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Drexel’s Calhoun Hall to be renovated into honors dorms with new glass entrance

Plans call for the semicircular eight-story brick building to return to dormitory use, with 211 rooms for honors students, and for the construction of a two-story glass addition.

Artist's rendering of Drexel dorm building at 3301 Arch St. after renovations.
Artist's rendering of Drexel dorm building at 3301 Arch St. after renovations.Read moreSolomon Cordwell Buenz (custom credit)

Student housing developer American Campus Communities plans to renovate Drexel University’s vacant Calhoun Hall at 3301 Arch St. into dormitory and office space for the school’s honors program.

Plans call for the semicircular eight-story brick building to return to dormitory use, with 211 sleeping rooms for honors program students, and for the construction of a new, two-story glass addition of about 10,800 square feet, according to plans posted to the website of Philadelphia’s Civic Design Review board.

The building addition will house lounge and study space, seminar rooms, honors college offices, and a reception lobby, according to the plans. Once completed, it will serve as the main entry for the two combined structures.

The CDR board, which provides nonbinding suggestions for projects meeting certain size and other criteria as part of the city’s building-approval process, is scheduled to consider the proposal Jan. 8.

The panel was asked to review the project after the Philadelphia’s Planning Commission deemed that the glass addition, on a prominent University City corner, would have “an impact on the public realm," according to the documents on the board’s website.

Calhoun Hall has been vacant since 2016. University officials aim to have it back open for student occupancy by September, Drexel vice president of real estate and facilities Donald E. Moore told the Triangle student paper in October.