Barnard College Milstein Center

For more than 125 years, Barnard College has been known for its distinctive academic culture, dedicated to cultivating women's intellectual ambition and broad perspective, integrating teaching and learning, and fully leveraging its relationship with Columbia University while embracing the unique energy of New York City. To address future challenges, the college has constructed a new interdisciplinary academic research hub at the heart of its campus. When it opened in fall 2018, the Cheryl and Philip Milstein Teaching and Learning Center became a laboratory for Barnard's academic and intellectual life, integrated with its sustainability and climate initiatives. SOM designed a 11,891-square-meter building to realize this convergence of knowledge, education, and learning. The Milstein Center encourages dialogue between students and faculty, with technology-enabled flexible classrooms and a multimodal learning center seamlessly connected, providing diverse, inspiring spaces for thinking, group study, research, and collaboration. At the core of the Milstein Center is a new type of library. It presents Barnard's collections and archives, expanding options for students. The design gives the library a variety of learning spaces for creative and exploratory study, offering settings suited to independent, group, and multi-person learning. The building's location at the center of campus strengthens Barnard's identity as a leading women's college while promoting interdisciplinary exchange and academic innovation.