University officials and Joe Tattoni of the ikon.5 architecture firm presented updates on the plans for the New South Student Center on Monday. The facility aspires for a clean aesthetic with a modern look. The project emphasizes eco-friendly initiatives with skylights, green indoor walls, and solar screens on the south windows to reflect heat.

The shrubbery on the slope going down to Prospect Road will be renovated with a paved walking space and a lawn with trees and grills, termed the Riverside Terrace. A raised wooden deck at the end of the lawn next to Village A is envisioned as outdoors seating for the Pub overlooking the Potomac.

The Pub is projected to hold 100 people seated and 200 standing and will also have a service window for pub food. Students at the meeting raised concern over how expensive the food and drinks would be, which the administration said is still being decided with the business that will operate it.

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GUSA leaders came to an agreement with the administration Thursday regarding the planned pub in the New South Student Center.

GUSA President Clara Gustafson and Vice President Vail Kohnert-Yount signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Dr. Todd Olson, vice president for student affairs, to ensure the pub will serve students’ interests (e.g. that it won’t turn into an Epicurean-like business).

The new campus bar will serve beer, wine, and liquor on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights and will include 18+ nights or a system of wristbands for underage students, according to the agreement. The vendor will also be required to hire Georgetown students for part-time positions in addition to creating a committee to guide the business.

“The pub vendor will form a committee, comprised of students, members of Students Affairs, a member of GUSA, and a member from the University Services, and pub vendor, to provide input on menu, food and drink selection, student programming, and advertising of the pub,” Gustafson said.

Gustafson said these requirements are a “real-time” way for students to provide input and will help the pub become a student hot spot rather than another on-campus business overrun by professionals. She believes the accessibility for underage students and its location in the NSSC will help designate the pub as a student-oriented business.

“We are confident [the location] will be a new hub of student life for underclassmen and upperclassmen alike, [and] will draw more students to the space,” Gustafson said.

The pub has been part of the plan for the NSSC since the 2010-2011 school year. This proposal was presented shortly after students and alumni launched a campaign to bring back the Healy Pub. The pub, which opened in 1974 and closed in the 1994-1995 school year, had operated in the Healy basement, but President John DeGioia‘s administration tabled the idea of re-opening the establishment in that location. Students then opted for the possibility of NSSC space.

According to Gustafson, GUSA is already pushing for the ability to pay with GOCards. Vox is just excited that she’ll be 21 by the time the bar actually opens in the 2014-2015 school year (ideally).

Read the full letter after the jump!

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New South Student Center to include Corp Smoothie Café. Yummmmmm.

Last night in Bulldog Alley, the final New South Student Center Forum revealed the newest version of the renovations planned for the New South Student Center, and gave students the opportunity to raise concerns on the construction and blueprint of the new facility.

Last night’s presenter, ikon5 architect Joe Titoni stated that he and his team sought to completely remodel New South, and create a diverse space that will complement the active Hoya lifestyle. When creating their plans for the new student center, Titoni and his team modeled the new building according to the theme of Hoya Saxa.

Titoni and his colleagues plan to make the building open and fluid, allowing for a seamless transition between academic and extracurricular life at Georgetown. The center will feature various individual and group study rooms, open spaces for leisure, a ballroom, two new dance studios, a Corp Smoothie Café, a Riverside Terrace, a pub, and, most notably, the Hoya Saxa Wall, which consists of a series of study rooms that will run the length of the building from east to west.

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On Monday, November 7, members of the Georgetown University Student Association met with University President Jack DeGioia, Vice President of Student Affairs Todd Olson, and other University administrators to discuss issues of student space on campus. During this meeting, the administrators officially reported that the plan for Healy Pub, after taking a few hits hits from the University in recent months, is no longer on the table.

According to a GUSA press release, this decision came after a “lengthy feasibility study” conducted by the University revealed that a Healy Pub is not in line with Georgetown’s goals for student space allocation. Efforts moving forward will focus heavily on the New South Student Center, and a redesign of Dahlgren Quadrangle that will include more student space in Healy.

Vox obtained a copy of the powerpoint from Monday night’s space forum, complete with the latest drawings of the New South Student Center.

Here’s our analysis of the notable changes from the last renderings.

• It does not resemble an airport
• Removal of the “shared workspace” and “internet lounge”
• The walkway above the multipurpose room should give the space less of a Sellinger/hallway feel

2011 10 03 Student Forum

On the evening of Monday, October 3rd, a forum about the New South Student Center took place in the Leavey Programming Room. The forum, which primarily featured a presentation by SmithGroup architect Bill Ash, focused on the “feasibility study” of the NSSC, rather than specific design and details, which remain works-in-progress.

Ash noted that the skeleton of the space’s architecture is in a pretty good state, although there will be miscellaneous necessary repairs over the next few years.. There will be quite a bit of demolition involved as well, as the majority of the interior of the ground floor is old and abandoned, and some of the finishes from the old dining hall are still there. The goal is to re-imagine New South by making full use of the enormous amount of space available on the ground level, and to restructure it to better make use of all of its space. As proposed, the NSSC will be accessible all the time.

