As the Weitzman School of Design prepared to open its first new building in more than 50 years, members of the design, preservation, and construction teams were highlighted in a series of conversations about the making of Stuart Weitzman Hall.
2 min. read
As the Weitzman School of Design prepared to open its first new building in more than 50 years—an interdisciplinary hub for research and teaching in the historic heart of Penn’s campus—members of the design, preservation, and construction teams were featured in a series of conversations about the making of Stuart Weitzman Hall.
In KieranTimberlake’s design of the addition, the rear wall of the former Morgan Building is exposed on the interior. The windows are filled with brick based on the building’s updated program.
(Image: Eric Sucar)
The first conversation of the series includes Weitzman dean and Paley Professor Fritz Steiner; Stephen Kieran, co-founding principal at KieranTimberlake; and Mark Kocent, University architect, who discuss why Penn’s campus is special, and how the new Weitzman Hall channels those qualities.
The second installment includes Steiner, Kieran, and Dominique Hawkins, managing principal at Preservation Design Partnership. The trio discuss which reviews the renovation and addition were subject to, as Weitzman Hall is part of a historic precinct on Penn’s campus that was added to the National Register of Historic Places in the 1970s.
Part three addresses sustainability, and includes Steiner, Bill Braham, the Andrew Gordon Professor of Architecture and director of the Center for Environmental Building Design; and Surya Prabhakaran, building performance researcher at KieranTimberlake.
In “The A to Z of Capital Projects,” Kevin Burns, project executive at the Target Building; Adam Loughry, associate [architect] at KieranTimberlake; and Karl Wellman, senior executive director of operations and planning, design, and construction at Weitzman, discuss the main chapters of a capital project like this.
Part five features Steiner, Burns, and Loughry in discussion about bricks—their ubiquity and history around Penn’s campus and Philadelphia, and the cost and sustainability of brick as a building material.
The final installment approaches the landscape design of the site and includes Steiner; associate professor of landscape architecture and founding partner of PORT Christopher Marcinkoski; and Sean McKay, associate principal at PORT. The trio discuss the value Weitzman Hall adds to Penn’s campus.
Novel plant-based approach to a better, cheaper GLP-1 delivery system
Research led by Penn Dental’s Henry Daniell investigates the use of a lettuce-based, plant-encapsulated delivery platform as a new oral delivery of two GLP-1 drugs previously approved by the FDA in injectable form.
No brain, no gain: Neuronal activity enhances benefits of exercise
Research led by Penn neuroscientist J. Nicholas Betley and collaborators finds that hypothalamic neurons are essential for translating physical exertion into endurance, potentially opening the door to exercise-mimicking therapies.
In honor of Valentine's Day, and as a way of fostering community in her Shakespeare in Love course, Becky Friedman took her students to the University Club for lunch one class period. They talked about the movie "Shakespeare in Love," as part of a broader conversation on how Shakespeare's works are adapted.
In Becky Friedman’s English course Shakespeare in Love, undergraduate students analyze language, genre, and adaptation in the Bard’s plays through the lens of love.
Beating the heat: Designing cooling for bodies in motion
Dorit Aviv, director of Weitzman’s Thermal Architecture Lab, studies how humans, technology, and design intersect, paving the way for the development of novel approaches to cooling people efficiently.
