At many colleges and universities, the student union serves as the focal point of campus activity. These days, campus planners are increasingly designing student unions as a multifunctional home to fuse student life and recreational activities under one roof.
Two years ago, Muhlenberg College, Allentown, Pa., embarked on a bold expansion and renovation project to dramatically upgrade the outdated Seegers Student Union.
The building was originally constructed in 1960 when enrollment just topped a thousand students. Despite previous expansions and renovations, the 66,000-sf student union was too tired, worn, and undersized to serve as a modern-day campus center for more recent needs of up to 3,300 guests per day.
Ultimately, college officials decided to transform the Seegers Student Union into a contemporary student dining and commons facility to meet the college’s growing, diverse needs.
PROJECT SUMMARY
Seegers Student Union, Muhlenberg College
Allentown, Pa.Building Team
Submitting firm: Bruner/Cott & Associates
Owner/developer: Muhlenberg College
Structural engineer: Barry Isett & Associates
Mechanical engineer: Snyder Hoffman Associated Inc.
General contractor: Alvin H. Butz Inc.General Information
Size: 70,000 sf
Construction cost: $20 million
Construction period: August 2008 to August 2010
Putting The Emphasis on Community Ideals
The Muhlenberg campus is located along a high ridge with a view of the Lehigh Valley. The architectural vocabulary reflects both English and German design traditions.
The 30,000-sf expansion and reconstruction focused on centralizing the Student Life and Student Organization offices, expanding the informal social space, and, most importantly, developing a 600-seat dining facility that could support the strong sense of community within the college.
In an effort to influence design criteria and create a sense of ownership with the Muhlenberg campus population, the Building Team relied on direct and indirect feedback with students, staff, and faculty. “We conducted a number of focus groups and hung a series of comment boards on which students wrote their suggestions, comments, and wishes for the Seegers Student Union,” says Dana Kelly, marketing director with design firm Bruner/Cott & Associates, Cambridge, Mass. “There was a lot of emphasis on the desire to ‘create a living room on campus’ that would serve as a neutral ground for all constituencies.” This factor influenced the social aspects of the design.
Senior staff members from the college served as the Steering Committee and helped clarify the project’s goals. “From an admissions perspective, it was important that the institution respond more deeply to the observances of Jewish students who make up one-third of the student body,” says Glenn Gerchman, director of Seegers Student Union. Maintaining a “strong sense of community” was also crucial. “That’s a characteristic recognized by nearly everyone who walks down Muhlenberg’s academic row,” he says.
Because the Seegers Student Union abuts the principal east-west pathway on the west end of the main quad, students, staff, and faculty were able to track construction progress. Not letting an educational opportunity pass, the Building Team created a Progress Plaza near the construction site where information about the project and its progress was continuously posted, according to Kelly.
Developing The Focal Point on Campus
The Building Team was charged with designing a facility that met a wide range of student dietary requirements and restrictions. One is the Noshery, a new kosher station that has two separate kitchens—one for meat preparation, one for dairy prep. “We believe this is the first fully integrated kosher station on a college campus,” says Kelly. “Integrated meaning that it is not segregated from the other stations like other kosher stations.”
The new food gallery also brings the kitchen out in the open. Food is prepared in a display-cooking format in front of the students, which brings food to students faster while reducing waste and labor cost.
“The response to this format has been tremendous,” says Gerchman. “The meal plan counts are up, and the students have responded favorably all around.”
The reconstructed 600-seat dining room has become a hearthstone visible from the surrounding campus. It can also host a wide variety of campus events. The Light Lounge serves as an active living room, while an outdoor terrace overlooking Brown Mall rounds out the amenities of the structure.
Designed for LEED Gold guidelines but not LEED-certified, the Seegers Student Union incorporates multiple sustainable measures: low-VOC paints and adhesives, recycled tile and carpet, renewable lumber and millwork, a spray-foam insulated building envelope, and integral air and vapor barriers.
“The new Seegers Student Union now completes a new quadrangle on the campus, providing students with an important connection to the outdoors,” says Kelly.
Seegers Student Union defines a new campus space for Muhlenberg College that reinforces the unified structure of the campus. The building balances the institutional ambitions of the college with a desire to be aesthetically and socially innovative. +
Delivery method: Design-bid-build
Related Stories
| Sep 24, 2014
5 business lessons from a 43-year Star veteran
Mary Ed Cain was supposed to be born a boy. That was the first time she surprised everyone. The second time came on a daily basis during her 43-year career at Star Building Systems. SPONSORED CONTENT
| Sep 24, 2014
Architecture billings see continued strength, led by institutional sector
On the heels of recording its strongest pace of growth since 2007, there continues to be an increasing level of demand for design services signaled in the latest Architecture Billings Index.
| Sep 24, 2014
Frank Gehry's first building in Latin America will host grand opening on Oct. 2
Gehry's design for the Biomuseo, or Museum of Biodiversity, draws inspiration from the site's natural and cultural surroundings, including local Panamaian tin roofs.
| Sep 23, 2014
Cedars-Sinai looks to streamline trauma care with first-of-its-kind OR360 simulation space
The breakthrough simulation center features moveable walls and a modular ceiling grid that allow doctors and military personnel to easily reconfigure the shape and size of the space.
| Sep 23, 2014
Third phase of New York’s High Line redevelopment opens
The $35 million Phase 3, known as High Line at the Rail Yards, broke ground September 20, 2012, and officially opened to the public on September 21.
| Sep 23, 2014
Cloud-shaped skyscraper complex wins Shenzhen Bay Super City design competition
Forget the cubist, clinical, glass and concrete jungle of today's financial districts. Shenzhen's new plan features a complex of cloud-shaped skyscrapers connected to one another with sloping bridges.
| Sep 23, 2014
Designing with Water: Report analyzes ways coastal cities can cope with flooding
The report contains 12 case studies of cities around the world that have applied advanced flood management techniques.
| Sep 22, 2014
4 keys to effective post-occupancy evaluations
Perkins+Will's Janice Barnes covers the four steps that designers should take to create POEs that provide design direction and measure design effectiveness.
| Sep 22, 2014
NCARB overhauls Intern Development Program, cuts years off licensure process
The newly adopted changes will be implemented in two phases. The first will streamline the program by focusing on the IDP’s core requirements and removing its elective requirements. The second phase will condense the 17 current experience areas into six practice-based categories.
| Sep 22, 2014
Biloxi’s new Maritime and Seafood Industry Museum is like a ship in a bottle
Nine years after the Museum of Maritime and Seafood Industry in Biloxi, Miss., was damaged by Hurricane Katrina’s 30-foot tidal surge, the museum reopened its doors in a brand new, H3-designed building.
