Opened to the UCLA campus community in February of 2012, this student center provides the campus with a new dining facility with informal spaces for study and socialization, revitalizing an important venue for intellectual exchange at the university. The 13,500 sf project consists of food vendors, interior and exterior seating areas, a coffee kiosk and a commissary, and outdoor gardens. Located on the southern half of the Court of Sciences, the facility’s low-profile design blends seamlessly into the campus landscape. The site is flanked by large academic buildings and crossed by two heavily-trafficked circulation paths. Due to its central location in the Court, the facility is approached from all sides and is highly visible from above. 

The main objectives of the design were to maintain the established circulation patterns, integrating the paths into the new structure while enhancing views of the courtyard from the surrounding buildings. The design solution emphasizes the existing diagonal circulation, literally carving a path through the project. Landscape and architecture were conceived as one, blurring the line between building and garden. Dining areas open on-grade to exterior patios, while green roofs, trellises, and planted walls surround and cover the structure with landscape, which, once grown in, will allow the design of the building to virtually disappear from above.