UC Berkeley Goldman School of Public Policy

Location: Berkeley, CA
Owner: University Of California, Berkeley
Completion: July 2017

Along with Bentall Kennedy and 4Terra, we were one of three groups selected to present to UC Berkeley and the Goldman School of Public Policy (GSPP) to develop a new state of the art facility providing new classroom and office space for GSPP, as well as replacement parking and new market-rate homes targeted to meet the needs of UC Berkeley employees and graduate students.

Our overarching design goal was to not only provide the physical programmatic elements established by the Goldman School and UC Berkeley, but to create social spaces that would foster and promote informal and impromptu exchanges of ideas while at the same time, creating a program that was financially achievable.

The resulting conceptual design for the GSPP space creates a new main entrance and focal point to the mini “campus”, and provides both indoor and outdoor places where visitors, faculty and students can work, gather and interface. A central atrium becomes the central place where occupants have a visual connection to others. A café sits at the ground level and opens onto the central lobby.

Our design and programmatic objectives included:
• New GSPP facility that serves as a people connector, unifying the existing and new GSPP spaces
• Common areas, indoor and out, designed to encourage both formal and informal interaction and strengthen GSPP’s sense of community
• Functional and flexible spaces for office, classroom work, and gatherings that accommodate GSPP’s needs as the program and its approach evolves over time
• Takes advantage of hillside location and frame views of the Bay
• Sensitive to surrounding context, including the existing GSPP buildings as well as neighbors along Hearst, LaLoma and Ridge
• Selection of durable, quality materials, and strategic use of high cost materials and details where such investment have the greatest impact