Five Transformational Designs Honored as 2024 HKS Top Projects

With each passing year, HKS design teams strive to do better — for our communities, for our clients and for one another. Through collaboration and a commitment to design excellence, designers across our global offices balance beauty and performance to create meaningful, positive outcomes through design.

Through our annual Top Projects initiative — now in its ninth year — HKS exemplifies this passion for continuous improvement. By evaluating our work together throughout the year and collaborating with industry-wide jurors, we honor projects with powerful stories of transformation and connectivity and encourage one another to continue evolving as designers.

Top Projects is far more than an awards program. It is an invaluable tool for our teams at HKS because it serves as a benchmark for excellence in the design and delivery of our work. It showcases how we consistently integrate innovation, technical precision and client-centered solutions, delivering measurable benefits through the transformative power of design.

We’re proud to announce the 2024 HKS Top Projects:

Auckland Stadium – Auckland, New Zealand

HKS’ proposed design for a new stadium near Auckland’s Central Business District incorporates commercial, residential, educational and hospitality components centered around a sports and entertainment venue with a stunning roof structure inspired by Māori culture and symbolism. The stadium’s conceptual design serves as a catalyst for the Auckland 2050 plan, which prioritizes social, economic, environmental and cultural well-being. 

Baptist Health Sunrise Hospital – Sunrise, FL

A new health campus dedicated to the well-being of people and the environment, Baptist Health Sunrise Hospital integrates buildings and landscape with a comprehensive design approach. It will be the first all-electrical hospital in Southeast Florida upon completion, and HKS’ interior and exterior design leads the way in sustainability, resiliency, and progressive planning that will elevate community health and deliver an exemplary working environment for care givers and employees.

Brook Park Stadium – Cleveland, Ohio

HKS’ proposed design for the Cleveland Browns, Brook Park Stadium, honors Cleveland’s rich industrial legacy while introducing a contemporary dynamism that resonates with the city’s evolving identity. With natural, forged materials and distinctive forms that echo Cleveland’s historic industrial architecture, the stadium integrates into its surrounding development. The project’s design is intended to provide premium fan experiences and offer new assets to its community including parks and public gathering spaces and transit connections. 

New Pediatric Campus – Dallas, Texas

HKS is part of an integrated team, along with Perkins + Will, designing a new campus for Children’s Health and UT Southwestern in Dallas, which is set to be one of the largest, most transformative pediatric hospitals in the nation. The design will include more than 550 beds and increase inpatient, emergency and operating capacity for the health system. HKS’ design for the master plan and bed towers are intended to make the health care environment feel calming, accessible and connected and promote restoration for children, families, and staff through integration with nature.

Nexus Recovery Center Doswell Building – Dallas, Texas

Nexus Recovery Center provides addiction recovery services to women in a family-centered environment, and HKS’ design for the Doswell Building is the first phase in a larger masterplan for a comprehensive recovery village. The building is organized around a central courtyard to promote healing, and when women graduate from the program, they will be able to add tokens to the building’s façade to symbolize their journey, allowing the building to transform over time.

Global Design Excellence and Innovation

The 2024 jury also recognized additional projects as honorable mentions including designs for Cura Day Surgery at Camden Medical Center, the NAVWAR headquarters in San Diego, as well as Rural Superpowers, an applied research project developed through an academic partnership among designers from HKS and first year graduate students at the University of Texas at Arlington. The jury bestowed further honors upon two projects with a strong emphasis on social equity: the Amman Athletics Academy in Indonesia and Casa Cuba, an academic and cultural center at Florida International University.

Top Projects, as a program, is deeply rooted HKS values of relationships, character, and purpose. The 2024 winning designs —projects ranging from small health centers to large cultural venues —exemplify innovation in our industry and demonstrate how designers who are committed to lifting up communities around the world are making a profound impact.

2024 HKS Top Projects Committee Members: 

Diana Araoz-Fraser – Studio Design Leader, Interiors; Jason Fleming – Office Design Leader; Karl Gustafson – Architect, Nathan Ferrance – Studio Design Leader, Interiors; Kristen Fraumeni – Studio Design Leader, Commercial/Mixed Use; Michael Malone – Project Architect

Anthony Montalto – Chief Design Officer; Bernita Beikmann – Chief Delivery Officer; Gracie Andraos – Director of Design, Interiors;  Rand Ekman – Chief Sustainability Officer; Julie Hiromoto – Director of Integration; Upali Nanda – Global Sector Director, Innovation; James Frisbie – Art Director 

2024 HKS Top Projects External Industry Jurors:

Elena Manferdini– Graduate Programs Chair, Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc); David Greenbaum – Director of Culture & Museums, Gensler​; Atul Khanzode – Chief Technology Officer, DPR Construction​; Matt Nobblet – Partner, Behnisch Architekten​; Matthew Melnyk – Principal, Nous Engineering​