TRUMPF CUSTOMER AND TECHNOLOGY CENTER

Farmington, Conn. Client Trumpf Architect Barkow Leibinger Architects, Berlin Building Type Machine-tool builders' customer center

Photos by Paul Warchol

Machine-tool builder Trumpf America wanted a customer center to showcase its equipment's capabilities: architectural elements, such as guardrails, made with gloss and precision. The new center's simplicity recalls the functional clarity of Mies van der Rohe. The metal-and-glass detailing lets Trumpf "achieve an amazing amount of concrete image and identity through a very abstract language," says juror Toshiko Mori. "It's a very sophisticated, intelligent project."