Page 36 - College Planning & Management, July/August 2017

PATHS OF GLORY
36 COLLEGE PLANNING & MANAGEMENT / JULY/AUGUST 2017
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enterprises, and the ways in which architects situate buildings to take best advantage of prevailing conditions, helping boost facility usage and satisfaction.
Smell the Coffee
The concept of a “third place” in people’s daily lives, beyond home and the workplace, was coined by Ray Oldenburg, an urban sociologist, and popularized by the Starbucks chain as it marketed its rapid development over the past two decades. In Oldenburg’s conception of these spaces as anchors of community life, a true “third place” was free or inexpensive; was highly accessible to people, usually within walking distance of their workplace or home; was welcoming and comfortable; had availability of food and drink as a critical component; and because it attracted “regu- lars,” would be a place to meet old and new friends.
Some of these, you’ll notice, have more to do with facility operations than design, and in fact, some are aspects brought by the patrons themselves as they adopt a place as their own. But designers have the ability to influence much of the activity that occurs in third places, by selecting sites that take existing campus pathways into account, and then creating interior spaces that are inviting and pleasant.
Buildings for scientific study and research will never be confused with coffee houses or barbershops, but as with many campus build- ings, they have been increasingly reconceived as places for collabora- tion and interaction. Science buildings in particular used to be very task-oriented, but as social interaction has been found to improve the quality of research, social spaces have become more visible and cen- tral to the experience. It remains a hard sell in some corners — even though the importance of breakrooms, relaxed atrium space and, indeed, coffee shops is widely acknowledged, it remains a challenge to get some administrators and PIs to look beyond basic financial pressures. Many still want primarily purposeful space, and won’t always see the purposeful qualities of these areas for interaction.
UWM’s particular circumstances spoke to something trans- formative, even if the building type wasn’t a traditional social hub. The campus felt forgotten; rendered in dark, almost sepia tones. The IRC was to be the campus’s first new academic building in more than a decade, and the building around which future redevelopment would occur. And the site represented something of a crossroads. Students walking from parking to the heart of
the academic center, student union and student housing would traverse an alley along the future IRC site and be funneled across the pedestrian overpass that is one of the few ways to quickly and safely cross North Maryland Avenue.
The Righteous Path
The Interdisciplinary Research Complex houses academic and research space for STEM disciplines, provides space for the chem- istry department including the Shimadzu Laboratory for Advanced