Belmont University ‘Tops Out’ Baskin Center

$32 million building will house College of Law upon completion this summer

Belmont President Dr. Bob Fisher speaks at the Baskin Center 'Topping Out' celebration.

Belmont University’s College of Law today celebrated the official “topping out” ceremony for the Randall and Sadie Baskin Center, a 71,000 square foot facility that will serve as the College’s permanent home upon the building’s completion this summer. In August 2011, Belmont’s College of Law welcomed its charter class of 132 students who hail from 14 different states.

College of Law founding Dean Jeff Kinsler said, “From breaking ground on this building to hiring our first faculty members to welcoming our charter class, Belmont’s College of Law has already achieved some incredible milestones. Today we celebrate another as we ‘top out’ this building which will soon house Middle Tennessee’s next generation of great legal minds and community leaders.”

The Baskin Center, which will cost approximately $32 million when completely outfitted, will be located on the southwest corner of the intersection of Acklen and 15th Avenues and will include a five-level underground parking garage accommodating 520 cars. Slated to open in July 2012, the Baskin Center is being designed and built by locally-owned companies Earl Swensson Associates and R.C. Mathews. The Baskin Center will house a high-end furnished Trial Courtroom outfitted with state-of-the-art AV equipment for mock trials.

The building will also include a large two-story Law Library and will provide three large, auditorium-style classrooms with tiered seating. In addition, the Baskin Center will contain more than a dozen classrooms, an appellate courtroom, more than 20 faculty offices and a Grand Lobby Rotunda area. Designed with the needs of law students in mind, the building will feature numerous amenities including a student commons, wireless Internet access, offices for student organizations, a locker room and food service.

The Baskin Center will also seek to attain silver LEED certification. LEED is an internationally recognized green building certification system, providing third-party verification that a building or community was designed and built using strategies aimed at improving performance across all the metrics that matter most: energy savings, water efficiency, CO2 emissions reduction, improved indoor environmental quality and stewardship of resources and sensitivity to their impacts. The new building will feature a Geothermal Heating and Cooling system and energy efficient light fixtures as well as utilize energy conservation methods within the building’s utilities (electricity, plumbing and HVAC).