Opened: August 2021
Architects: Hanbury
The words “creativity” and “innovation” are common on
the Virginia Tech University campus. Beginning with the 2021-2022 academic
year, those traits received a permanent home with the launch of the Creativity
and Innovation District Living-Learning Program and an accompanying 232,000-square-foot
residence hall for 600 students.
The goal of the program is to take elements of a traditional
living-learning community as well as those of a residential college and make
something, well…. creative and innovative. Led by resident faculty
principal Tim Baird, the program strives
to develop student leadership, community traditions, and faculty mentorship
relations.
There are three separate living-learning communities within
the program. The Studio 72 community focuses on artistic development and
collaborative art-making via showcases and workshops with visiting artists and
faculty. The Rhizome community, meanwhile, digs into the ways design and
planning help shape built and natural environments. And the Innovate
living-learning community works to nurture entrepreneurs and leaders in a
variety of fields, helping develop business ideas or continuing existing
projects.
Student Bennett Kawas, who serves as the chief operating officer of Innovate LLC's student leadership, said that “being part of the inaugural cohort for CID has opened up a wealth of opportunities that were never in my original plan coming into Virginia Tech as a freshman.” He touted the hall's features noting that “pairing the ability to not only live but also work and play in this space allows faculty and students to interact in a more personalized manner, and it brings out the best in them. I can't tell you how many times I will see students spending late nights in the makerspace hard at work on their class projects, or professors come in extra early to prepare the performance hall for their orchestras.”
Rooms primarily are traditional layouts for two students with some suite-style rooms reserved for campus student-athletes. Since its opening, the project has received a number of architecture and design-build awards noting how the space incorporated different community and teaching spaces, visual arts studios, makerspaces, both a metal and a wood shop, music practice spaces, a performance theater, and a multimedia library.
— James A. Baumann