Wilbur O. and Ann Powers College of Business | LMN Architects

The five-story Wilbur O. and Ann Powers College of Business, located in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains and conspicuously located at the highest point in the area, serves as a new entryway for Clemson University. The building is carved out of the hillside and maximizes accessibility with five entry points that converge at the central atrium, inspired by the hills and natural scenery surrounding the site.

“As one of the major capital projects funded under our Clemson Forward 10-year strategic plan, the new Wilbur O. and Ann Powers College of Business has created a new gateway to the University,” says Wendy York, Dean of the Wilbur O. and Ann Powers College of Business at Clemson University. The design team envisioned a student-centric think tank atmosphere that fosters student/faculty involvement, active learning, and student-body socializing. The new facility has been transformative for our students and faculty, assisting the University in making a bold statement about the College’s prominence at Clemson. Our new facility is a game changer.”

Wilbur O. and Ann Powers College of Business’s Design Concept

A great public stair connects the complex’s north and south wings, drawing movement westward and down from surrounding residence halls into the historic core of the university, which includes the legendary Bowman Field and Tillman Hall. The project greets students on three levels and leads to Bowman Field, where classrooms connect to daily campus activity. Above grade, the project soars to stunning heights as wide, daylight-filled common areas enable students, professors, and community partners to collaborate and explore possibilities.

“Our collaboration on the project with LS3P and Clemson University began with the charge from former Dean McCormick to create a “unleavable” home for students from across campus,” says Rafael Violy-Menendez, Partner, LMN Architects. As the first new academic building adjacent to Bowman Field in over a century, the architecture had to be mindful of its surroundings while presenting an aspirational vision of Clemson’s global prominence over the next 100 years. The project site, located at the intersection of campus’ academic, residential, and social zones, provided a unique opportunity to combine these energies into a solitary hub of activity, extroverting the activity of the business school and stimulating the surrounding campus.”

With a broad glass façade, high ceilings, and a grand, connected stairway illuminating an entrepreneurial focus, this technology-rich, immersive educational experience stands out as the newest piece on campus. The complex equips students to enter today’s competitive marketplace as leaders by increasing recognition, recruiting, and rankings. A blend of formal and informal areas, similar to a modern workplace, fosters hands-on participation through chance contacts, focused study, team cooperation, research laboratories, and group presentations.

Additionally, other amenities, such as food service and lounge rooms, are accessible for students to come and remain all day. To allow for pedagogical change over time, a combination of tiered, flat, adaptable, and high-tech classrooms is based on a common module. Outdoors, interaction spaces and landscaped places encourage continued conversation outside of the classroom. Environments that simulate real-world sales and financial trading, as well as a dedicated company incubator, increase students’ chances of joining forces with the professional community and launching their careers. It was clear from the start of the project that this building would be a community anchor for this new campus district,” says Scott May, Higher Education Sector Leader, LS3P. The warm, lively gathering spaces that replicate the topography of the site demonstrate the emphasis on connection and transparency. The building’s adaptability will allow it to meet as-yet unanticipated needs as pedagogies and technology evolve over time. This is a long-lasting, collaborative, and resilient structure that will serve its occupants well into the future.

The interior palette is equally site-inspired, with natural materials echoing the firmness of the mountains and celebrating the horizontal strata of the hillside. Vertical and crisp textures contrast and indicate how the building rests on a substantial and rich historic campus while remaining open to innovation with contemporary and lighter materials on the higher levels. Respecting its wider historic and natural setting, the building’s brick façade respects its larger historic and natural environment, while modern construction technology provides for maximum transparency and energy efficiency. Natural light transforms the transparent electrochromic glass façade in the atrium, and the opacity is stimulated and triggered by the changing seasons. This open and transparent design anticipates the future while reimagining Clemson’s historic campus and providing a new destination for business education by connecting the building with the hill and the hill with the building.

LMN Architects is a North American leader in the design of higher education facilities. The Bill & Melinda Gates Center for Computer Science & Engineering at the University of Washington, the Voxman Music Building at the University of Iowa in Iowa City, the Edward J. Minskoff Pavilion at Michigan State University, and the Interdisciplinary Science Center at Eastern Washington University are among the other completed projects.

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