Exceptional Design and Performance

The Truman Medical Center University Health Facility, located on the aptly-named Hospital Hill, is home to a state-of-the-art surgical center, which can handle advanced surgical procedures including eye, orthopedic, oral, and reconstructive services. It provides convenient and central patient access in Kansas City to a wide range of highly-desired and essential services from a multi-disciplinary team of trusted academic physicians and surgeons. The facility is one of only two outpatient centers in the area, and is an extremely important addition to the community.

Truman Medical Center is the downtown area’s only freestanding, outpatient specialty surgery center, meaning that the facade had to be highly visible and like nothing else in the vicinity. It had to reflect the facility’s importance in the community and possess an aesthetically cutting-edge design to represent modern medical advancements and available services inside the structure. 

“The architect had sold the building owner on a design concept, explains Curtis Jeisey, Western Regional Sales Engineer with Mays Maune McWard, “And CENTRIA were able to meet the look and provide the colors the design team wanted. Additionally, the panels were able to meet construction requirements in the Midwest.”

The architectural team at CannonDesign selected CENTRIA’s Formawall® Dimension Series® exterior insulated metal panels as the ideal visual manifestation of the innovative medical procedures and research taking place inside the structure. The 90,000-square-foot outpatient care center is clad in 29,761 square feet of the panels in a smooth, silver white finish. 

The panels are coated in Fluorofinish®, which adds a unique depth to the façade; overall, the design team “wanted a flat, smooth look, which the panels were able to achieve, and the selected finish provided an added pearlescent sheen which makes the building seem to shimmer,” Jeisey adds.

Aesthetics are paramount in successful design, but the performance of the CENTRIA product was the key to this project’s success. “CENTRIA’s product was able to meet the schedule, but most importantly, the panels were able to meet the building’s movement requirements,” Jeisey says. “Not only were the panels able to satisfy these requirements, but they also had an aluminum extrusion built into the system, and it zigzags around the windows making it both vertical and horizontal. From the ground, it cannot be discerned that the live load movement is built into the CENTRIA systems, which enables the facade to remain seamless. It’s an outstanding building in a highly-visible location.”

CENTRIA’s Formawall Dimension Series panels were also able to achieve the flat, smooth look desired by the design team, and, as Jeisey says, “the 3-inch panels didn’t require insulation in the stud cavity. One pass around the building covered thermal, vapor intrusion, and moisture protection requirements. These panels’ performance characteristics were also able to ease concerns about fire safety.”

LOCATION
2101 Charlotte Street, Kansas City, MO

BUILDING OWNER
Truman Medical Center 

CONTRACTOR
F.A. Wilhelm Construction Co. 

MANUFACTURER
CENTRIA 

BUDGET
n.a. 

SIZE
90,000 square feet 

DATE COMPLETED
May 2015