Laying Bricks

Just before the holidays, the masons started laying brick for interior walls in the basement of Huntsman Hall. This is the first finish to be completed on the interior of the building. I thought you’d like to see what it looks like since the webcams don’t really show interior work.

Inside brick wall

Last week, the masons started laying brick on the exterior face of the building, but you wouldn’t know it. That’s because you can’t see it. “What?!?” you may ask. Even though it’s on the exterior, you can’t see it? Let me explain.

Outside brick wall

Due to the need to control working conditions, the masons have to have a controlled environment to lay brick. That’s easy when the work is on the interior. It’s not so easy when it’s on the exterior. So, masons have developed a tent that they use during inclement seasons of the year. It is a movable tent.

Movable tent

Actually it’s more than being just mobile, it moves with them. It travels. It’s a traveling tent.

Ken Snyder

A Grand Entrance

New Grand Entrance

One of the main criteria we established for the design of our new building is that it be an “integrated complex.” By “integrated complex” we mean that the new Huntsman Hall building had to be completely integrated into, and linked with, the existing Eccles Business Building.

We are very pleased with the overall way the building designers have solved this challenge. An important part of their solution was to create a grand entrance. This is located at what is currently the NW corner of the existing Eccles Business Building. I have included a rendering of the grand entrance so you can see that it is one entrance for the two different buildings.

Steel Structure

While analyzing the need for a grand entrance, the building designers did a study of what percent of people enter and exit the building through each entrance. They found that 75 percent of the inflow and outflow of the current Eccles Business Building is through the NW entrance. We think that percent may actually increase due to the location of the new classrooms, the new meeting rooms, and the cafeteria. Based on the analysis and how the design integrated the two buildings, we endorsed re-construction of the existing entrance so that it can be a grand entrance for both buildings.

The reconstruction of the existing entrance started over the holidays. The construction company had to demolish the old structure of the entrance and replace it with a new steel structure that will support the new entrance that will serve both buildings. This was not accomplished without some complications. In demolishing the old structure, we found that the structure was not built according to the drawings on file. The construction company did a nice job adjusting to this change. They are just finishing the new steel structure. The attached picture is of the welders finishing up the work on the new steel structure.

Ken Snyder

Walls

Glass walls on Huntsman Hall

Usually walls are seen as barriers – often, barriers that need to be torn down. Sometimes that’s what we need to do in education – tear down comfort zones, tear down broken practices of business, etc., to achieve success.

But sometimes walls can be good. They protect us from the elements. And they can decorate our lives.

Last week, at long last (drumroll please…) the walls started going up on Huntsman Hall. These walls are the glass exterior walls that enclose the building.

It is difficult to see the walls from any of the webcams because the place the glass walls are being installed first is on the inward side of the building – the side facing the Eccles business building – and not on the outside face of the building visible to the public.

It is amazing how quickly the glass walls can be “hung” (I use that word because that is literally how the large glass panes are installed). In just four days, a significant portion of the ground floor, west wing and inward side, are now complete. As the glass wall installation continues over the next few weeks, the look of the building will change dramatically.

The building will really start to look like a building!

Ken Snyder

Up on the Rooftop

The structure for the roof is now up on parts of the building, but today, they actually started installing the roof.

I recognize that it is better to install a roof in a season other than winter. Well, technically it’s still autumn, but as you can see from the photo below, they were removing snow to install the roof. But they’re doing it anyway. It’s going well – with just one hitch. The building contractor and the roofing subcontractor tell me that some of the roofing materials can’t be finally installed until the external temperature is 40 degrees. Let's hope that we get a touch of autumn sometime next week.


However, it is a good time of year to think about people up on the rooftop…

Ken Snyder