On the Drawing Board

drafting

“On the Drawing Board” is an old school term that still gets kicked around and I’m curious just how many of you are familiar with the saying. It’s one of those terms that is most relevant to the design industry; architects, engineers, graphic artists, interior designers, etc. It goes back to the day of drafting tables and drafting stools when designers would actually draw up their ideas on paper taped to the boards and eventually would create construction drawings on paper taped to the same boards using mechanical and hand-held devices to draw the line work.

But then the automated world came into the design workplace. Continue reading

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Starting a New Year – a time to reflect

Happy New Year

Happy New Year

Kicking off a new year is always exciting; a fresh start, new hopes, new aspirations, getting out the black-eyed peas, remembering to put the correct new year on dated documents and making New Year’s resolutions.

“Set goals this New Year. Reflect on those things that will make a difference. Goals give your life direction. fcs”

For the Chickasaw Visitor Center the New Year was a milestone that signaled we were moving forward into another year of progress on the project. The first new year’s milestone in 2012 signaled the transition from schematic design (preliminary design) to design development (final design). The second New Year’s milestone in 2013 signaled construction was well on its way. Continue reading

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Happy Holidays – the seasons schedule

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What a scene to wake up to in this special and festive time of year; fresh unexpected snow on the ground for my visit to family in Greeley, Colorado. Wishing all of you a wonderful Holiday Season with your family and friends. With some reflective opportunity, let’s look at the events that shaped the Chickasaw Visitor during this time of year. Continue reading

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The Project Schedule – a view in retrospect

CN Visitor Center Schedule

Hindsight is 20/20; it doesn’t matter what you’re reflecting on. Compared to forecasting, the clarity of retrospect brings everything into crystal focus. Now that we are at the end of the ride for this project, the project schedule is a matter of pulling the dates of actual events and placing them into a timeline. The Gantt chart above is a documentation of those dates and events. This chart is a broad band look at the project with only the major activities noted. However Continue reading

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Retracing Our Course

SD sketches

Forecasting and projecting the anticipated course of a project is not an exact science. From experience, we know about how it is going to play out. But now that we are at the end of the trail, we can create an accurate reflection of exactly how we got here. We can retrace our course step by step. I am pulling together the milestones from all of the project phases we traipsed through to recreate the project schedule in reverse and see exactly what it took to get here. But let’s revisit the first activity of real substance Continue reading

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Mapping the Course – what’s next

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While we continue to close the project out, there are a number of upcoming events.

Current Events

The facility has had its ribbon cutting and is open to visitors. However, we are still creating lists of incomplete items and/or items to be corrected (punch lists). The most recent visits have been to review the landscaping and landscape irrigation systems, gray water system and HVAC systems operation. There are new items to be corrected and a list of previous items that are still being corrected. The contractor still has a full-time superintendent on the job site overseeing this aspect of the work. Continue reading

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A Day of Celebration and Ribbons

Photo Courtesy of the Ardmoreite

Photo Courtesy of the Ardmoreite

The milestone that signifies the Owner’s public celebration of the completion of the project is the Day of Dedication more commonly known as the Ribbon Cutting Ceremony. The ceremony inaugurates the official opening of a facility for its planned use. Amongst a hat trick of grand openings, the Visitor Center was dedicated along with the new Bedre Café and the ARTisian Gallery. All these facilities occupy the main Sulphur downtown intersection of First Street and Muskogee Avenue. It is fitting that the 100th Post of the FSB Blog would celebrate this major milestone of the Chickasaw Visitor Center. Continue reading

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Finding Our Way

Toledo

Toledo

It is interesting to find parallels in cultures and experiences across the globe. I had the recent fortune to visit ancient cultures in Spain. The heart of Spain is Madrid its current capitol. It is literally in the geographic center of the country and is considered mile “0”. Continue reading

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FF&E in the Raw

FF&E Floor Plan

FF&E Floor Plan

Earlier in the design phases when we are designing and exploring furnishings, we typically put together a rendered floor plan that provides a suggestion of how furniture would lay out in the spaces. The process we go through is shared in the post “FF&E what duh heck are we talking about.” We have reviewed the approach to FF&E planning and had a conversation with the interior designer for the project, so now it’s time to look at the documents that were produced for pricing and installation. No pretty pictures, no touchy feely material samples, just plain raw data for getting ‘r done. Continue reading

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The Transformation of a Site

Site Banner

 

Over the past year, the site has seen a major transformation from a dusty piece of property with concrete remnants left from a previous structure. It has been a while since we talked about exactly where this site is located. The site for the Chickasaw Nation Visitor Center is located in the town of Sulphur, Oklahoma. Sulphur is known as the City of Springs because of the local mineral waters and was initially named Sulphur Springs. Within twelve years of being formed as a township in 1892, the city has a unique history of being moved between three different sites. The population of Sulphur in 2009 was 4900. For you geomappers, the current location of Sulphur is 34˚30’33” N 96˚58’31”W on the globe. Continue reading

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