Student Life

AC Martin completed a programming and feasibility study for a 192,000-SF, 600-bed student housing building for sophomores and juniors that will include staff and graduate student apartments, lounge space, recreation space, a multi-purpose room, and housing support functions.

The Mesa Court Expansion Project is a new student housing building at the University of California, Irvine (UCI). Driven by a need for more affordable and inclusive student housing, the project provides 400 residence hall beds for undergraduate students in quadruple-occupancy rooms, shared bathrooms, and common areas distributed throughout the building, including study areas, living rooms, kitchens, and laundry facilities.

The project vision and goals created:

• Affordable housing
• Inclusive, universal design
• Comfortable, student-centric environments
• New center for Mesa Court housing community
• Gateway presence statement along Campus Drive.

The design and criteria creates residential blocks of 40 students and one RA, forming a small community for students to connect and identify with. Two blocks occur on each floor, creating a neighborhood community, which shares living, dining, and laundry facilities. In this way, the building planning supports the development of a variety of scales of community for students.

The project’s impact is extended through outdoor amenities, such as outdoor living rooms, study space, and recreation areas. The site design also incorporates bike parking, walking/jogging paths, bike paths, and a pedestrian “promenade” connecting the site with the existing student housing community.

UCI first engaged AC Martin on the project with a site feasibility study. Through the study, our team assessed two site options for the project, including development of pros and cons and site selection criteria and recommendation. Upon site selection, AC Martin confirmed the site’s viability for buildable area, site utilities, and overall opportunities and constraints.

AC Martin developed a Detailed Project Program and Design Criteria for the project, for design-build delivery procurement. The Detailed Project Program and Design criteria scope and deliverables included: site analysis, visioning and goal setting, space program development, adjacency development, scenario development options, conceptual design, and design criteria.

Out of the programming process, AC Martin and UCI identified a need to renovate the nearby Mesa Court Community Center. UCI is currently engaging ACM in the Community Center renovation feasibility study.

AC Martin completed programming and concept design for the Filmmaker's Village at Chapman University. Significant effort went into the design of this new, three-story, Type V Construction residential village study in order to keep it at a scale that wouldn’t overwhelm the historical facades of the adjacent structures. The main circulation spine runs straight east to west across the site and connects all three student housing buildings.

AC Martin completed a programming and feasibility study for student housing at CalArts. The common spaces in the new student housing serve as campus resources that are used on a 24-hour basis, while the residential areas requires their own security and privacy, presenting interesting opportunities for the building’s program and plan.

AC Martin is currently developing programming, planning, and Design-Build criteria for a new 200-unit multi-family apartment complex for faculty and staff housing at Cal State Northridge (CSUN). Known as the Devonshire Downs Housing, the project vision is to promote and enhance faculty and staff retention and recruitment by offering quality, modern apartment homes at attainable rates. The project will strengthen the CSU, Northridge community connection, and provide value through prioritized amenities and design.

The Student Center is designed to create a sense of belonging, a welcoming environment, and a safe space for students, faculty, staff, alumni, and the community. The University envisioned a design for this Student Center that not only provides a fulfilling experience and the resources necessary to allow student success, but also ignites campus pride, enhances student life, and becomes the campus hub for the diverse student population. In pursuit of this vision, the existing student center was renovated and expanded into an 84,500 square foot, state-of-the-art building that is versatile, innovative, progressive, and inviting. Centralizing multiple function spaces including study areas, food-service, and event spaces, the center brings the campus community together, becoming the central hub of campus—a place where every student can find their niche.

The design reduces halls and corridors in exchange for more meaningful gathering, study, and lounge space to truly use every square foot. The variety of spaces accommodate different personality types and group sizes. The intelligent and innovative design of the indoor/outdoor auditorium links the two floors of the building and effortlessly transforms into student lounge stairs when not in use to minimize vacant/underutilized space and maximize efficiency. The Student Center opens to a large lawn where students can congregate, creating a true campus hub.

Characterized by modern design and sustainable practices, the program includes:

• Warrior Grill restaurant
• Multiple food service vendors
• Conference rooms
• Lounges and study alcoves
• Bookstore
• Event center
• Offices and administrative space

California State University, Northridge (CSUN) built a 400-bed facility specifically designed as freshman-engagement housing for a campus that previously had only apartment-style housing. Statistically significant results from a behavioral post-occupancy study show that, compared with campus apartment residents, 1st-year students living in the new cluster-style, freshman-engagement housing have higher Academic, Personal/Emotional, and Overall adjustment scores on an adaptation-to-college assessment.

