Program Summary:
A signature, gateway building at the entrance to Austin Peay State University is created to showcase the development of the solar industry and green technology in Tennessee.

Program Statement:
As part of the development of the solar power industry in Tennessee, Hemlock Semiconductor Corporation (HSC) (a company that manufacturers the silicon crystals used in solar panel technology) relocated to Clarksville. The corporation, in partnership with Austin Peay State University, desired a space to educate Chemical Engineering students in the management of the various operations at the HSC plant as well as operations at other chemical manufacturing facilities.

The 20,000-square-foot Hemlock Semiconductor Building is located at a prominent point of entry to the campus, the corner of College and Eighth Street. The challenge of its siting is its proximity to a facility ten times its size, the Sundquist Science Center, located across Eighth Street. The architect intentionally aligned the HSC building with the Science Center to form a gateway to the campus.

The lab, containing stations demonstrating various manufacturing functions, is the focal point of the facility and is housed in a two-story volume facing College Street. Its southern façade is glass-enclosed, showcasing the technology being developed. Classrooms are located adjacent to and overlooking the lab to augment the education within the lab. They are supported by administration and faculty offices along the northern façade.  

The lab is separately defined by iconic parapet chimney forms found throughout the Austin Peay State University campus. Its southern exposure supports the use of solar panels that create the steeply sloped roof form and augment this building’s energy supply. A horizontal sunscreen stands in front of the southern façade allowing natural light and views in and out of the lab, controlling unwanted summer sun and heat gain while allowing desirable winter warmth.  

In a further gesture toward the progressive technology created within the building, the classroom and support spaces on the northern side of the building are clad in metal panels and a glass curtain wall and are bound by masonry stair towers on each end. A two-story entry porch defines the campus approach of students and faculty.

Symbolic of the solar technology that gives this facility its purpose, a sundial clock tower designed by the architect stands at the Eighth Street end of the building. The tower is formed with steel I beams and clad with active solar panels. Its focal point, the sundial, conveys the time both in central standard and daylight savings time. The gnomon, the part that casts a shadow on the dial plate, is precisely placed to accurately convey the time. But due to the non-circular orbit of the earth, a supplemental time correction table provides a scale for the observer to interpolate the exact time throughout the year.

The selected materials complement the building form to evoke a connection with the color, scale, proportion and Georgian elements of the original campus fabric while integrating a sense of the emerging technology that the building is dedicated to advance.