Brown University News Bureau

The Brown University News Bureau

1998-1999 index

Distributed September 28, 1998
Contact: Scott Turner

W. Duncan MacMillan Hall: Science instruction for the 21st century

W. Duncan MacMillan Hall, dedicated Friday, Oct. 9, 1998, entered service in the fall semester of the 1998-99 academic year. It houses undergraduate research and teaching facilities for chemistry, geology and environmental sciences.

Features

Other notes on the building

According to architect David Frieder, designer of Hasbro Children's Hospital in Providence, MacMillan Hall integrates laboratory and teaching spaces in an embracing and inclusive design, while creating a coherent science quadrangle on campus.

In an op-ed article in the Providence Journal-Bulletin, Frieder described how MacMillan Hall was a fit between architecture and program. The building, he wrote, "is a rare demonstration of how the architecture of one age can engage in a stimulating yet respectful dialogue with past architectures....The architects clearly intend that their design respect the adjacent buildings in terms of size, material and architectural language, but that it do so in such a way as to express its essential nature as a laboratory."

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