Case Study | Miami University Farmer School of Business

At 218,000 sq feet, the Farmer School of Business at Miami University was the first LEED building on campus. The new construction project housed classrooms, two auditoriums, a cafe, private offices as well as a grand atrium.

The greatest challenge on this project was marrying the concept of traditional decorative luminaires with high performance. Custom luminaires were created to take advantage of current source technology and push the envelope on luminaire types that had traditionally served as “jewelry” on the building. The spaces required maximum flexibility to keep up with today’s collegiate learning environments and a flexible digitally addressable lighting control system helped meet that performance need. All spaces with windows contained dimmable daylight harvesting systems as well as automated shades for glare control and thermal comfort.

Through thoughtful design and application, the designed energy consumption on this building was 20% less than code while still producing a visual quality that meets the needs of the occupants, provides harmony with the architecture and is easy to maintain for the life of the building.

Ardra Zinkon received the prestigious GE Edison Award for Excellence in Environmental Design for this project.