Brown University – new residence halls knitted into the surrounding fabric

Hugging both sides of Brook Street, the pair of buildings strengthen connections between existing campus residences and the Fox Point neighborhood alike. Well-composed volumes and sloped roof lines temper the scale of the building, taking their cues from the pitched roofs found across Providence. A distilled palette of brick, terracotta and wood complements and draws from the immediate context.

Interwoven with new, publicly accessible green spaces, the residence halls offer spaces for living alongside places to socialize, study, and gather, inside and out. Within the dorms, light-filled corridors are punctuated with kitchen spaces and small nooks—warm, inviting spaces to encourage spontaneous conversations and gatherings. Social spaces are located at corners and towards Brook Street for views out while animating the building facades at street level, reinforcing connections between the interior and exterior. Planted with native sedges and a mixture of heritage and resilient tree species, the sequence of green spaces will also perform year-round as a stormwater management system.

Behind the scenes, the project’s all-electric, high-performance design employs a hybrid steel and cross-laminated timber structure to minimize the environmental impact of both the residence hall and the construction process. It contributes to the university’s de-carbonization pledge of cutting campus greenhouse gas emissions to net-zero by 2040. An integrated design-build project delivery approach ensured that material, labor, and maintenance costs are an equally considered part of a holistic sustainability strategy.