Western Specialty Contractors’ Great Plains Roofing and Sheet Metal Branch of Kansas City, KS recently completed installation of a decorative metal panel system and TPO roofing on the new Regnier Family Wonderscope Children’s Museum of Kansas City.
Opened on October 23, 2020, the new 30,000-square-foot museum at 433 East Red Bridge Road in Kansas City, MO features 10 dynamic exhibit spaces focusing on STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts and math), birthday party rooms, classroom spaces, and a half-acre of outdoor educational space. For the past 30 years, the museum has resided in the former Flint Elementary School building in Shawnee, KS.
Construction on the new $15 million museum began in March 2018. McCownGordon Construction of Kansas City, MO was the general contractor and Haizlip Studio of Memphis, TN was the architect on the project.
Western Specialty Contractors was hired to install multi-colored, metal wall panels above the museum’s exterior entrance, along with TPO roofing over the top of the panels.
A crew of six workers installed the .125 aluminum plate wall system, manufactured by Northclad, which consisted of 210 brightly colored, angled panels that averaged 7 feet tall with widths ranging from 2 inches to 6 feet. Western used a series of subgirts to attach the metal panels to the building’s façade and also installed 800 square feet of Firestone fully-adhered TPO roofing over the top of the panel area. The installation was completed in 20 days.
Western Branch Manager Rod O’Bannon said installing the panels in the complex pattern designed by the architect posed the greatest challenge on the project.
“We were given an extremely specific pattern to follow for the panels. The museum would be recognizable by its unique façade, so we had to make sure we had it right. Each panel had custom angles, so aligning them correctly with equal spacing was a challenge, but our experienced crew did an outstanding job, particularly our Foreman Tony Sayers who did a tremendous job laying out all the panels and overseeing their installation,” said O’Bannon.
About Western Specialty Contractors
Family-owned and operated for more than 100 years, Western Specialty Contractors is the nation’s largest specialty contractor in masonry and concrete restoration, waterproofing and specialty roofing. Western offers a nationwide network of expertise that building owners, engineers, architects and property managers can count on to develop cost-effective, corrective measures that can add years of useful life to a variety of structures including: industrial, commercial, healthcare, historic, educational and government buildings, parking structures and sports stadiums. Western is headquartered in St. Louis, MO with 30 branch offices nationwide and employs more than 1,200 salaried and hourly professionals who offer the best, time-tested techniques and innovative technology. For more information about Western Specialty Contractors, visit www.westernspecialtycontractors.com.
