Boston – WS Development and Turner Construction Company announced they are wrapping up construction on One Boston Wharf, a 945,000sf mixed-use development in Boston’s Seaport District.
The 17-story tower includes 707,000sf of office space as well as ground floor retail and a performing arts center that features both a 100-seat and 500-seat live performance venue. Amazon has signed on as the single tenant occupying the building’s office space. The development also includes a 3-level, 200,000sf below-grade parking garage connected to the existing L4 parcel that Turner completed in 2022.
One Boston Wharf / Photo courtesy of WS Development
According to Michael Cusic, director of construction – Seaport at WS Development, One Boston Wharf will serve as a gateway into the Seaport District from Downtown Boston and the Fort Point Channel Landmark District. The building is active on all four sides and emphasizes pedestrian comfort and porosity with an intimate, human-scale streetscape activated with vibrant retail, restaurant, and civic uses.
Upon completion, the development will be the largest net-zero carbon office building in Boston, and is targeting LEED Platinum. Cusic said, “One Boston Wharf is an all-electric building, which employs many redundancies built into the heating and cooling systems, including secondary condenser water loops, secondary chilled water loops, and secondary hot water loops. Additionally, the building’s envelope design includes high performance triple-pane glazing to reduce both heating and cooling loads.”
WS Development has also implemented a long-term power purchase agreement to source renewably-generated electricity for both base building and tenant electric loads. “This will ensure a true net-zero operation for the building and a 90+% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions below the already-stringent requirements of the current Massachusetts state energy code,” added Cusic.
One Boston Wharf / Rendering courtesy of WS Development
“We used our self-perform group for concrete placement and strategized to reduce the project’s embodied carbon in multiple ways. Turner Self Perform worked with Boston Sand & Gravel to utilize mix designs with cement replacement. A moisture retention method in lieu of wet-curing reduced the amount of required potable water,” said Genci Leno, construction executive at Turner Construction Company. “Turner led a combined effort with Boston Sand & Gravel and the design team to engage Sublime Systems for topping slab placement. Sublime Systems has developed a means of manufacturing cement without fossil fuels. Turner is targeting a 24% embodied carbon reduction for all concrete mix designs and reinforcing steel.”
The project team for One Boston Wharf also included Gensler, architect of record; Henning Larsen, design architect; Buro Happold, MEP engineer; and McNamara Salvia, structural engineer. “There is a very productive relationship between the design team and Turner. From early in the project, direct lines of communication were established which served the project well in incorporating constructability feedback into the project details,” said Leno.
Cusic added, “By assembling our project team early on during the design process and sharing our team’s project goals, vision, and values with all team members from the beginning, the project team developed a cohesive, respectful, and productive culture that has yielded a beautiful and timeless end product that we hope will contribute much to the surrounding neighborhood and the city as a whole.”
