Prominent architect joins Rice to teach science of building labs

From the inside out
Prominent architect joins Rice to teach science of building labs

BY JESSICA STARK    
Rice News Staff

When looking for a new home, people identify and anticipate their current and future wants and needs. Then they consider building new, or buying and renovating. Then they make a decision.

But as anyone who has been through the home building/buying/renovating process will tell you, it’s never that easy. Robert McGhee ’76, adjunct professor in architecture, can also tell you: The process is no easier for research laboratory construction and renovation projects.

BOB McGHEE

“There are always conflicts and tradeoffs in any building,” McGhee said. “Making something aesthetically pleasing does not guarantee its functionality and vice versa. Research buildings can be more challenging because they need to serve purposes that aren’t even known at the time of the design.”

For more than two decades, McGhee has led the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s (HHMI) participation in more than $1 billion of research laboratory construction and renovation projects.

Though he will continue to serve as an adviser to HHMI, McGhee left his position there to join the Rice School of Architecture this year. He plans to teach, write and conduct research on the design of science buildings, and he also will be involved with the Rice Building Institute.

McGhee has already begun balancing his professional and professorial duties by delivering the recent lecture, “From the Inside Out,” about his work and trends in building research labs.

Considering the past

One of the most effective ways McGhee has found to build a lab of the future is to consider the past.

“You have to look at history and see what has changed and how it’s changed,” McGhee said. “If you can figure out what has driven change in the past and what the outcome was, you have a better shot at determining what might be driving change now and in the future.”

McGhee has identified some current trends in research buildings. As data collection has become more automated, buildings need less lab space but more computational, office and collaborative spaces.

“If you’re designing a research building, you can’t think in the here and now,” McGhee said. “If you build it for today, under these conditions and demands, you’ve already lost. You have to build it for the future. You have to consider how the research programs might change from the time you design the building to the time the building will open.”

McGhee said that science will continue to evolve over the life of the building, so the building will need to respond to those changes or it will become obsolete.

“Too often people are blinded by their current setting — what space they have and how that space is used — instead of re-imagining how the building as a whole could function,” McGhee said. “I like to challenge people to focus on the larger picture of how the building will need to perform. It’s not about designing something to fill an individual need at a point in time. It is about understanding how the building will function and what it can become.”

Designing for social interaction

It’s not just construction trends that McGhee factors into his projects: He also looks at trends in technology.

He said that something as seemingly insignificant as a television or computer screen size can impact drastically the way people exchange ideas. Larger screen sizes can make virtual meetings feel more real, making them more effective and utilized more often. That can reduce the amount of meeting space needed.

Though what’s on the outside may not always accurately reflect what’s inside, McGhee suggested that function can drive the exterior form of research buildings. Instead of putting the functions in some predetermined box, the designer should let them influence how the building should be laid out and its exterior articulated. 

McGhee noted that buildings are more than physical structures. They are also conduits for social interaction.

“There should be a social grace to a building,” McGhee said. “The design should make things easier for people to work and interact. The way a building is organized can affect productivity. If the design of the whole is good, they will want to work there. It’s a great privilege and responsibility to be involved in that and really, it’s the only reason to do the work — to try to make things better.”