Trinity University Dicke Hall + Business and Humanities District

The new Business and Humanities District at Trinity University brings together 11 academic departments in a cohesive and vibrant interdisciplinary academic district. The district was formed by the renovation of two historic mid-century buildings originally designed by noted Texas Modernist O’Neil Ford and the addition of Dicke Hall, a new mass timber academic facility. The district completes the campus’ academic spine and creates a variety of indoor and outdoor social and collaboration spaces. As a gateway to the district and broader campus, Dicke Hall pays homage to Trinity’s design heritage while expressing the university’s commitment to innovation in liberal arts education and environmental stewardship.

The new mass timber Dicke Hall connects to the renovated buildings through a new courtyard that offers collaborative areas. The landscape design incorporates 100% native plants and drought-tolerant grasses that are naturally water-efficient and well-adapted to the Texas climate. Rain gardens, permeable pavers, and water-wise landscaping reduce impervious ground cover by 1,735 square feet despite the new building’s footprint of 12,000 square feet.

Dicke Hall pays homage to the historic legacy of Trinity architecture while embracing the need for environmentally responsive design and does so like no building I have seen before . . . my experience was one of beauty, grace, respect, and restraint, a building that is a perfect complement and addition to the Trinity campus. John L. Scherding, AIA

Former University Architect & Director of Sustainability, Trinity University

Mass Timber Design

Structural Innovation

Dicke Hall extends Trinity’s tradition of sustainable and innovative building into the 21st century. Mass timber was a natural fit for Trinity’s O’Neil Ford-designed campus, providing an aesthetically beautiful and structurally innovative design that meets Trinity’s goals for reduced embodied and operational carbon. The mass timber structural system reduces the need for finish materials required to achieve the desired warm and modern aesthetic.

Mass Timber Design

First CLT Building in San Antonio

Dicke Hall is San Antonio’s first cross-laminated timber (CLT) structure. To celebrate this innovation, the design team chose to expose all interior panels on the interior of the building. Prefabricated treated wood panels, which are exceptionally strong and fire resistant, were shipped directly to the building site, allowing the construction of Dicke Hall to generate virtually no waste.

Measuring Building Performance

Sustainable Outcomes

Passive and active sustainable design strategies help achieve notable outcomes. The mass timber Dicke Hall reduces embodied carbon by 52% and energy use by 90% as compared to a baseline building. The building also captures 100% of its condensate to eliminate all potable water from toilets and landscape. The sustainable transformation of the district, with the addition of Dicke Hall, allowed the university to add 42% more square footage while increasing energy use by less than 1%.

Mass Timber Conference

Advocacy & Education

To engage members of the design and construction community, the design team hosted a mass timber conference on site while Dicke Hall was under construction. Attendees learned about the mass timber process, from coordination with systems to erection and construction, while seeing the work on display. The conference generated excitement for the mass timber structure both within the campus and beyond.

Faculty were looking for highly adaptable spaces where technology, furniture, and environmental controls work in unison. This goal was met through various spatial typologies including tiered auditoriums, stepped activity-based learning classrooms, highly flexible flat floor active classrooms, student support labs, and seminar rooms. Classrooms and collaborative spaces support cross-disciplinary opportunities across a diversity of fields, from religion, classics, history, philosophy, and English to business, economics, accounting, and healthcare administration.

The renovation of the mid-century Chapman and Halsell Halls transformed the student experience within the outdated facilities. Traditional classrooms were converted to active and hybrid learning environments, and underutilized spaces were renovated into vibrant collaboration nodes. By replacing solid walls with glass and operable walls, activity and learning are now visible across academic communities. New skylights punctuate the interiors, flooding the buildings with natural light.

Campus Heritage

Trinity’s commitment to sustainability has shaped its campus and culture. When architect O’Neil Ford surveyed the limestone quarry bluff which was to become the Trinity campus, he rejected the recommendation to level the landscape and instead opted to design the buildings in harmony with the campus' unique topography.
In 1948, Ford master planned the entire 43-acre campus and designed and realized more than 29 of its buildings over subsequent decades. The campus was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2018.
A Texas Modernist, Ford believed that architecture should harmonize with the natural world—an objective that led him to practice sustainability long before it was a widespread term or aspiration. Ford and his ethos had a profound impact on Lake Flato's founders, David Lake and Ted Flato, who met at Ford's office in 1980.
Ford famously pioneered the use of the lift-slab method on Trinity’s campus, where concrete floor and roof slabs are poured on the ground and then raised into position using hydraulic jacks. This method is efficient for buildings with repetitive floor plans as it reduces labor and material costs compared to traditional cast-in-place construction.
Ford worked closely with his brother, Lynn, to design and craft fixtures and interior details throughout his buildings. Wooden doors, beams, and mantels were hand-carved in geometric patterns, and perforated spherical hanging lamps adorn corridors. These interiors were sensitively restored in Chapman and Halsell Halls and served as inspiration for the interiors of Dicke Hall.
Dicke Hall and the renovation of Chapman and Halsell Halls extend O'Neil Ford's legacy of innovation into the 21st-century by incorporating sustainability practices and novel construction methods. Dicke Hall is the first cross-laminated timber (CLT) structure in San Antonio and the city’s first mass timber education building.