Project Description
Inspired by the Big Sky landscape, regional geology and an eclectic campus, Jabs Hall provides 52,875 square feet of state-of-the-art teaching facilities and formal and informal meeting areas for Montana State University’s Jake Jabs College of Business and Entrepreneurship. It is a campus destination encouraging interaction between students and faculty of all disciplines.
Four guiding principles for the project were established by the University and Design Team:
• Foster a “Community of Professionals”
• Make a place for “Creating Knowledge & Exchanging Ideas”
• Create a building that is “Of its Place in Montana”
• Provide for “Multiple, Smart Uses”
The parti places classrooms at the south, a bar of faculty offices and administration at the north, and open forum spaces housing informal learning and gathering spaces in the middle. This organization is functional and environmental: deeper generously glazed classrooms on the south allow for sunlight and good temperature control and smaller offices to the north with punched windows reduce heat loss while still providing ample daylight in these shallower spaces.
The office bar is clad with terra cotta panels in colors referential to the masonry of Montana Hall – the most iconic historic structure on campus. The rich stratified pattern of the terra cotta, offset by the classroom spaces clad in dark vertical zinc panels, emulates the geology of the Bridger Mountains, Yellowstone and Gallatin basins.
Two-story forum spaces at the ground and third floors, both with warm fireplace hearths giving respite from Bozeman’s snowy winters, are the core of the informal learning environment. A grand stair knits the four floors together and the forums offer informal seating and workspaces along with technology-driven trading pits. Quiet study niches with amazing views of the Bridger Mountains, and classroom “porches” offering space for students and faculty to confer out of the way after classes dismiss, are provided throughout the building.
LEED Gold Certified, Jabs Hall employs 53 closed loop geo-exchange wells for heating and cooling, a transpired solar collection wall augmenting heating, natural daylighting, low flow plumbing, LED lighting, recycled and locally sourced counters and stone, and hundred year building skin systems. Mechanical systems are integrally connected with district energy systems enabling Jabs Hall to harvest excess heat from adjacent lab buildings.