Design Philosophy

Hutteball & Oremus Architecture has the creative design experience to serve you as a trusted advisor through the entire process of a project. We seek to provide the chemistry that creates an effective partnership and facilitates the achievement of common goals. The solutions we design are not the end result of our single vision; they represent the integration of the many visions we help bring together.

Approach
We believe that a school project is more than just a product, it is a process. Our team offers you the skills, capabilities and communication techniques that make this process work for everyone involved. We match the pursuit of innovative and imaginative solutions with an open, straightforward approach to team building and project communication. We bring a strong commitment to the design of clearly organized, well-detailed, constructible projects. We enjoy building consensus through creative design work. You’ll find the members of our team to be enthusiastic and knowledgeable participants in your effort to create an excellent facility that the entire community will view with pride.

Community Engagement
Community engagement is probably the most powerful tool there is in the development of a dynamic project. Community involvement creates increased opportunities for future funding, generates exciting ideas for design solutions, and gives all participants a stake in the process.

Hutteball & Oremus Architecture excels at working with diverse groups of people. We are able to identify our clients’ needs, develop a strong conceptual design, communicate the design vision through the presentation of dynamic images and renderings, and generate enthusiasm and consensus for a project. Our design methodology includes working with user groups, participating in public meetings, and giving public presentations.

Planning
We work closely with our clients to identify, quantify, and define the scope of project work. We believe that effective planning enables the project team to determine and adhere to the established goals, philosophy and mission, while providing a guide for future growth and change. We encourage broad participation and consensus building in the planning process, and we include decision-makers from inception to implementation. We back up this optimistic philosophy of project planning with more than a decade of experience. Our goal is to help you create a physical environment that truly achieves your goals and your mission.

Design Innovation
A great building doesn’t exist in a vacuum; it has to work well within a site’s environment and it must serve the needs of the organization and the community for which it was built. Our goal for your project is to create a unique and workable design that optimizes the possibilities of the building site and which benefits your program to the fullest extent possible. Building organization, placement, and the environmental factors specific to your site are all given careful consideration, along with other significant factors, including community identity, your educational program, service needs, and organizational values. Our goal is to work with you to fulfill your project’s highest potential.

Designing for Future Learning Styles
School facilities must be designed to accommodate ever-changing needs. Enrollments fluctuate. New program initiatives are an ongoing reality of educational life. And new technology continues to change the ways students are educated. In short, the relationship between a school and the community it serves evolves constantly. We believe that change is not only inevitable, it is essential—and it should be accommodated with foresight. For all of these reasons and more, Hutteball & Oremus designs strive for flexibility and adaptability. This philosophy of sustainability embraces several key planning concepts as we envision how today’s new school facilities can serve education for at least the next 40 to 60 years, and ideally much longer:

• The plan of a new facility must be based on the flow of communication and human movement between and among the activities/functions the facility is designed to accommodate. The strategic positioning of functions enhances student identity, the sharing of limited supplies and resources, teacher communication, team teaching, community use, and orderliness within the building.
• Technology (and the integration of technology into educational facilities) continues to evolve and modify the ways education is delivered. A new facility must be able to adapt readily to the infrastructure changes required to accommodate changing technology.
• A recognition that an educational facility must have connection and relevancy to the community it serves, and that these qualities will continue to be of paramount importance well into the future.
• A future-oriented planning that provides the flexibility and adaptability needed to make spaces as interchangeable and re-interpretable as possible.

Sustainable Design Principles
Hutteball & Oremus Architecture advocates a participatory planning and design process to review and select appropriate methods of achieving long-term building performance. We believe that each project attains its own distinct identity within its environment, just as each owner must determine the appropriate choices needed to achieve their overall goals.

We are well versed in sustainable design practices and we bring this wealth of experience to every project. We assist our clients in evaluating each concept or system through a variety of resources, including informative spreadsheets, research literature, energy lifecycle cost analysis, maintenance practices, and by sharing the knowledge gained from 12 years of practical experience. Our overall goal is to design facilities that maintain their value and provide optimal performance for our clients.