The new building for the College of Health and Human Studies at Missouri State University impresses through its sculptural formation. That can be said not only of the volume, but also the spatial organisation, which includes a communication zone connecting all floors.

Although the inner organisation is orthogonal, thereby transferring the logic of the street grid onto the building, one of the architect’s goals for their new university building was to break open the rigid geometry. This is evident not only in the slants and upturns of the entry front, but also in the nooks in the southwest, which mediate to the neighbouring residential development; the slightly buckled east facade towards South Holland Avenue; and finally, the folds of the roof. What thus arises is a sculpturally-formed volume whose physicality is emphasised by the all-over cladding with Swisspearl panels in the Carat model, based on the Sigma 8 fixation system. In interplay with the slightly recessed glazing, the horizontally offset panels underscore the building’s compactness, but as a recognisably thin façade skin, likewise emphasise its lightness. In this way, the new building creates a counterpoint to the rather heavy seeming limestone structures from the post-World War II decades. However, with the Onyx 7090 colour option, it purposely integrates into the existing spectrum of colours.