Henning Larsen to design new university building in the Alps

Henning Larsen has been named as the designer of the new 376,700-sf campus building for Management Center Innsbruck (MCI) after a two-stage competition and dialogue process. The project is located on the edge of the Innsbruck city center.

The new building will create a unified campus for MCI for the first time in the school’s history. Bordered by the city to the south and east and by the historical Hofgarten to the north and west (and the Alps all around), the building is designed to have no back or front. Multi-story entries are carved into each facade to break the scale of the building in relation to its surroundings. These pockets are planted with gardens to match the identity of their neighbor. For example, the mountain-facing north entry features alpine flowers while the southern city-facing entry is an urban terrace.

Classrooms and lecture halls populate the outer edge of the ground level, framing a fluid interior space with a large community stair in the center that links the three levels of learning spaces and also serves as a community space itself. Learning floors are designed to be open and flexible, with nearly as much unprogrammed space for students to study, socialize, and rest as there is actual classroom space.

The building’s upper floors are divided in two sections, one containing offices for MCI faculty, administration, and students, and the other containing laboratories and research spaces. The design is dense, with four cores that serve not just as vertical circulation, but also as social hubs within the large floorplates.

Construction on the facility is expected to start in fall 2023 with move-in expected for early 2025.