Resnick Sustainability Center

A mass timber home for bold climate solutions

Client: California Institute of Technology
Location: California, United States
Size: 80,000 square feet
Status: Completed

Essentially a makerspace for scientists, Caltech’s Resnick Sustainability Center will be a dynamic hub for critical research into the most pressing climate and sustainability challenges we face.

Designed by our Yazdani Studio of CannonDesign, the building will unite experts from across physical sciences, life sciences and engineering disciplines in shared spaces with access to unparalleled instrumentation to advance novel solutions that extend beyond any single discipline.

The Sustainability Center’s transparent design puts “science on display,” helping spark the imagination of passersby.

In the building’s core, key spaces include a biosphere engineering facility, a solar science and catalysis center, a remote sensing center, a translational science facility, teaching labs, and lecture and interactive learning spaces.

Learn more in this Architect's Newspaper feature

In certain ways, Caltech is conducting an experiment that really hasn’t been done in sustainability. We are building an institute that really tries to pull, essentially, all of the campus toward problems in sustainability. We need all hands on deck.

Jonas Peters Resnick Sustainability Institute Director

A space for all students

The building won’t just benefit graduate students and scientists coming together from varying disciplines/departments. The center’s second floor will be populated by undergraduate classrooms and labs, and every freshman will have at least one class in the building.

Read Caltech Magazine's piece on the building

Bringing every Caltech student into this space puts an emphasis on how integral sustainability is to all of the areas of discipline they will encounter throughout their education at Caltech

Mehrdad Yazdani Design Principal, Director of Yazdani Studio of CannonDesign