The Mississippi University for Women is in the planning phase for a new culinary facility.
MUW Vice President for Administration and Chief Financial Officer Nora Miller said the university is working on a pre-planning project with JBHM architects for the facility. The new building should cost about $12 million, she said.
To make room for the new facility, MUW will have to demolish the vacant Taylor and Keirn residence halls. The former dormitories sit on the east side of campus with 15th Street running behind them. Miller said the halls were built in the 1950s, though they haven’t been used as residence halls since 1979.
MUW President Jim Borsig said the location for the new facility was determined thanks to a university master plan that concluded about a year ago. Borsig said the university assessed the costs of renovating the culinary art program’s current home in Shattuck Hall against the cost of building a new facility, and decided to build after finding that renovating would cost about 20 percent more per square foot.
“We realized the most prudent way to spend these dollars was to construct a purpose-built, modern building for culinary arts,” Borsig said.
The university is waiting for permission from the Mississippi Department of Archives and History before it can move forward with the demolition.
“Ideally, we would like to demolish the buildings next summer,” Miller said. “We’d prefer that because it’s close to Poindexter Hall, which is where the music program is housed, and we feel the noise from demolition could be distracting. The summer is also when we have the least amount of people on campus.”
Miller said a construction timeline for the new culinary arts facility is contingent on funding from the Mississippi Legislature. She said MUW will request funding from the legislature in the 2017 session.
The new building will match its surroundings, Borsig said, and the university board of trustees must approve the façade appearance before construction can begin.
“It’s not going to look like a modern building, necessarily,” he said. “It’s going to be the same color brick–it’s going to blend in.”
Established in 1996, MUW’s culinary program has awarded 98 degrees in the last five years, including 20 during the 2015-16 academic year, according to the university’s institutional research website.
Alex Holloway was formerly a reporter with The Dispatch.
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