Nutrien Agricultural Sciences Building

Feeding a growing world

The 160-seat, in-the-round auditorium provides a unique teaching and learning experience. It puts students closer to the action with no student more than five rows from the instructor.

Colorado State University, Nutrien Agricultural Sciences Building — The 160-seat, in-the-round auditorium provides a unique teaching and learning experience. It puts students closer to the action with no student more than five rows from the instructor.

Client: Colorado State University
Location: Fort Collins, Colorado, United States
Size: 80,000 square feet
Status: Completed

From the food we eat to the clothes we wear, agriculture is an essential science that needs strong innovators and entrepreneurs working together to meet the demands of our growing global population.

Since its inception, Colorado State University (CSU) has always had strong ties to agricultural studies. The College of Agricultural Sciences’ home, the Nutrien Agricultural Sciences Building, required a dynamic expansion and renovation to ensure it can further its mission and empower new generations of students. Driven by the university's land grant legacy, the design for this revitalization both honors the original 1938 building and creates a much-needed home for all the departments, providing a modern space that embodies CSU’s mission and will allow it to advance in a changing future.

Our environmental graphics team created a full branding and graphics package for the building. Interpretive signage, bold colors and the iconic "A" can be seen throughout, showing off Aggie pride.

The design both honors the original 1938 building and creates a new home for agricultural sciences.

A unique partnership with industry

In 2020, Nutrien—the world’s largest provider of crop nutrients, inputs and services—announced it would provide CSU’s College of Agricultural Sciences $1 million each year over the next 10 years. The largest donation the college had ever received at the time, the gift funds state-of-the-art research and teaching initiatives on campus, along with scholarship support to students, elevating CSU into a position of leadership in developing a diverse, highly skilled agricultural workforce. Nutrien currently employs more than 600 CSU alumni, so the partnership will only strengthen current relationships.

We need places where the next generation of agricultural advocates can grow and thrive, personally and professionally. We need a workforce with diverse backgrounds and lived experiences. This building is a place where we can do that, and we can also have important conversations and build positive momentum around sustainable agriculture, innovation, diversity, equity and inclusion.

Brent Smith Vice President of Marketing and Innovation at Nutrien

Elements of the original 1938 building are reflected in the renovation, including exterior brick and precast elements and Spanish roof tiles.

Growing student success

All classrooms are designed with student success in mind. Flexible classrooms can adapt to many inclusive teaching and learning styles and can also support remote learning. An addition on the south of the building includes a 160-seat, in-the-round auditorium along with a student-focused “mall” that creates “storefronts” to many key programmatic features such as the Student Success Center, the café/coffee shop, a 90-seat classroom and an “Innovation Gym”—a flexible, collaboration-focused space ready for diverse uses.

Advanced teaching labs provide optimal learning environments for scientists of the future.
Flexible, collaboration-focused spaces abound, ready for diverse learners and users.
Many of the finishes on the building relate back to the Nutrien building’s agricultural theme. Reclaimed deck planks are used as wall and door treatments.
Common areas are plentiful for students to enjoy before and after class, sharing conversations and ideas while also building community.

As agriculture faces a critical moment amid global supply chain, food insecurity and geopolitical issues, buildings like this play a vital role in creating a better future.

A focus on research

The third-floor features three teaching labs that host soil science, plant pathology and entomology. The five labs encourage collaboration between researchers, faculty and students. Running along the walkway leading out to the roof, a specimen lab is designed to display current research. A green roof provides an inviting respite as well as sustainability benefits of rainwater absorption and insulation, while doubling as an outdoor “lab” to conduct research.