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The new Veterans Affairs (VA) Community Based Outpatient Clinic in San Antonio, Texas, offers patients, medical professionals, staff, and visitors an environment promoting health, life-safety, and well-being. Representing these principles, Hoefer Wysocki Architecture designed the building’s main entry with a sweeping curved exterior as a “healing embrace.”

Bringing the concepts to reality, the three-story, 226,148-square-foot facility features Tubelite’s high-performance ForceFront® Blast Curtainwall, Storefront and Entrances on the exterior. Tubelite’s interior framing systems also were provided for the security entrance vestibule and breakroom. All the aluminum was finished by Linetec in “Silversmith” color using 70% PVDF resin-based architectural coating.

Completed in the summer of 2021, the new outpatient clinic offers general and mental health, surgery, imaging, lab, pharmacy, and CT/MRI services to the area’s 150,000 veterans, serving up to 1,000 patients each day. The facility’s design follows the VA’s Patient Alignment Care Team (PACT) delivery model, a patient-driven, team-based approach to health care focused on wellness and prevention.

Realizing the VA clinic’s architectural vision, Bulverde installed approximately 14,600 square feet of Tubelite’s ForceFront Blast systems to form the façade’s comforting embrace. Complementing the silver-colored aluminum framing and reflective, blue-tinted laminated glass, Texas limestone clads the exterior walls. The local masonry blends with the natural landscaping, suggesting the building may have grown from the ground.

Inviting the outdoors inside, the San Antonio VA’s welcoming atrium bathes the curved lobby with daylighting and visually links the upper floors with the main level and front entrance. On the other elevations, Tubelite’s blast-mitigating storefront creates the multi-story spans and single “punched” openings. The views outside extend the sense of connection beyond the clinic’s walls with access to a park-like pedestrian-friendly setting, further supporting the complete healing experience.

Natural and locally sourced materials, daylighting strategies, views and access to the outdoors, and other sustainable elements demonstrate the VA’s commitment to green building practices. Designed to achieve Green Globe certification, the new medical center consolidates existing services from multiple clinics into one efficient, centralized, community-based location.

Balanced Performance
The VA project team outlined numerous performance-based specifications for the project. Tubelite’s systems addressed all requirements including local and federal building codes, wind loads of up to 120 mph, condensation resistance, solar heat gain and thermal performance criteria, and blast mitigation.

Tubelite’s ForceFront Blast systems are engineered to comply with the blast hazard-mitigating requirements for the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), the General Service Administration (GSA) and the VA Office of Construction and Facilities Management’s “Physical Security and Resiliency Design Manual” (PSRDM).

“The goal is to protect people, property and assets, and to do so with cost-effective systems that provide safe, healthy, comfortable buildings,” said Greg Hall, Tubelite’s product development manager. “Blast criteria vary by project and selecting the appropriate product with the right glass and anchorage is challenging even for experienced professionals.”

Simplifying installation with a modular approach, Tubelite ForceFront Blast Standard Medium Stile Entrances complement and easily integrate with the curtainwall and storefront systems. Tubelite ForceFront Blast 400T Curtainwall and T34000 Storefront systems also are thermally broken to support energy-efficiency goals and requirements.

Successful Outcomes, Care-Focused Design
“Our work with the VA is unlike any other client – it’s a partnership with a shared goal, which is to provide high-quality care that’s responsive to veterans’ needs,” said Hoefer Welker’s partner and director of design, Hosam Habib, AIA.

Habib continued, “A common theme throughout all of our VA facility designs is to promote a sense of camaraderie, hospitality, social responsibility to the environment and a focus on the entire health of the person. Ultimately, we want to provide care-focused designs that reflect our country’s commitment and gratitude toward veterans as well as an understanding of their and their families’ physical, psychological and emotional needs.”

_{Photos by Tyler Messer, Bulverde Glass, Inc.}