Journal staff

Photis by Robert Pisano

Washington Aggregates and Concrete Association's Excellence in Concrete Construction awards entered its 29th year Thursday night when the 1997 winners were honored during a banquet at the Hyatt Regency in Bellevue.

This year, a total of 39 projects competed for top honors in six different categories, including: Cast-In-Place Structures, Tilt-Up Structures, Residential, Special Applications, Public Works and Concrete Paving.

The judging panel included Rick Zieve of The NBBJ Group, Tom Garren of Trammell Crow, Tom Higgins of Concrete Nor'West, Alex Hill of Fred Hill Materials, Hans Saxter of Parsons and Brinckerhoff, Dale King of GLY Construction and Benjamin Minnick of the Seattle Daily Journal of Commerce.

Winners of each category are profiled in the following pages. A Grand Award winner was selected by the judges from the category winners.

This year's Grand Award winner was the REI flagship store in Seattle. REI was selected as the top project for its expansive use of concrete to meet structural, architectural and construction considerations.

The REI project had three primary objectives: cost, aesthetics and environment. Concrete was selected to fulfil those requirements -- from the building's cast-in-place walls, columns and post-tensioned decks to its shotcreted climbing pinnacle.

The REI store features colored concrete topping slabs with exposed multicolored aggregate on the retail floors. The effect simulates a hiking trail. Embedded brass animal footprints in the concrete add to the outdoor theme.

Integral colored shotcrete was selected for the climbing pinnacle to match sandstone used throughout the facility on landscaped rockeries, a water feature, fireplace, welcome station and signage.

In keeping with REI's environmental bent, many materials were recycled or reused. For example, some of the existing sidewalks on the site were broken up and used for short landscape retaining walls. Also, ready-mix concrete was designed with maximum use of fly ash, a recyclable byproduct of another industry.