North Paseo Building (NPB)
The North Paseo Building serves as the university’s front door and is known for its award-winning design. When designing the building, architecture firm Page used elemental simplicity, off-the-shelf materials, crisp detailing and strong urban design moves as well as a fresh look to combine indoor and outdoor spaces.
The five-story, 176,000 square-foot structure opened in September 2014. It contains research and teaching laboratories, classrooms, seminar rooms, and faculty and staff offices. The building features a wide corridor and seating areas to service first-floor classrooms. Landscaping and shaded outdoor seating enhances the north side of the facility. A glass wall creates a strong visual connection between outdoors and indoors with an inviting environment for informal gathering and group study.
At the building's south end, a stairwell open to the fifth floor and topped with a skylight allows light to pass through multiple floors. The open stairway promotes interaction between floors and improved physical fitness, enticing more use of the stairs and less of the elevator. A wall system with doors on each level slides close in the instance of a fire.
Photo Credit: Larry Speck/Page/Southerland-Page