Project Description
The yakʔitʸutʸu housing complex consists of seven three- to five-story residence hall buildings that house 1,475 students, prominently located adjacent to a primary entrance of the Cal Poly San Luis Obispo campus. The design team overlaid an identity program that aims to integrate first-year students to university life.
With views opening to the ring of the Nine Sisters hilltops that wrap the campus, student study spaces provide quiet places outside of the dorm-style rooms. Living rooms dedicated to communities of 50 students each are linked inward to vertical circulation to encourage interaction among students. The living room spaces open to outdoor courtyards and to a generously sized central staircase designed to foster connections leading to friendships that last for a semester or perhaps a lifetime.
The university and the design team partnered with the local indigenous yak titʸu titʸu people to create naming and environmental graphics for the residence halls. These graphics tell the stories seven Northern Chumash villages and culturally significant places along the Central Coast. Designers worked alongside the Northern Chumash tribe throughout the process, building place specific stories on local plants and animals to create vibrant and truthful place metaphors within each building.
Plant materials on the site were selected in collaboration with the local indigenous yak titʸu titʸu people to demonstrate native plant species. The buildings are designed to be LEED platinum (pending certification) and were designed to be net zero electric.