First-year college students are more likely to drop out of school:  they face the greatest challenges and are least prepared to meet them. Based on national research showing that students’ experiences in campus housing are key to retention, the new "Suites" cluster-style housing at CSUN was designed to promote students’ engagement and adjustment to college by encouraging friendship formation and supporting the development of social bonds. Small communities of 32 students and a Resident Assistant share a semi-private wing within the larger residence hall. Double bedrooms are grouped around a "living room" which serves as the cluster’s own informal gathering place.  

The freshman housing at CSU Northridge is organized around a single goal:  to have freshmen see and be seen in a comfortable and familiar setting. The Suites at University Park is a gradually-scaled social setting that allows first-year students to adapt to the university experience. The site design promotes interaction by focusing entrances and activities around a central outdoor space that gives the Suites its own sense of community. The courtyard concentrates activity and energy inward, while keeping visual and physical connections to pathways, dining, parking, pool and campus shuttle as well as the surrounding on-campus apartment buildings. 

See Phase II Student Housing at CSU Northridge

AC Martin served as the owner’s design consultant for the new yakʔitʸutʸu Student Housing project at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. The design consists of 11 four-five story buildings totaling approximately 950,000 SF and containing 1,400 beds; including two parking structures totaling approximately 325,000 SF.

The buildings are designed—both internally and externally—to create a strong sense of community; the overarching goal of the project was to increase interaction and exchange amongst the residents.

Housing Buildings and Site Design:

• Schematic design is based on groups of 50 students with one RA, forming “extended families”. Each “family” has a shared living/study room, located adjacent to students’ path of travel into their clusters in order to attract their attention as they enter and encourage interaction/socializing/group work.
• Clusters are designed as one-and two-level modules to provide spatial variety within the large community and offer a variety of room types for both two and four people. They incorporate a unique alcove design that allows students a variety of ways to arrange furniture.
• Each building has its own outdoor space, easily accessed from the front doors, and provides a green, courtyard, plaza or lawn.
• Site arrangement creates large open-space areas for activities and group events, with circulation pathways that cause residents to continually pass through the most populated areas, increasing opportunities for interaction and exchange.
• A café is situated at the north of the site to activate the site’s central space and create a connection to the existing food service venue across State Street.

Gateway Hall provides California State University, Channel Islands with a new “front door” that is a beautiful and welcoming space for both the campus and the surrounding community. The spaces provide innovative environments for learning, interaction, and collaboration. The project consolidates several departments and spaces into a centralized hub - providing a new building and renovated buildings that are intuitive, user-friendly, and easy to navigate.

The program for the new Gateway Hall provides approximately 80,000 SF of renovated existing facilities and new construction. The project will house campus admission, and a new “one-stop-shop” for student services, including financial aid, registrar, and advising. The new building will also house new general classrooms and departmental labs for math, computer sciences, and mechatronics. Lastly, the extended university will find a new home in renovated facilities; one that provides a new front door to the community. The project pulls together programs and occupants from across the campus into an interdisciplinary and integrated complex, putting the student and public community first.

Designed according to the mission style campus guidelines, the new building blends harmoniously into the contextual campus. Gateway Hall will greet all who arrive at the CSUCI campus with its welcoming façade. As a campus built in the Mission style, buildings were sited to define outdoor space. The new Gateway Hall building is sited to maintain that character. At the termination of University Drive, the visual corridor facing south towards the North Quad is preserved by siting Gateway Hall on the west side, in anticipation of a future theater to be located on the east side, and creating a paseo in between the two buildings. The Paseo serves as the main outdoor circulation through the Gateway site and into the North Quad and the rest of the campus. It is envisioned to have a leisurely quality as one moves through the site with Paseo-facing edges that are porous, providing visibility into interior activities. The Paseo has an entry plaza on its north end, giving a sense of arrival to the campus. The renovation of the historic structures gives new life to the old buildings, adapting the previous mental hospital into a welcoming university environment.

The "K" Residence Hall provides Chapman University with on-campus housing for 400+ students. The new student housing is a key component to an integrated master plan which includes the adaptive reuse of the Villa Park Orchards Packing House built in 1918. The historic Packing House contains an exciting array of student services, academic uses and a museum. A subterranean open central courtyard acts as a circulation hub between the renovated packing house and new residence hall while providing a dynamic outdoor space for students to relax, study and socialize. The new residence hall is differentiated from existing structures on site by its contemporary design and use of exterior brick veneer accents, visually aligning it with other buildings on the Chapman campus. The building has a combination of metal sawtooth and flat roofs, recalling the roof forms of the Packing House.  To compliment the surrounding neighborhood’s agri-industrial context, the exterior walls are clad in metal siding at the upper levels and smooth troweled cement plaster at the lower levels.