The new home of the School of Law, the Angelos Law Center, unites classrooms, faculty offices, administrative space, and the law library under a single roof for the first time in the history of the school. The building, located at the prominent intersection of Mount Royal Avenue and Charles Street, functionally and symbolically defines the Law School as an academic & social nexus, offering state-of-the-art teaching and learning facilities while fostering an interactive, communicative environment for collaboration between students, faculty, and administrators.
With the proximity of the site to Baltimore’s principal train station, Penn Station; at the terminus of one of Baltimore’s great urban thoroughfares; and immediately adjacent to the Jones Falls Expressway, this building also creates an important and highly visible threshold to the campus and the City, and demonstrates the commitment of the University of Baltimore to the on-going renewal and development of the city. The Angelos Law Center is also the first large-scale opportunity for the University to demonstrate its intent to pursue strategies that eliminate global warming emissions and achieve climate neutrality.
The building form consists of three interlocking L-shaped volumes which articulate the functions of the building program – classrooms and offices, the legal clinic, and the law library – and define a narrow atrium, a “green stalk” rising up through the heart of the building and connecting the three volumes. In addition to its function as the connective tissue between program spaces, the atrium also captures the lobby, two coffee bars (forum level and level 6) and informal work and meeting spaces. An Appellate Moot Court for practice court hearings, lectures and events is located one floor down from the main lobby and a garden level “forum” space for informal public events gives onto an exterior sunken garden on the north side of the building.
Certificated with the LEED Platinum status, the building utilizes a number of closely-integrated strategies to achieve a 43% energy cost savings over a baseline building. The climate concept responds both to varying programmatic requirements and Baltimore’s humid summer climate, moderate intermediate seasons, and moderate winters.
I was part of the design team from Schematic Design through Construction Administration and building opening.
My responsibilities for this project included:
- BIM coordinator in the Behnisch Architekten Boston office. This was the first project that the office used Revit for and I was instrumental in setting the office BIM standards and implementing processes. I maintained the BIM model and taught the entire office Revit.
- Design and detailing of:
- atrium space
- stairs
- railings
- elevators
- interior glazing
- signage
- Regularly commuted to Baltimore during design and construction to work with the architects of record (Ayers Saint Gross), engineers, and contractors. I performed site visits and coordinated with trades as part of my daily work.
- Reviewed and approved shop drawings
- During the construction drawing phase I routinely managed the work of interns
