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Insight—Student Life :

We approach architecture humanistically, so the student-centric, collaborative nature of student life projects are a natural fit. With campus work comprising nearly 80 percent of our commissions, we have our fingers on the pulse of evolving student needs and preferences.

In addition to having completed over 10,000 beds of new student housing in the past decade, we have planned, designed and renovated student unions, student activity centers, recreation facilities, campus centers, cafes and dining commons.

Our efforts, in some cases, include pre-referendum activity to determine project feasibility, facility program development with broad student engagement, and costing exercises aligning facility options with fee tolerance.

Principal Stephanie Kingsnorth and her team creatively balance fresh, inviting finishes and furnishings, flexibility and adaptability, as well as campus culture and style, with the realities of durability and maintenance in designing student spaces.

“I have always been fascinated by how students use space, understanding the importance socialization plays in the undergraduate experience.” — Stephanie Kingsnorth, Principal

"Having spent the better part of two decades designing or renovating student residence halls, dining commons and campus centers, I’ve found students extremely eager to help us in crafting the spaces they or their predecessors will one day inhabit. We find their participation fundamental in providing us an understanding of their particular campus culture."

The level of engagement and interaction that occurs in our student life projects goes so far beyond what one typically sees in designing a higher education building, with outreach methods that are wide ranging—social media, “tabling/drop-in sessions,” open forums, comment walls, town hall meetings and even barbeques—an approach designed to engage a broad spectrum of the campus population.

We have found students to be passionate, freethinking and extremely energetic, investing a high level of energy and vitality in each project, from conception through implementation. Incorporating all this input, combined with our own knowledge of these facilities, results in student life environments specifically tailored to the culture of the institution.