Boora Architects

Located at the intersection of the academic precinct and areas for student gathering and recreation, the new Teaching & Learning Center will create a dynamic hub of activity on the Harvey Mudd College campus.

The center will contain the Office of the President, technology-rich classrooms, meeting rooms, faculty offices and a 300-person auditorium for use by all science and engineering disciplines. Stepping down from the ground plane, the auditorium shares a glass wall with a central courtyard that provides outdoor seating for study sessions and social gatherings. The central courtyard, around which orbit classrooms and offices, directs light and views into the adjacent spaces. This organization also promotes interaction across all levels of the building.

Rather than simply containing the work that will occur within the building, the Teaching & Learning Center will showcase this activity. External circulation will activate the building from all sides, while extensive glazing will broadcast internal activity to the surrounding campus. In addition, the ground level is left open to the north and south to draw passersby into the central courtyard.

The design of the Teaching and Learning Center respects the Modernist architecture of Harvey Mudd College, which is characterized by symmetrical building forms, horizontal lines and a repeated pattern of buff-colored concrete block forms called warts.

The new building reinterprets these elements to meet contemporary academic needs, better express interior functions and support flexibility. Instead of concrete blocks, the building will be clad in a series of square metal shingles, which suggest a more pliable and flexible building. The shingles will be painted in four shades drawn from a color sampling of the warts and installed in random order. Extensive glazing on the 1st and 3rd floors will help reinforce the horizontal lines of the building.

The design also takes cues from neighboring buildings, which open onto Harvey Mudd’s Great Mall through a series of exterior courtyards. The Teaching & Learning Center opens to the campus from multiple sides of the building and offers a variety of landscaped space throughout the building. These outdoor rooms bring interior functions out into the temperate Southern California climate.

The program was developed and refined via a highly collaborative process with faculty, staff, administration and students. Boora facilitated 31 meetings on campus in 40 days, as well as 7 all-campus forums that gave the campus community a chance to learn about project progress and offer input. Boora also hired three Harvey Mudd students for research internships to facilitate deeper understanding of campus culture and project goals.

A study of the spaces on campus that will be vacated with the opening of the new center, as well as underutilized spaces on campus, was also analyzed. This study identified possible space needs and potential renovation projects to accommodate current, near-term and potential long-term needs.

The new Teaching and Learning Center will earn LEED Platinum Certification through the following strategies:
- Filtering and reusing storm water through bio-swales and a green roof.
- Using only renewable and durable materials such as FSC-certified wood.
- Daylight and natural ventilation through operable windows.
- Rooftop PV panels.
- Visible metering of energy production and use to enrich education.
- Heating via finned radiators and cooling via chilled beams.
- Under-floor ventilation in large classrooms.
- A voided concrete slab system by Bubbledeck that employs recycled plastic spheres to optimize structural performance and decrease slab weight.