University of Georgia Black-Diallo-Miller Hall

Named in honor of the first African American students to enroll as freshmen and complete their undergraduate degrees at the University of Georgia, the Black-Diallo-Miller First-Year Residence Hall is the first new student housing constructed on campus in nine years. Designed to meet the expectations of today’s first-year students, it also incorporates the lessons learned from decades of operating and maintaining housing facilities at UGA.

The new, 525-bed student residence hall includes double-occupancy rooms with privacy-enhanced community restrooms. The six-story building also includes study rooms, student lounges, warming kitchens, a community kitchen, central community room and laundry facilities.

The design team faced some unique site challenges due to existing underground utilities. Beck facilitated full team meetings starting early in the concept design phase with all consultants and the contractor. These discussions helped the team to create solutions that met the project goals, maintained the project budget and schedule and addressed the site challenges. Weekly check-in meetings with UGA project stakeholders kept everyone current with the design issues and facilitated timely decisions to keep the design process moving forward.

Due to the sustainable components incorporated in the design of the new Residence Hall, Black-Diallo-Miller Hall received 2 Peaches from the Georgia Peach Program. The Georgia Peach Program rates and recognizes buildings owned or managed by the state to optimize energy performance, increase the demand for materials and furnishings produced in Georgia, improve the environmental quality in this State, conserve energy, protect the State’s natural resources, and reduce the burden on the State’s water supply.