Slice of Italy

Miron delivers for Palermo's pizza

By Jennifer Pfaff

Deep in the heart of Milwaukee, a Tuscan villa offers a quiet spot to get away for a bite of freshly made pizza.

The nine-acre Palermo Villa is the pizza-maker's new corporate headquarters and manufacturing base. Also boasting Palermo's Pizzeria & Café with an outdoor dining plaza, the building is a major advancement for a business park Milwaukee hopes will flourish in the Menomonee Valley.

"The city's vision for that area … they are looking for walking paths, a park-like setting," said Mike Schmid, project manager with general contractor Miron Construction Co. Inc. "Palermo's has set the tone for that. They created a very peaceful view of their building."

The building features more architectural detail than most industrial facilities because it was inspired by the 16th century Villa Le Volte near Siene in Italy's region of Tuscany. The villa feel comes from high ceilings, intricate masonry archways and earthy high-end finishes combined with a u-shaped building and central plaza.

Recreating Tuscany in Milwaukee was no easy task. The stained concrete floors, for instance, required exact sequencing and careful planning because the stain reacts chemically with the concrete, and the resulting colors can differ from batch to batch.

	Project Name: Palermo Villa Manufacturing Facility & Corporate Headquarters Location: Milwaukee Submitting Company: Miron Construction Co. Inc., Neenah General Contractor: Miron Construction Co. Inc. Project Leaders: Mike Gambsky, Miron's on-site superintendent; Mike Schmid, Miron's project manager Architect: Excel Engineering Inc., Fond du Lac Engineer: Excel Engineering Inc. Owner: Palermo Villa Inc., Milwaukee Project Cost: $17.25 million Project Size: 135,000 square feet Start Date: September 2005 Completion Date: August 2006

"The big thing was thinking about what you'd be able to see in the building and sequencing it so what you see at any one time all matches," Schmid said.

Despite its attention to ambience-setting details, the facility is a food manufacturing plant and needed to meet federal health and safety standards. The majority of the space needs to be refrigerated, and a 660-ton ammonia refrigeration plant was built to accommodate the massive refrigeration requirements.

"It was the largest subcontract on the project," Schmid said. "It was over $2.5 million, and that particular work touched everything in the building."

The site before construction was filled with challenges. The Palermo's building sits on what was once a river bottom, and those soft, organic soils, paired with a prohibition on deep foundations, created a problem anchoring the 135,000-square-foot building.

Miron excavated and surcharged the site with material taken from the nearby demolition and reconstruction of the Marquette Interchange, said Jack Michler, Miron's project executive and vice president of pre-construction services. The weight of the material, piled 12 feet high, accelerated the soil's settling process and let the project stay on schedule.

Organic materials in the soil also generated a second problem: As they decompose, they release methane, which needed to be collected and removed for the health of those working in the building.

Miron installed a grid of pipes and placed a rubberized layer underground to prevent methane from seeping into the building, Schmid said.