In Qatar, Carnegie Mellon U. Opens a Showplace

Carnegie Mellon U. has opened a building in Qatar. (Carnegie Mellon U. photos)

Carnegie Mellon University has a big new building to show off, but don’t go looking for it in Pittsburgh — it’s in Qatar’s Education City, on the outskirts of Doha, Qatar’s capital.

The building’s atrium serves as a gathering space.

The 460,000-square-foot building, paid for by the Qatar Foundation, houses a library, five lecture halls, 11 classrooms, five computer classrooms, five labs, an interdisciplinary and a robotics lab, and 149 offices and workstations. Two exercise rooms, two prayer rooms, a food court, and an atrium that doubles as a 400-seat multipurpose room fill out the space. In 2008 the university’s Qatar program enrolled 239 students.

The building — designed by the Mexico City firm Legoretta + Legoretta — bestrides a main walkway through the 2,500-acre Education City, created as a home for six institutions. Decorative features include sculptures, colored glass, and fountains.