Moataz El-Alfi Hall chair |
AUC’s new campus is modern and inventive not only from the outside, but also from the inside. While architecture and the sheer size of the new campus project involved a tremendous amount of planning, the interior design has also been carefully researched from both a technical and aesthetic perspective. From teaching walls and custom-made furniture to lighting, acoustics and rugs, experts have tended to the smallest detail that helps create an optimal learning environment.
Designing the interior required a coherent evaluation of teaching approaches, new technologies, appearance and cost. Juggling these overlapping considerations was Robert Luchetti, architect, industrial designer and president of award-winning Robert Luchetti Associates, a Massachusetts-based team commissioned to design the furniture, equipment, fixtures and signage of AUC’s 260-acre project.
Classroom table |
“We sought to create an international contemporary learning space that reflects the local environment and culture and at the same time is flexible, safe, comfortable, energy conserving, easily maintainable, affordable and technologically advanced,” said Luchetti, whose clients include Harvard University, Kuwait National Petroleum Company and Knoll Furniture Corporation.
One of the unique features inside the new campus classrooms, computer labs and meeting rooms are the whiteboard teaching walls, which will be directly mounted on three sides of the room, replacing the traditional blackboard. Two adjacent whiteboard-surface walls, each 1.4 meters high with overlapping sliding panels, will provide more writing space, while a shorter teaching wall will consist of a tack board made of thick woven porous fabric to absorb echoes in the room and noise from the tiled floors.
Bookstore table with top display tower |
Another advantage is flexibility. Depending on the mode of communication and variation in class size, the layout of the classrooms can be quickly altered from a long to a wide configuration. Half of the classrooms will be outfitted with tablet arm chairs, and the other half will have tables for two and freestanding chairs. In these rooms, to ensure this swift transposition, all the tables are outfitted with wheels and are built to fold quickly. A variety of layouts, from rows to facing tables for team interaction, are then possible. “The layouts are easily interchangeable so any room can be used in either format,” explained Luchetti. “This way, the teaching range is far more flexible.”
Each new classroom also has its own projector and screen and is equipped with a floor to ceiling control panel that consolidates an integrated clock, sound speakers, light switches, fire alarm, strobe light and wiring. The speakers, built into the ceiling, will be able to transmit sound from a campus-wide public address system, class microphone, CD or DVD, PowerPoint presentation or online soundtrack.
External dining table with patio chair |
In addition to the classrooms, the faculty and staff offices are innovative as well. Each office is set up as a freestanding, wall-based modular working station, with large metal cabinets, integral wiring and durable tabletops made of Formica, a heat-resistant plastic laminate. “It is state-of-the-art furniture in terms of its performance,” Luchetti said, adding that faculty offices have been conceived in such a way that they can be utilized to conduct small seminars. “We wanted a more student- and experientially-based environment. The formal lecture is not going away but is diminishing in its importance, thanks to modern technology.”
In terms of lighting, the new campus classrooms and offices will feature adjustable integrated uplighting, projecting the lighting upward and bouncing it off the ceiling. This is different from the commonly used downlighting, where lighting is cast from the ceiling toward the floor.
Library chair |
“The advantage of putting the light in the furniture and aiming it toward the ceiling is that you make the volume of the room apparent,” said Luchetti. “Uplighting also makes it easier to view a computer screen because it minimizes glare.”
Locally manufactured, the 20,000 custom-made chairs, many made from wicker and rattan, a durable vine-like stem, represent one of the most abundant furniture items on the new campus. “It made sense to use a lot of wicker and rattan for the seating. It is robust, easy to maintain and ideal for this hot climate,” said Luchetti, who stressed the importance of using local material and manufacturing. “We tried to incorporate as much Egyptian craft as possible,” he noted, citing examples of indigenous features used like mashrabeya (Oriental woodwork), brass lighting and hand-made rugs. In a special effort to capture the essence of the Middle East’s rich culture, certain lounge chairs have been designed to resemble diwans (Oriental couches), while some tables were inspired by the curved metal stand of the traditional Egyptian coffee tables.
Double-sided library carrel |
“What we have in mind for the interior design of the new campus does not exist off the shelf in Egypt, so we are having it all custom made,” explained Luchetti. In fact, since the new campus project first began in 2002, the American interior design team visited and interviewed more than 40 local furniture, aluminum, textile and carpet manufacturers. “Those we ended up with are the ones we thought we’d end up with; they are the best in Egypt,” he said.
From the onset of this $20 million interior design plan for the new campus, the main objective was to use furniture that could be made and serviceable in Egypt, thus not only supporting the local economy but also reducing costs. “Manufacturing most of the furniture here turned out to be 30 to 70 percent less expensive than if it had been imported,” noted Luchetti. But just as important was the compatibility of the material with the environment. “We need furniture that is durable, solid, robust and can withstand desert sand, heat and the sun.”
Indoor dining chair |
Equally as challenging as the choice of manufacturing material and design was color selection. To identify and capture the local tones and colors present in Egyptian daily life, Luchetti and his design team compiled an extensive collection of color prints reflecting samples of indigenous fauna and flora, pharaonic and Islamic art, tenting materials and fabrics, paintings, terracotta, stone and even soil from the new campus. The palette was then filtered through a color system and narrowed down to a handful of predominant master colors. “What we found was amazing; the colors that appeared the most in order of frequency were those of the sun, the earth and the sky, in other words, the cosmos,” explained Luchetti. “For the new campus, we used mostly greens and blues to contrast the warm colors of the wooden furniture and interior floor, wall and ceiling finishes.”
Luchetti emphasized that getting the colors right is fundamental for an interior designer. “If they just feel right and don’t interrupt, then we’ve done our job,” he said. But more than just color, Luchetti hopes that the interior design of the new campus as a whole exudes a certain harmony. “It should be coherent and understandable,” he said. “Sometimes the most important part of a room is not actually the walls or ceilings, but what we touch and use and the relationship of these pieces to the whole.”
By Ingrid Wassmann
Photos by Ahmad El-Nemr
