Enzi Education [STEM] Facility

A campus STEM building designed as a geode; the exterior responds to the campus fabric while a multi-story, skylit atrium creates a central forum for collaboration and science on display.

Size
100,000 SF

Year
2016

Location
Laramie, WY

Awards
2017 Laboratory of the Year, R&D Laboratory Design Special Recognition for Collaborative Learning Environment

Client
University of Wyoming

The ENZI STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) Facility is a campus gateway building centered around the idea of providing a central forum for science for all of Wyoming’s undergraduate students. The building is conceptualized in three parts: a central, collaborative “science forum,” state-of-the-art laboratories, and circulation. Three floors of L-shaped laboratories embrace the public forum, while the circulation is envisioned as an experiential element that changes as one moves throughout the building.

The first building within a new campus precinct, the design goals for the STEM facility were to create teaching and learning environments that attract and retain new students interested in the STEM fields, cultivate success within STEM disciplines, and provide enriching experiences related to scientific and computational processes, discovery, and collaborative learning. These goals are realized by creating a building that is a celebration of science designed as a conceptual “geode”; while the exterior of the building reflects material choices that directly relate to its campus context, the interior of the building’s multi-story, skylit atrium illuminates an exciting, energetic interior where STEM learning and outcomes are visual in real time.

Two additional design drivers for the building are daylighting and flexibility. Modulated daylight is brought in through the large atrium space and the adjacent interior laboratory environments. The effect is one of quiet shadows and filtered light in the laboratory areas contrasted with the luminous atrium, where the sun and shadows animate the ever-changing qualities of light provide a fitting stage for science and discovery. Flexibility is embedded within the planning of the facility, creating adaptable, modular spaces designed to meet the University’s present and future needs. Flexible furnishings are also incorporated throughout, empowering students to create customized collaborative environments within minutes.

In collaboration with By Architectural Means

Everybody wants to be here. You can try almost everything in here.

Larry Blake, former Campus Architect
University of Wyoming

Flexibility is embedded within the planning of the facility, creating adaptable, modular spaces designed to meet the University’s present and future needs.

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