Walking up the steps of the new Darla Moore School of Business, the sunlight hits you first.
Once you reach the top step, you’re greeted by a courtyard full of palmetto trees swaying in the breeze. The building is shaded copper and green, the colors of South Carolina’s state tree.
“[The building is] a natural element itself, coming out of the ground and embedded in the hillside,” building architect Andrea Lamberti said. “The colors that you see, the metal panels, the brown, the green you see are all intended to reflect to the palmetto [tree] as an inspiration.”
Aside from the palmettos, the Moore School is home to six floors of faculty areas, a 250-seat classroom and 500-seat auditorium and study rooms built for group projects and collaboration.
The study rooms, which weren’t available in the old business building, give students a chance to work together on projects without leaving the classroom.
“I have to do group projects in four of my five classes, so it’s hard to find times to meet, let alone a location that is conducive to meet other than the library,” third-year international business and supply chain student Joshua Blackwood said. “Having that on-site at the school where we all take classes is going to be great.”
Peter Brews will start off his first year as dean of the business school, while students start off the year in the new building.
Brews said students have welcomed the building exceptionally well, describing it as “sick” and “dope.”
“The reaction was amazing. We’ve got video of students walking and the first thing that were doing … was saying, ‘Wow!’” he said. “They are very excited as far, as we can tell. They’re not unhappy. I can promise you.”
The school also offers plenty of areas to host business or other functions, including multiple outdoor patio areas and a large venue in the palmetto courtyard, The Sonoco Lounge, where businesses can host professional conventions and meetings.
Those meetings will give students opportunities to interact with local businesses and for businesses to interact with the new building.
“We’re trying to promote this as a place for businesses to have functions,” Brews said. “We can do stuff on the roof, as well.”
Brews said his colleagues are excited about the new era coming for the business school and students are more inspired this year because they realize they’re in a “world-class building.”
The school will host a ribbon-cutting Sept. 12 to complete the final stages of the introduction.
Brews believes that when the building opens it will bolster business school rankings and bring more students to Columbia.
“I think that this building will be an inflection point of the Darla Moore School of Business,” Brews said. “It’s going to reframe the way students see the business school, and it’s going to reframe the way outsiders see the business school.”