Klarman Hall is entering the home stretch now, just a few months from its anticipated January 2016 completion (and a few weeks behind the December 2015 date initially planned). Montour Falls-based Construction firm Welliver is busy sealing up the building’s exterior, while putting up drywall, painting and finishing-out the interior lower floors, and wrapping up services rough-in in the upper level offices.
From the looks of it, most if not all of the sandstone exterior wall panels have been installed. The vestibule has been framed out but has yet to be glazed (window installation), and while the atrium has been glazed, the glass-paneled roof above the atrium has not. Concrete stairs have been poured on the slope, and the rest of the landscaping will follow after the building has been completed and the warm, snowless weather of spring comes around. Construction progress of the project can be followed through aerial photos shared by Landmark Images here.
The 33,250 sq ft building was designed by Koetter | Kim & Associates, and is named for billionaire hedge fund manager Seth Klarman ’79. The building will be the first new humanities building on Cornell’s campus since Goldwin Smith Hall was built onto the old dairy science building in 1906. Just like Cornell did with Goldwin Smith over a century ago, the new building will be combined with the old building through hallways and commons areas. Klarman Hall will contain classrooms, faculty and graduate student offices, and in its the north section, a 350-seat auditorium. The large interior atrium makes use of the rotunda of Goldwin-Smith Hall for open-layout seating, a food/cafe area, and ingress/egress. Cornell is aiming to have the building achieve LEED Platinum certification.
The cost of the new building, which began construction in May 2013, is estimated at $61 million.
Ithacating in Cornell Heights 
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