MISSOURI CENTRAL CREDIT UNION

In a building with heavy proportion set low on a massive nondescript lawn the Missouri Credit Union Building struggled to announce itself to the heavily trafficked highway two-hundred feet east of its door. Countless passers-by sped past, oblivious of the tiresome stucco building with clay-tile roof. The problem was visibility, the solution three-fold: lighten the building’s proportion, foreshorten the lawn, and enliven the building with the Credit Union’s brand. 

The clay-tile roof was visually weighed down by a two-foot tall flat metal fascia painted red. Aluminum banding top and bottom were added to the fascia, all painted white to match the stucco below. The two-foot fascia datum became home to brightly colored back-lit channel letter signage. Spindly columns beneath the drive-thru canopy were enlarged with back-lit perforated aluminum panels. Perforated aluminum screening, also back lit, were shaped along the otherwise blank stucco façade marking the front entry, teller window, and screening mechanical equipment. The screen continued into the landscape punctuating the earthen berm, introduced to connect an existing flagpole monument deep in the site with a new monument sign nearby the road.