Community Development
Campus
Lander University Student Housing
Together, our firms worked to design a 70,000 SF, LEED Silver-certified, 210-bed dormitory building. The three-story residence hall replaced aging units on the campus and provided a spacious, modern suite layout with more private bathrooms for its residents. The structure features extensive green landscaping, a formal courtyard, and outdoor lighting. The building is lined with floor-to-ceiling windows and the students who now fill the dorm spend late afternoons studying and socializing in the sun-soaked halls.
Solutions
Davis & Floyd created innovative solutions to provide the structure and foundation for Garvin Design Group’s architectural plan. Davis & Floyd’s team of structural engineers designed the building’s foundation and its steel framing. The design for the foundation of the building included plans for elevated concrete slabs and precast, prestressed hollow-core slab design, while the design for the structure of the building included plans for load-bearing, intermediate masonry sheer walls and a cold-formed roof truss.
Several factors required frequent and detailed coordination between the design team: the intended use of the building — a full-time residence for 210 students — demanded an unusually large volume of infrastructure, therefore requiring an abundance of space in the structure to accommodate it. The window plans in the architectural design required innovative structural solutions to offset the load-bearing walls supporting the second and third floors above. These challenges were each met with a creative and effective solution.
Davis & Floyd’s landscape architects provided functional and aesthetic design plans that coordinated with and complemented the architectural design of the building. Our team designed a multi-use decorative path, serving as both a pedestrian corridor and fire lane access. The design also provided plans for a brick-paver and cored-concrete plaza, complete with benches, trash receptacles, and decorative site lighting.
Keeping in mind Lander’s short- and long-term, cost-saving goals, our team designed a drip irrigation system to avoid water waste and reduce long-term environmental impacts. To ensure that the upkeep of the landscape could be long-term and low-maintenance, our team selected drought-tolerant, hardy plant material that would require little groundskeeping attention from Lander’s maintenance crew. With Lander’s goals in mind, our team designed an outdoor space that was as functional as it was aesthetic and a foundation that would serve the growing university for generations of students to come.
Services Provided
- Civil Engineering
- Landscape Architecture
- Structural Engineering
- Surveying
