Carl and Ruth Shapiro Campus Center, Brandeis University
Waltham, MA
Brandeis University, a 235-acre modernist campus founded in 1948, offered no obvious site for a campus center. We sited the building at the university's geographical heart, acknowledging the administration's goal of heightening the quality of student life and symbolically placing student spaces at the center of the campus. The location marks the intersection of east-west and north-south primary pedestrian paths. A parking lot and aging building were demolished to make way for the project allowing for the creation of new landscapes including a west courtyard and an expansive collegiate green which is central to the admissions and university administrative buildings, the campus art museum and the university theater.
The center is really two connected buildings. The overall mass of the building is separated into south and north wings connected by a three-story atrium, not only creating distinctive parts for the building's many functions but also offering a means for the majority of rooms to enjoy ample natural light throughout the long New England winters. The atrium is crisscrossed by catwalks that connect the building's upper levels, and serve as a large gathering hall and informal gallery, augmenting the gallery and the third level.
Please see our Flash website at www.charlesrosearchitects.com for a more complete representation of this project.
Waltham, MA
Brandeis University, a 235-acre modernist campus founded in 1948, offered no obvious site for a campus center. We sited the building at the university's geographical heart, acknowledging the administration's goal of heightening the quality of student life and symbolically placing student spaces at the center of the campus. The location marks the intersection of east-west and north-south primary pedestrian paths. A parking lot and aging building were demolished to make way for the project allowing for the creation of new landscapes including a west courtyard and an expansive collegiate green which is central to the admissions and university administrative buildings, the campus art museum and the university theater.
The center is really two connected buildings. The overall mass of the building is separated into south and north wings connected by a three-story atrium, not only creating distinctive parts for the building's many functions but also offering a means for the majority of rooms to enjoy ample natural light throughout the long New England winters. The atrium is crisscrossed by catwalks that connect the building's upper levels, and serve as a large gathering hall and informal gallery, augmenting the gallery and the third level.
Please see our Flash website at www.charlesrosearchitects.com for a more complete representation of this project.
