Photos courtesy Lease Crutcher Lewis Five industrial buildings were turned into classroom space at the University of Washington's Tacoma campus.

Lease Crutcher Lewis was the general contractor/construction manager for 133,000 square feet of renovations to five historic buildings on the University of Washington’s Tacoma campus. The buildings were converted into academic and support spaces.

The project consisted of complex and expensive seismic/structural construction staging and phasing. Work involved selective demolition, structural upgrades, masonry restoration, historic preservation and site improvements.

The contractor suggested “historic replica” replacement windows, which eliminated the cost of abating lead paint and reduced the mechanical system cost by $200,000. It also reduced schedule risk and satisfied the Historic Preservation Committee and architect.

Lease Crutcher Lewis saved another $160,000 and reduced the structural work schedule by two months by using an integrated roof structure.

Lease Crutcher Lewis suggested using historic replica windows to eliminate lead paint abatement and save $200,000 on mechanical system costs.

During renovation, dry rot was discovered in wood columns in one of the buildings. Since those columns could not withstand new structural loads, the contractor shored the entire building to suspend the columns, cut the bases off where dry rot was and poured structural concrete in their place.

Lease Crutcher Lewis beat the UW Capital Projects safety goal of a 3.0 incident rate with a 2.8 rating with 352,105 worker hours.

A LEED certified rating is expected for this phase of the UW Tacoma campus.