Project Statement
The University of Balamand (Lebanon) master
plan is a landmark project for a country eager to move
beyond local and regional conflict. Focused on education
and learning, the plan recognizes the particular Lebanese
landscape and building culture. The plan re-directs
the physical form of the currently inward focused university
to establish a civic realm of exterior spaces designed
to encourage communication and interdisciplinary learning.
The design strategy engages the campus with its spectacular
setting on a hill top overlooking the eastern shores
of the Mediterranean.
Narrative Summary:
A Gesture of Hope after Fifteen Years of Civil War
The University of Balamand was founded fifteen years
ago by the Orthodox Church as a response to the violence
of Lebanon’s civil war. Lebanese education and
culture had suffered catastrophically during the war,
as had the physical environment, urban and rural. The
goal of the University of Balamand is to provide an
education for students from Lebanon and the entire Middle
East region that will reinvigorate Arab cultural traditions
while embracing religious pluralism and strengthening
the economic potential of North Lebanon. The University,
although initiated by the Church, is wholly secular,
and its student body is 50 percent Christian and 50 percent Muslim.
The rapid early growth of
the University left little time for planning. The first
buildings, designed initially for a secondary school,
were quickly adapted to University use. New faculties
were added and accommodated in somewhat improvised fashion.
More recently, individual buildings and facilities were
added to meet specific needs, but without an overall
vision. While the site given to the University was magnificent,
its potential was quickly being compromised. Equally
important, the educational goals of the University were
being undermined by the siting and programming of its
facilities.
The consultant completed
a strategic academic plan along with the physical master
plan, in the belief that there was a natural connection
between the University’s educational ideals and
the history and character of its land. Following the
master plan, the team prepared a series of landscape
design guidelines and was hired to implement the design
for core campus landscape improvements. Principal features
of the master plan, some of which are described in greater
detail on following pages, were as follows:
- Interpretation of the University’s
commitment to transparency, dialog, and softening of
dogmatic positions to create outdoor spaces for students
to gather and informally share ideas
- Development of a memorable institutional
narrative, centered on two overarching concepts: the
“Village on a Hill” and the “Path
of Learning”
- "Village on a Hill"
- Concentration of academic facilities to encourage
collaboration and cross-disciplinary understanding
in an “academical village"
- "Path of Learning"
– Creation of useable outdoor pedestrian spaces
to link together academic facilities
- Protection and celebration of
the unique and neglected campus natural environment,
including a botanic garden, designated nature reserve,
preservation and celebration of historic olive terraces,
water collection and wind power
- Improved relationship of building
siting and massing to the land’s history, topography,
and dramatic site: avoidance of inward-turning or
isolated buildings and the creation of a civic realm
A Dramatic Site Overlooking
the Mediterranean Sea
The young University occupies a dramatic and extraordinary
site, some 80 kilometers north of Beirut. Established
on land held for centuries by the Orthodox Church, it
commands panoramic views to the Mediterranean Sea, looking
over the walls and towers of an 850-year-old monastery.
It is shaped by ancient olive groves and steep rocky
slopes; with an existing cluster of new buildings, it
combines the freshness of modernity with the patina
of history, and connects the spiritual and the secular,
the practical and the visionary.
The University’s buildable land
resembles a figure-of-eight laid on a steep hillside,
and scored from top to bottom by a shallow valley planted
with olive trees on a series of somewhat neglected stone
terraces. The remainder of the land is dominated by
low-growing Mediterranean oak. The terrain is dry and
rocky, but thick in wildflowers in early spring. The
45-hectare campus is some 1,000 feet above the sea,
and reached from the coast road by a narrow switchback
among groves of umbrella pine.
The University’s initial development
had been on the lower half of the figure-of-eight, and
the assumption was that as the University continued
to expand rapidly it would build primarily on the upper
campus. A large ring road and utility infrastructure
had been established in anticipation of this development.
Integration of Physical and Strategic
Planning
The burden on the master plan process was considerable.
The consultant team was asked to interpret the spiritual
and practical aspirations of the University not only
in physical terms but also organizationally and in terms
of academic programs. The whole campus had to become
a classroom, teaching collaborative learning, environmental
engagement, and openness to new ideas. Each component
of the plan had to enhance the others. The team developed
the strategic plan concurrently with a physical master
plan, looking for lessons in appropriate program development
in the history, topography, and vegetation of the site,
and in the evolution of nearby villages.
Gathering Information
The process involved comprehensive gathering and analysis
of building and land use data and extended on-site interviews
with faculty, staff and trustees. Academic space and
adjacency requirements were determined, and the successes
and deficiencies of existing structures and landscape
planning in supporting the aspirations of the academic
program were assessed. Demographic data were gathered
from a variety of formal and informal sources, despite
the general lack of reliable data in the region. Concurrently,
the team analyzed the topography and vegetation of the
site, circulation patterns, parking issues, prevailing
winds and rainfall.
