After completing a comprehensive facilities plan with VMA, the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School wanted to address the  first phase that would completely renovate the school’s L1 and L2 lecture halls.

The challenge for VMA was that the four rooms targeted, which dated from the 1950’s, were oriented diagonally and had no teaching wall real estate. They left professors feeling distant from students. As part of the renovation, we were also required to modernize systems and improve accessibility.

The design reconfigured the rooms into a horseshoe to better support the school’s Socratic method of teaching and to maximize interaction between students and faculty. New seating tiers were designed to provide clear sightlines and wheelchair accessibility, without the mess and noise of removing any of the original concrete seating tiers. Lighting, careful acoustical treatment, and extensive AV technology were added to support a variety of teaching styles and special events, resulting in what has become the school’s preferred teaching environment which they consider to be acoustically perfect.

PUBLICATIONS

• "Inside Look: Learning Spaces" by Kristen Domonell. University Business Magazine, 22 January 2013.