In 1999, Smead Manufacturing Company commissioned Hoisington Koegler Group to create a new visitor parking court, visitor entrance, and employee break area for its newly expanded offices. The challenge was to create a space that provides a sense of arrival for visitors, establishes two public entries of equal importance, and provides clear and inviting pedestrian circulation. The task also involved creating a private space for Smead employees that would be at once separate yet visually connected. The concepts created by HKGi reflect the natural landscape and cultural history of the area as well as the brick, glass and aluminum of the building itself.
Ultimately the client preferred a concept that treated this place as an edge between forest and prairie, much like it had been prior to human settlement. Parking facilities and other outlying areas incorporate elements of the prairie landscape, while the building, its foundations