Travelers along West College Avenue have gotten to peer inside the guts of Crispin Hall on the Illinois College Campus lately.
The front facade of the building and the interior of the building have been completely demolished leaving only concrete and steel behind. The 1963-built educational building is receiving $12.6 million worth of renovations as part of IC’s Inspiring Achievement initiative. The college has privately raised $48.4 million over the last few years to bring the college into the future.
Construction began on the project on June 1st. Vice President of Business Affairs & CFO for Illinois College Kent Siltman says that O’Shea Builders, the contractor for the project, is on track: “Almost all of the demolition work has been done. The contractor has actually begun pouring some foundations along the north edge of the building so they can move on to the new facade, or re-skinning of the building in terms of the masonry, windows, and those sorts of things. That will really start from that northwest corner and then they will work their way all the way around the building. As it is right now, you can see straight through the building. There is nothing but the concrete pours and piers.”
Siltman says the next big piece of the building will be making it more accessible: “The big piece that they are working on for probably the next couple of weeks is that we will be installing an elevator in this building to make it fully accessible. It is going to go in the northwest corner of the main part of the building. There is a stairway there currently. That is going to be removed to the opposite corner – the southwest corner. The space in the northwest corner will become the elevator shaft, the equipment room, and all those sorts of things. They will begin working on that here in the next week or so. Then, they will be at the point where they can start doing some of the layout of the interior with the new interior walls and begin some of the work on the electrical systems and HVAC systems.”
Siltman says that the building will once again house the college’s Computer Science, Math, Physics, and Psychology courses and programs once it is complete. He says those classes will be sprinkled throughout campus while work is being completed. Minor construction is occurring at various other buildings on campus throughout the summer to utilize empty space to turn into classrooms for use during the construction. According to an announcement in May, 73% of the college’s population take at least 1 class in Crispin Hall during the academic year.
Siltman says Crispin Hall should be completed before the start of the Fall 2023 semester.