Third floor studios launch redesign this fall
For generations of design students at CU Boulder, the third floor of the Environmental Design building was more than just a workspace – it was a canvas for creativity and community. Alumni speak fondly of the infamous “carpet garden,” a lounge-like area that once held floor-to-wall carpets. They reminisce about working late into the night with friends, materials and designs spread across the rickety drafting tables. ENVD’s third floor always seemed to be a space that encapsulated the creativity and rigor of design students.
This summer marks another iteration of third floor updates and while there may not be a wall of carpet addition, the third floor will be, in many ways, student-oriented once again.
Assistant Teaching Professor Jared Arp and Creative Labs Center Coordinator Kiera Cudmore spent much of the summer redesigning the remaining third floor studios while constructing new study spots, maker spaces and lounge seating on the western side of the building. “Before, there was just no space to study or gather,” Arp explained. “People would crowd around the stairway, sit in the lobby or take over empty studios. It just wasn’t working.”
Once filled with crooked bar stools and crowded drafting tables, the third floor is now home to a newly furnished and carpeted student lounge area complete with plushy chairs and dangling lamps. After students finish their naps, they can head next door to the cubicle-like worktables in the newly designated student study space. Constructed from old drafting desks, the cubicles offer private, secluded pods for those late-night study sessions.
“It’ll be really nice just to open up the space a bit more,” Arp said. “It’ll help increase the movement within these rather confined spaces.”
The studios, which, according to student feedback, were notoriously loud and overcrowded, have now been entirely refurbished and rearranged. Each space is equipped with repurposed tables and seating, new shelving, TV monitors, fabric partitions for noise control and ample open space for review and pin-ups.
