HED designed the Murchie Science Building at the University of Michigan with specific needs for research and community in Flint, Michigan.

In the last decade the number of UM-Flint students majoring in STEM disciplines increased by 58%—all housed in a single facility, the Murchie Science Building (MSB). To accommodate continued enrollment growth in STEM, MSB is expanding, with an addition that adds 70,000 sf of new, active and team-based learning spaces.

UM-Flint turned to HED to design an addition to extend and enhance the existing MSB. The new structure would not only need to create new classrooms and laboratories, but also meet the unique needs of UM-Flint’s nontraditional student population, providing majority-commuter students with a strong connection to the campus and cultivating a sense of community. In response, the proposed design seeks to encapsulate a traditional four-year campus experience within a single building.

Pursuing LEED Silver certification, the four-story addition will add learning spaces, including a high bay lab for vibration and automotive experiments; wet labs for bioscience and chemistry; and engineering labs. Large, general purpose classrooms are consolidated in a single, universal 3rd-floor space, preventing siloes, promoting synergies and encouraging cross-disciplinary study.

The completion of the Murchie Science Building Addition will enable UM-Flint to continue delivering the highest-quality education to students pursuing degrees in STEM, and will ensure that every student—whether traditional or non-traditional—experiences the university’s on-campus community.

Design: HED
Photography: Tom Harris