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Elevating Lab Design: AMRF Earns Special Mention for Sustainable Renovation
The NRC’s $77 million AMRF project in Ontario transforms an occupied, conventional lab building into a vertically expanded, LEED Gold, highly flexible, and electrified research facility—earning a 2026 Design Excellence Special Mention while serving as a scalable model for modern, low-carbon laboratory design
User Input, Real Impact: Simulation Lab Recognized with Special Mention—User Engagement
At WashU School of Medicine, the Multidisciplinary Surgical Simulation Lab demonstrates how intensive user engagement and iterative mockups shaped a highly flexible, ergonomic training space that earned Special Mention for User Engagement in the 2026 Design Excellence Awards
Breathing New Life into an Old Asset: University of Waterloo Wins Excellence in Whole Building/Holistic Design—Renovation
The University of Waterloo’s Earth Sciences & Chemistry Building Level 3 renovation modernizes a 1960s-era research facility through major spatial reconfiguration and high-performance infrastructure upgrades while maintaining live operations, earning the Excellence in Whole Building/Holistic Design—Renovation prize in the 2026 Design Excellence Awards
Sustainability by Design: L’Oréal’s Prize-Winning Research Hub
The L’Oréal North American Research & Innovation Center earned a Design Excellence Award for seamlessly integrating advanced laboratory functionality with sustainability and human-centered design to create a high-performance, collaboration-driven research environment
Aggie Square Wins Excellence in Whole Building/Holistic Design—New Build in Design Excellence Awards
Aggie Square at UC Davis, winner of the Excellence in Whole Building/Holistic Design—New Build category in the 2026 Design Excellence Awards, brings together research, industry, education, and community functions within a connected ecosystem, where shared spaces and “soft” programmatic connections support everyday interaction and large-scale collaboration
A*STAR Infectious Disease Labs Earns Excellence in Interior Design
The renovation of A*STAR’s Infectious Disease Labs in Singapore earned the 2026 Design Excellence Award for Excellence in Interior Design by transforming a complex biosafety research environment through strategic planning, intuitive wayfinding, and user-focused design features that enhance safety, navigation, and day-to-day usability
Lab Design Conference Tours Spotlight Real-World Research Environments
The 2026 Lab Design Conference offered guided tours of active research, innovation, and environmental laboratories across Orlando, led by both project teams and lab users, to directly observe how design decisions translate into real-world workflow, collaboration, and operational performance
Rapid Response, Lasting Asset: LSU Health’s EVT Wins Excellence in Small Project Design
The LSU Health Shreveport Center for Emerging Viral Threats demonstrates how a tightly integrated, budget-conscious design successfully delivered a flexible, high-containment BSL-2/BSL-3 laboratory that earned recognition for Excellence in Small Project Design
Future-Ready Labs Take Focus at Lab Design Conference in Orlando
The Lab Design Conference’s second day of sessions highlighted adaptive reuse, sustainability, automation, and user-centered design through a mix of expert-led presentations and interactive discussions
Key Takeaways from the Lab Design Conference
The Lab Design Conference convened diverse stakeholders in Orlando on May 12 to share how laboratory environments are designed and experienced, through lab end user engagement and thoughtful design and construction techniques