Photo by: Andrew Fielding
Plans to remodel Penrose Library, set to cost over $30 million, will be viewed March 10 by the Board of Trustees for approval, in preparation for an anticipated 16-month construction project to establish the new Academic Commons facility.
According to University architect Mark Rodgers, the projected timeline will span from summer 2011 through the end of fall quarter 2012.
Although this process will be disruptive, the library “will be functioning through this academic year, and then in the summer the demolition contractors will come in,” said Rodgers.
Nancy Allen, the dean of the library, seemed confident that the project is on schedule. Currently, those both directly and indirectly involved are in daily meetings to organize a multitude of details, from floor plans to furniture, skylights to sustainability.
After project commencement on June 6, it is expected that the active collection housed in Penrose will be moved out. Allen anticipates library faculty and services will move into Aspen Apartments, student housing which will be converted into temporary library offices by June 28, to leave the Penrose Library building empty for renovation to begin.
“We’re still in flux,” Allen said. “The schedule for completion of each consultant’s work varies. But not long from now, we’ll set the dates for everything.”
Rodgers said that presentation visuals should be prepared in the next two weeks, approximately.
The library remodel is included in the key investments of the ASCEND campaign, the University’s current, multi-year campaign focusing on fundraising and financial aid for undergraduate and graduate students, faculty support and facility improvements, to ultimately coincide with the 150th anniversary of DU’s founding in 2014.
As of last week, nearly $266 million had been raised through the ASCEND campaign, according to Scott Lumpkin, the vice chancellor for University Advancement. It is hoped that DU raises $500 million total by the completion of the campaign.
“I’m confident we will meet and surpass the scholarship goal,” Lumpkin said. “As of mid-February, $75 million had been raised and committed for scholarships. [But] our heavy focus on raising funds for scholarships should not impact our ability to successfully complete funding for Academic Commons.”
The Academic Commons project is expected to cost between $32 and $33 million. Lumpkin said $9.4 million will be raised from alumni, parents, friends and other members of the DU community. The balance of the funding will come from capital that has been set aside by the university over several years in preparation for the project.
$4 million of the approximate $32 million for the Academic Commons undertaking has gone toward DU’s recent purchase of the Hampden Center, a building that will house the entire Penrose paper collection during construction.
“This is nearly five miles of book storage located in Aurora, Colo.,” Allen said. “Following completion of the library, it will continue to house our less active collections.”
Rodgers went on to say that without this facility, it had been considered to leave the library partially open during construction, extending the project period to nearly three or four years.
“While it may seem more intense to take the library completely off-line, it’s only a 16-month timeline we’re looking at,” he said.
$3.4 million has been raised or committed to the $9.4 million goal fundraising goal, leaving $6 million that will be collected in the form of gifts, according to Lumpkin.
Chancellor Robert Coombe has instructed that all unrestricted contributions received from July 1, 2010, through June 30, 2012, will be directed specifically to the Academic Commons.
Prior to contracting with the architect of record, a commercial firm called H+ L Architecture, the Board of Trustees requires that DU account for 80 percent of the funding. This serves to reflect DU’s solid financial management practices, according to Lumpkin.
Rodgers said that currently, the project is over-budget; he did not specify by how much.
“This is not a surprise,” Rodgers said. “We want to be able to draw and capture the aspirations of this project, so we’re sifting through so as to be best-informed.”
This includes features such as a full-use café, potentially a fireplace and a skylight, similar to that atop the Knoebel School of Hospitality Management, to maximize the natural light available inside the remodeled space.
The Academic Commons project has come at a time when DU has accumulated a number of reasons to update the library.
“I would argue that the library is the purpose of a university,” he said. “The library is a place where you can expect people with different interests to intermingle. People feel they can cross the threshold into someone else’s domain. I’m quoting Dean Allen, but ultimately, the library is less about paper and more about people.”
As seen today, the Penrose Library building was erected in 1972.
“Penrose was designed efficiently,” Rodgers said. “It took us over 40 years before we were willing to take it all apart and put it back together again.”
He added that the inside will be more dramatically transformed than the outside.
“We are trying to make the learning environment the focus of the project. However, the outside will get some attention too – mostly on the south side.”
Rodgers referred to a 10,000-square foot addition to the current facility that sits on nearly an acre of the campus. On the new space, drawings at this time show a large reading room, some meeting and group study areas and large staff spaces. Allen noted that the entire floor plan, including new and existing floor plans, will be redrawn.
Before the library doors close for just over a year, students can look forward to additional hours in Penrose. The new Academic Commons will remain open 24 hours daily, so Dean Allen opted to extend the same opportunity to students this coming spring quarter through Penrose. Allen is still in the process of finding and hiring the appropriate staff to fill such positions.
