Corbett Inc. · Widener Commonwealth Law School
Concept studies for the sunken student lounge at Widener Commonwealth Law School, developed by Corbett Inc. These studies are not to exact scale, dimension, or size. Every concept is preliminary and can be moved forward as shown or reimagined entirely.
Concept 01 — Hospitality-grade lounge core with slatted booth pods
The Salon rebuilds the sunken floor of the Pit as one continuous hospitality room instead of a leftover circulation void, and it is deliberately dense — the current space reads empty and institutional, so this scheme puts real furniture count on the floor. Important to the read: …
Concept 02 — Tiered oak amphitheater, biophilic palette, kit-of-parts flexibility
The Forum takes the opposite tack from The Salon. Instead of treating the level change as an edge to be railed off, it turns one long side of the shallow drop into a built-in amphitheater: wide rift-cut white oak tiers with sage wool bench cushions and warm LED under each nosing,…
Concept 03 — Scholarly law-library lounge with built-in bookcases and study carrels
The Library gives the Pit the academic gravitas a law school commons should have, without sliding into old-fashioned reading-room stiffness. It treats the sunken floor as a single, quiet study hall: one room, one continuous 2x2 ceiling, and the same shallow two-to-three-step drop…
Concept 04 — Clean navy-and-gold student commons with simple geometry
The Commons is the simplest, most direct read of the Pit: a single open lounge that lets the architecture and the furniture do the work. It stays honest to the existing shell — one room, one continuous 2x2 ceiling, and the same shallow two-to-three-step drop below the raised peri…
Concept 05 — Fully modular student-activity platform, reconfigurable in minutes
The Kit of Parts throws out the "law school" reflex entirely. Concepts 01 through 04 all read as a lounge first; this one reads as a student-activity platform first, and it is built so that a student org can reconfigure it themselves in fifteen minutes without calling facilities.…
Concept 06 — Daylit gallery loft with rotating exhibit wall and light, movable seating
The Gallery scraps the clubby direction entirely. Instead of another lounge, it treats the Pit as a daylit gallery loft — a calm, crisp, art-forward room that happens to seat a hundred students. The bones stay honest to the building: one single-story room, one continuous 2x2 ceil…
Concept 07 — Budget-conscious furniture, carpet and paint refresh of the existing shell
The Refresh is the value option in the set. Every other concept adds millwork, canopies or a built-in element; this one assumes the school wants the biggest visible change for the smallest number, so the scope is furniture, carpet, paint and one display — nothing structural. The …
Concept 08 — Four loose-furniture zones defined by carpet tile and mobile acoustic screens, no construction
The Neighborhoods keeps the same modest budget as Concept 07 but solves a different problem. Instead of treating the Pit as one big lounge, it accepts that the room is long, open and loud, and breaks it into four distinct student "neighborhoods" — using nothing but loose furnitur…
Concept 09 — KI movable wall architecture, a room that reconfigures itself
The Kit Wall answers the one thing the Pit has never been able to do: change shape. Every previous concept has fixed where the rooms are. This one does not build a single permanent partition — the entire architecture of the sunken floor is a KI movable wall system on casters and …
Concept 10 — A luminous faceted canopy that traces the Pit's own footprint, and the Pit as the best room on campus
The Halo is the swing-for-the-fences option. Every other concept treats the sunken floor as a problem to solve; this one decides the Pit is actually the most dramatic architectural gesture in the building and doubles down until it becomes the space the school puts on the front of…
Bonus Concept — The most change per dollar: carpet, one wall of paint, quickship furniture, nothing structural
The Value Play is the bonus round, and the rule is simple: every dollar has to be visible from the top of the steps. Nothing structural moves. The 2x2 ceiling grid, the troffers, the oak door trim, the low oak-capped guardrail and the shallow two- or three-step drop all stay exac…
Round Two
These studies build directly on the renders currently in progress rather than starting over: same room, same geometry, refined materials, palette and detailing.
Round 2, Concept 01 — The slat drum kept and elevated: warmer materials, Widener navy and gold, real hospitality finish level
Round 2 starts by keeping the single strongest idea already on the table — the curved vertical slat drum that wraps the center of the sunken floor — and pushing it from a rough massing study to a finished, hospitality-grade room. The geometry does not change: same footprint, same…