In general, the consultant team discovered
a gap between the articulated aspirations of the University
and early organizational and physical interpretation.
Commitment to the environment had not been translated
into respect for the site, and commitment to openness
and dialog had not been translated into a physical or
organization model that encouraged collaboration, engaged
learning and cross-disciplinary research. Recent buildings
had been sited villa-like, with views to the sea but
no real connection to each other, to the immediate land
or to the rest of the University community. Alternatively,
buildings were inward-turning, and took no advantage
of the possibilities of the site to create a sense of
place. There was an impression that the land was simply
to be used as an opportunity for construction, and that
open space was raw material, useful in the interim for
parking.
Storytelling
The team concluded that it should work with the client
to generate compelling stories about the land and its
meaning for the University. Alternatives were developed
that contained a central metaphor for the development
of the site, and reflected philosophies of learning.
This approach allowed the client to quickly grasp the
essential components of each alternative. The two most
compelling metaphors were a “Village on a Hill”,
and a “Path of Learning."
Village on a Hill
This phrase drew on the high social importance of villages
in North Lebanon, and on the topography of the site,
while emphasizing the high-minded purposes of the institution.
It also supported the notion of achieving a far higher
level of density on the lower part of the site than
the client would ever have imagined possible initially.
This density was critical for two reasons. It encouraged
cross-fertilization of ideas, and discouraged the building
of balkanized academic empires, while allowing for efficient
sharing of common facilities. It created a true learning
community, with a new Library and outdoor academic commons
at its center, directly adjacent to the new Student
Center.
It also made possible the creation of
well-defined outdoor gathering spaces, at a variety
of scales, which would be naturally enlivened by frequency
of pedestrian traffic. Spaces within and between the
buildings become analogous to village streets. Varied
landscape treatments and careful choice of plant materials
make these spaces more congenial for informal gathering,
and alterations to buildings give more frequent and
easy access to the outdoors. The landscape became an
essential and integral part of the educational experience.
Full advantage was taken of the topography to provide
distant views to the hills and the Mediterranean Sea
from the majority of gathering spaces and buildings,
so that the campus celebrates and is inspired by the
physical environment.
Acceptance of the concept of a Village
on a Hill allowed the consultants to locate sufficient
new space on the lower half of the campus to accommodate
the great majority of projected academic growth for
the next twenty years. Development included structured
parking below proposed new buildings on the site for
faculty and more remote on-grade parking for a limited
number of students. A new entrance was created in the
plan to enhance the sense that the University is a cultural
destination.
Path of Learning
The second concept that captured the imagination of
the University was a “Path of Learning,”
a pedestrian path leading from an ancient but recently
restored stone-vaulted goat house at the top end of
the campus to the ancient monastery at the bottom end.
The path takes on a range of forms as it winds down
from the goat house (now a meeting place for faculty
gatherings, etc.) alongside the terraced olive groves.
The entire University site is bracketed by the “secular”
goat house and the sacred monastery, and we saw the
University as creating a path between the practical
and the spiritual.
As we organized the campus, we shaped
it around the concept of the Path of Learning. Along
this path are places for contemplation, places for gathering,
places for performance, places for rest and conversation,
and still and moving water. Part of the path is almost
urban in its concentration of academic activity; much
of the path is rural, and some leaves room for new academic
possibilities. The path will include along its length
a proposed Botanic Garden with greenhouses, an Environmental
Center, an informal woodland path, a formal tree-lined
esplanade, two outdoor amphitheaters, and a centrally
located plaza for outdoor gatherings. We believe that
careful interpretation of this vision for campus development
will create an elegant, memorable and powerful sense
of place for the University of Balamand, and will ensure
consistency between the vision of the University and
its physical expression.
Design guidelines
Following the development of the master plan, design
guidelines were created to give comprehensive guidance
in the future development of all building and site components.
The guidelines also outlined an infrastructure strategy
to implement the University's goal to conserve water
and energy. The careful siting of a powerhouse, a campus
water treatment plant, and water storage tanks avoided
major impacts on the topography and existing vegetation.
Implementation
After the successful master plan process, the University
was convinced that the landscape vision outlined in
the plan could create an immediate transformation on
campus and also encourage donors for proposed landscape
improvements and buildings. As a result, the consultant
team was hired together with a local firm to implement
the landscape design for the key areas of the core campus.
The process of advancing specific projects into schematic
design proved to be an efficient tool to verify and
re-inform the design guidelines. The process is currently
underway.
The redesigned areas will create distinct
open spaces designed to be used in Balamand's challenging
climate, characterized by severe winds and strong sun.
The design strategy also capitalizes on the high level
of locally available craftsmanship and materials. Local
Lebanese landscape architects and horticulturalists
were included in the team to promote traditional Mediterranean
practices and establish a native plant vocabulary for
the campus.
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