UNCC Center City Building, renderings © studio amd

Construction is scheduled to begin this spring for the new 12-story Center City Building for UNC Charlotte. Located at Ninth and Brevard Streets in downtown Charlotte, the new building will house the University's MBA program and other programs including graduate-level classes in the colleges of Engineering, Health and Human Services, Liberal Arts and Sciences, and Arts + Architecture's new master's program in Urban Design. The new building defines UNC as a vibrant addition to the central business district, providing a unique icon for the University while establishing a lively urban presence in the First Ward. Charlotte-based Gantt Huberman Architects, close design collaborators with us in this project, is serving as Architect of Record.

Read the news release

Ninth and Brevard Entry

Level 1 lobby

Outdoor plaza

The building is designed in response to the multiple scales of its context. At street level, a bookstore, art and architecture gallery, café and landscaped plaza provide a welcoming pedestrian experience.

Level 2 lobby

At the second floor, a double-height lobby, auditorium and lecture hall share the scale of the new park and surrounding neighborhood, defining the building as uniquely public. The tower is designed to enhance the skyline, with upper floors articulated as three rotated masses that establish a dynamic presence for the University, while defining a smaller, more intimate scale for learning. This organization provides a mix of teaching, administrative and gathering spaces throughout the building.

Eighth and Brevard

The Center City Building uses high performance and innovative building systems as well as local and recycled materials, with a LEED Silver certification as a possible outcome.

During early design conception, solar radiation analysis was performed to optimize building orientation and reduce external solar heat gains. The downtown Charlotte street grid is rotated 45 degrees from true north, and a building massing located at the southeast corner, directing its longer façade towards plan east/west, was determined to be the most favorable solar orientation. On the facades, a pattern of transparent and high performance opaque glass panels screens solar radiation, while maximizing natural light and views. In addition to creating a more intimate interior scale, the rotating three story building masses also provide exterior shading.