A new conference and reception center for Gonzaga's Forte family commons — built into an existing administrative building during a fourteen-week summer window, with full classroom occupancy resuming on the first day of fall term. The room had to serve three purposes: formal donor reception, faculty boardroom, and overflow event space — without reading as any one of those.
Summer
window,
no slack.
Pre-construction began six months out — every long-lead item was procured before mobilization. Demolition started the day after commencement; substantial completion was Labor Day weekend.
Self-performed millwork let us hold the schedule when a casework subcontractor fell behind on shop drawings. Custom wall panels and the central boardroom table were fabricated in our shop and installed in a single weekend.
Scope
Full interior demolition · New partitions and acoustic ceiling · Custom rift-sawn white oak millwork (self-performed) · AV and conferencing infrastructure · Architectural lighting · LVT and broadloom flooring · Window film and motorized shades · MEP rebalance for new occupancy load.
The team
that built
it.
Architect: Hickok Cole · MEP Engineer: Setty · AV: CTI Audio Visual · Millwork: Kinch self-performed · Owner's Rep: Gonzaga Facilities · Owner: Gonzaga College High School.
Gonzaga has been a Kinch client since 1989. The Forte Center is our thirty-seventh project on the campus.