The Kresge Hall renovations and the construction of the new Kellogg School of Management building, two of the more than ten ongoing projects overseen by Northwestern University Facilities Management, are on schedule to be completed by the end of 2016.

Renovations at Kresge began August 2014, requiring the relocation of more than 20 NU departmental offices and classrooms to other buildings scattered across campus. Many faculty offices were moved to spaces in a building at 1800 Sherman Ave., but classroom use of these spaces is prohibited by Evanston zoning laws.

Kresge’s entire interior has been gutted and steel additions are being used to rebuild it, said Bonnie Humphrey, director of design and construction for Facilities Management.

A construction area in the building caught fire in November 2014, as sparks resulting from handling old water pipes fell to the second floor. Firefighters responded when the fire was discovered at about 9 a.m. and had the fire contained after about 20 minutes. Construction workers were able to return to work in the building by 10 a.m. that day.

Construction of the new Kellogg building at 2211 Campus Drive began April 2014 following the presentation of design plans at a meeting of the Site Plan and Appearance Review Committee at the Lorraine H. Morton Civic Center. Primarily for University use, the building will house Northwestern’s economics department and a full-time Kellogg MBA program, both of which are housed in the Jacobs Center.

The Kellogg building is planned to be approximately 415,000 gross square feet, which includes both the usable area of a building as well as the space filled by the structure. Designed by KPMB Architects in Toronto, Canada, the new building will include classrooms, offices and communal areas while minimizing the building’s impact on the environment, according to the project website.

Humphrey said construction crews recently “topped out” construction on the new Kellogg building and will now focus on closing it and beginning internal construction.

Construction finished on the new Patrick G. and Shirley W. Ryan Center for the Musical Arts in January 2015. The new building, which belongs to the Bienen School of Music and the School of Communication, was dedicated to the Ryan family in September in recognition of their gifts to NU.

During the dedication event, School of Communication Dean Barbara O’Keefe said the Ryans’ gift not only provided more spaces for students to collaborate by moving Communication faculty offices to the new building, but also helped fund planned renovations at the Virginia Wadsworth Wirtz Center for the Performing Arts.

Other recent construction resulting from gifts include the new Louis A. Simpson and Kimberly K. Querrey Biomedical Research Center, which broke ground this August following a $92 million gift from NU trustee Louis Simpson (Weinberg ’58) and his wife Kimberly. Construction is expected to be completed in 2019.

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