywood deck with another layer of reinforcing on top. Deck pours begin by placing the first 4” to 6” of readymix to secure the voids in place before the balance of the slab is poured. Elevated decks ranged between 16” to 20” with typical levels at 18” thick.

The flat plate, bubble deck system allowed architects to maximize floor space in the building with a typical bay measuring 30’x45’. Flat decks also enhanced production flow by eliminating beams, drop caps, depressions and hanging form build up. On average Largo poured 11,000sf of deck every other day during the elevated slab duration of the project.

Overall, the voided slab construction reduced the weight of the structure nearly 30% in comparison to conventional methods of waffle slab or post-tensioned decks. This measure not only limited the seismic forces and foundation loads but also reduced the environmental impact of the project with significantly less material to transport and a faster schedule. The company supplying the voids was BubbleDeck North America.

The corner cantilever at the Sky Deck level required shoring from street level to remain in place until the 3’ wide by 10’ tall upturn beam on the roof deck was poured and stressed. All six stories of office space and the roof are suspended at this corner from this same upturn beam on the roof. The corner columns of the cantilever have continuous reinforcing from the first commercial level to the roof. This feature required the shoring removal process to be reversed with the upper levels being stripped first while checking for deflection throughout the process.

Largo poured over 47,000CY in the structure over 11 months. General contractor KRPS, Gensler architects and Saiful Bouquet structural engineers aim to have the project complete in the first quarter of 2021 making it the first, large scale structural bubble deck system on the West Coast.

Social Responsibility

$20,000 in Scholarships

Due to the amazing range of candidates in our summer intern program, Largo expanded the award for our Summer Intern Scholarship Application. We would like to congratulate Mohammad T. Ali Adib for winning the first place, $10,000 award. Our carpenters apprentice Jennifer Knickerbocker was also awarded with a $5,000 scholarship. And finally, our interns Luke Martin and Brandon Montiel each received a scholarship award of $2,500. We were lucky to have so many outstanding interns this year. We are grateful to teach and learn alongside the future leaders of the construction industry!