The Westin Virginia Beach Town Center is a Contemporary skyscraper designed by BBGM, and built between 2006 and 2008, for a reported $98.0 million dollars, in Virgina Beach, VA.
Its precise street address is 4535 Commerce Street, Virgina Beach, VA. You can also find it on the map here.
In 2008 the Westin Virginia Beach Town Center was awarded with the 1st place Creative Use of Precast.
The building underwent a major restoration in 2018.
BBGM was the architecture firm in charge of the architectural design.
That being said, architecture is a complex discipline involving many professionals from different fields, without whom this building would have not been possible. We will surely be leaving out a lot of names here, but here is a list of the people we do know also played their part in making the Westin Virginia Beach Town Center a reality:
The Westin Virginia Beach Town Center can be categorized as a Contemporary building.
Contemporary style architecture builds on top of the principles of Modernism and Postmodernism, but incorporates other variables which might not have been that important in the past, but certainly are today, such as technology, sustainability, inclusivity, and others.
From a historical point of view, it is hard to categorize things from a not-so-distant time, and therefore we choose to categorize most buildings built after the year 2000 as "Contemporary". It is possible that as time goes by and we, as a society, gain perspective on the things happening today, we'll be able to look back and recategorize all these buildings into more concrete subsections, some of which might not even exist today.
That being said, and even thought being a contemporary building, probably taking advantage of modern materials, construction techniques, and technology, the design of the Westin Virginia Beach Town Center is inspired by the postmodernism style.
The Westin Virginia Beach Town Center reaches an architectural height of 413ft (126m), 509ft (155m) if you count the antenna. It has a total of 38 floors, served by 5 elevators.
In regards to parking space, the building has a total of 900 spots available, which roughly equals 24 spots per floor (above ground).
Ever since opening its doors to the public in 2008, the Westin Virginia Beach Town Center has been a mixed use building. It incorporates 2 main uses, which are hotel, and residential spaces.
The hotel spans from the first to the 15th floor, while the residential units occupy the remaining floors.
The complex also offers a conference center, and 3200 square meters of retail spaces.
The hotel is a 4 stars category hotel, with a total of 236 rooms available to the public. The name of the hotel is The Westin Virginia Beach Town Center. You can learn more about the hotel by visiting their website here.
The Westin Virginia Beach Town Center has a total of 114 residential units throughout its 38 floors. If you are interested in learning more about the residences and their availability, you can check the Westin Virginia Beach Town Center's website.
The Westin Virginia Beach Town Center uses a frame structure made of steel and concrete columns and reinforced concrete slabs.
A frame structure uses a combination of beams and columns to sustain the building's weight. The walls in this case are non-load bearing, which allows for more flexibility when distributing the interior spaces.
The facade uses a non-load bearing modular, or panelized system. This type of facade can function as either a window wall or a curtain wall, depending on the design. Unlike traditional glass curtain walls or window walls though, the modular facade is not primarily composed of glass. Instead, it often features more opaque panels that mimic masonry or stone-clad finishes, with smaller windows cut into the panels.
This type of facade allows the building to benefit from the modern qualities of a curtain wall while giving the design team flexibility to achieve visual aesthetics beyond the all-glass modern skyscraper.
Its structure is composite, using a central concrete core and steel columns around it.
From an aesthetic point of view, the facade features prefabricated concrete panels in a polished beige tone with a subtle acid-wash finish. To highlight certain details of the facades, darker brown accents are added for contrast.
Starting from the level where the condominiums begin, balconies appear at the center of the facades, and a slight setback becomes visible as the tower approaches its crown.
The top is capped with a four-sided pyramid, featuring an open-frame structure at the peak that is illuminated at night and houses the antenna.