The scope of the program, which consists of three plans, was presented in the forum. The lower level’s existing conference room will be converted into a loading dock, along with a storage area that will contain a variety of flexible furniture for student use. The over 3,000 square feet of ground level will house a sizable food-service venue, which will differ from places like Hoya Court and Epicurean in that it will be a club-like setting, which will conduce to students’ exiting after having a brief meal. The details as to whether the area will consist of a restaurant, a student-run venue, a pub, or a bar are, for the most part, undecided.

“A lot of that is still being defined, but the administration is seriously interested in pursuing serving alcohol in that space,” Vice President for Student Affairs Todd Olson said at the forum. “I don’t want it to be a place just about maximizing profit and pouring hard liquor day and night. There is serious interest on exploring a venue that serves alcohol, but also that not being the one single overarching goal of it.”

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This fall, the saga of the proposed New South Student Center continues as the university enters into the public phase of their capital campaign this October. However, as discussions proceed over the layout of the NSSC, the administration appears to be leaving talks on the Healy space on the back-burner.

“It’s [NSSC] being presented as one of the key elements of the capital campaign,” Todd Olson, Vice President for Student Affairs, said. On the viability of Healy, Olson adds, “I very much hear and respect the student interest in having space in Healy and I take that seriously, but I don’t have any well-developed ideas on what or how or where. But I hear that point and I know it’s a part of what the students want to continue.”

Many students, particularly those involved in the Georgetown University Student Association’s Healy Space Working Group, welcome the idea of student space in New South, but are disappointed at the unwillingness of the administration to hear ideas presented about Healy. To note, the two projects are not mutually exclusive: NSSC will go ahead regardless of student space in Healy. However, if Healy is deemed unfeasible, the $3.23 million allocated by the endowment commission would be reallocated, and $1.75 million would go toward New South.

Chris Pigott (COL ’12), who is a leader on the “Bring Back Healy Pub” campaign as well as a GUSA senator and working group member, wants plans for Healy to remain a priority in the capital campaign.

“We’ve never had the chance to argue any type of merits with the administration,” Pigott said. “I think that’s wrong and until we have the chance to argue the merits to the provost, to Todd Olson, to anyone who will listen, any kind of decision on their part is premature and doesn’t necessarily respect the work that students and alums have put into the project.”

GUSA President Mike Meaney (SFS ’12) and Vice President Greg Laverriere (COL’12)  look to the campaign and the plans on NSSC optimistically.

“The Leavey Center is already a natural center for club and organization space,” Laverriere said. “And New South should be the social space, located near Leo’s, right near upper classman dorms, the Quad, Village C East and West. New South is the natural center for social life on campus.”

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Last week, University Architect Amy Sanderson led Vox and Chris Pigott (COL ’13) of GUSA through the area that will one day become New South Student Center.

The space below New South began as an undergraduate cafeteria (there was another on the ground floor of Darnall). After Leo’s was opened in the early 2000′s, the University shuttered it. The front dining area became what is now Riverside Lounge.

Below you can follow the tour through the space as it appears today. Bear with us, it’s a little chopped up and confusing.

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On Wednesday, Brad Lukanic of Cannon Design, led students, architects, and University administrators in a “visioning” of the renovation of the Leavey Center that is to occur over the next two decades.

In contrast to the last student space forum, a consensus emerged at the meeting: Leavey should maximize workspace for student groups, whereas the New South Student Center should serve as “hang-out” space for the student body at-large.

Lukanic led the room in brainstorming exercises, in which both students and University officials characterized Leavey as an “inefficient and insufficient response to student needs.”

Other characterizations called it a “de facto student center by process of elimination” and a “hallway and parking lot.” Multiple responses said the center’s purpose was to confuse people. Lukanic noted that these problems were endemic to Leavey’s design.

Most participants at the meeting agreed that the redesign should maximize student organization space at the expense of hang-out space.

“We’re very much lacking space in terms of collaboration,” said Emma Green of Philodemic (COL ’12).

Lukanic had the meeting’s attendees rank desired uses for space in Leavey and the NSSC, respectively. Participants were nearly unanimous in their desire to see group spaces in Leavey and a student lounge in New South. “Now I don’t care about any student group space in New South,” said Alex Pon (COL ’12), Corp CEO.

Other desired uses of the Leavey Center included work space for informal student groups, better availability of the esplanade for events like outdoor concerts, and an archetypal “Georgetown” feel instead of generic university architecture.

Additionally, Kathleen McCollough of GPB (SFS ’12) and Chris Pigott of GUSA (COL ’12) expressed their desires that the space be intuitive. Both cited how difficult it is to give people directions to and within the center.

Meetings about the Leavey center will continue into the fall, when Cannon Design will present to the University possible scenarios for renovation. The University will decide how to move forward from there.

Otherwise, the completion of the New Science Center and the proposed conversion of the Leavey Center Hotel into an upperclassman dorm leave some uncertainty as to the future usage of Leavey. In the mean time the University will add interim worship spaces for Jewish and Muslim chaplaincies and renovate Bulldog Alley for the start of the fall term 2011, according to University architect Gina Bleck

Meanwhile, her office is compiling a list of miscellaneous social spaces on campus, such as Alumni Lounge, to include in the University’s overhaul of student space.