Penn Dental Medicine has called the Evans Building its home since 1915, when the school’s benefactor, Thomas W. Evans donated his estate to the school with the request that they use it to create a dental school that would be “second to none”. In anticipation of the Building’s 100th anniversary in 2015, the school commissioned Ballinger to re-envision the aging structure for the “Evans Building Centennial Renaissance”.

Ballinger’s design for the renovation honors the historic nature of the building while adapting it to new technologies to better serve the University and students of Dental Medicine into the future. Ballinger programmed, planned, and designed a new community clinic, teaching and study spaces to accommodate a variety of learning styles, simulation studio, and Dean’s Suite, as well as a reimagined Dental Library.

The result is a new home for Penn Dental Medicine that optimizes patient care, fosters student education, expands academic and clinical spaces, improves circulation flows, and modernizes building infrastructure and systems to improve occupant comfort and operating efficiencies. The modernized infrastructure maximizes energy efficiency, which resulted in the US Green Building Council awarding it LEED Gold certification.