Services   Barthco International Corporate Headquarters   Philadelphia Naval Shipyard Philadelphia, PA   The client The Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, funded by Congress in 1799, was the nation’s first naval station. With four miles of waterfront on the Delaware River, it built ships for 197 years, closing in 1996. Now a trendy office complex in the metropolis, the Philadelphia Naval Business Center houses, appropriately, Barthco International, a global customs broker.   The O&N solution The three-story Building 26 included a two-story-high clear space where ships were once fabricated. Barthco hired Casaccio Architects, of Havertown, Pa., to convert a 1900s ship-building facility into its corporate headquarters. Casaccio turned to O’Donnell & Naccarato for structural engineering with instructions to convert the cold, high crane bays of the warehouse into a vibrant, warm and inviting building. O&N extensively analyzed the structure of the existing building to determine whether the existing structural elements could support the full load, particularly a new floor made of concrete and steel beams midway up the clear bay. During this 2004 project, engineers also planned how to expose key elements and upgrade the building to current codes. W.S. Cumby, of Springfield, Pa., handled construction.   O&N’s contribution O’Donnell & Naccarato worked with the architect on an elegant retrofit of an historic industrial property, giving the client a distinctive corporate headquarters, recognized by the Preservation Alliance of Greater Philadelphia as:  “…a distinguished example of historic preservation as a key tool in the redevelopment of the nation’s oldest naval base. The project required ingenuity and respect for Building 26’s history.”