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A favorite student hangout gets a bright makeover
One of its walls may be blue, but the ambiance never has been and now it's cheerier than ever.
One of its walls may be blue, but the ambiance never has beenand now it’s cheerier than ever. The Lincoln Campus Center’s Bluewall dining area, a key meeting place for generations of UMass Amherst students, emerged from the recent winter intersession with a fresh new look based on subtle variations on primary colors. The $200,000 renovation is part of an effort to improve student life on campus..
The room retains the “broken” concrete partitions and the blue-tile wall for which it is named, but its floor now features pale tiles flecked in bright colors, with occasional accent tiles in sage, maroon, or medium blue. Plastic chairs and scratched tables have given way to chrome and maple-veneer chairs and chrome tables topped with blue-swirl patterns. Multi-colored fabric seats in sage, rust, caramel and two tones of blue dot the room. Tables and chairs come in standard and bar heights.
A raised area in one corner, the former “television section,” will now be used during evenings for dancing, according to Brenda Ryan-Newton, Retail Food Services operations manager. “We’re going to work with the Student Activities Office on programming,” she adds.
“The basic concept was to brighten up the place,” says Ashoke Ganguli, director of Auxiliary Services. Ryan-Newton says of the renovation, “Parents can see it and feel good about the campus and about sending their children here.”