Garey Hall Public Safety
This renovation transformed two floors of low-ceilinged book stacks, vacated when the law library moved to a new building, into light-filled spaces to house the growing Public Safety operations at Villanova University. To address the problem of low ceilings, tight spaces, and a lack of natural light, CICADA’s design included the partial demolition of one level of stacks within a core rectangle of the space, creating high-ceilinged spaces for the most active and consistently occupied spaces. Interior windows to upper-floor corridors provide views of the exterior through the resulting clerestory windows of those spaces.
Floor-to-floor heights of less than eight feet required close coordination of all new piping, conduit, and lighting, which had to be exposed at the underside of the concrete structure above. At the lower floor, wall locations were dictated by the tight spacing of the stack system posts supporting the thin slab of the floor above.
Translucent ceiling panels above the administrative open office space provide a visual screen between the overhead corridor windows and the workstations below.