Features

UC Berkeley officials have called for new designs to transform the face of Lower Sproul Plaza, the less familiar portion of the university’s most famous public space. 

The plaza is located immediately to the west and down a flight of steps from the scene of the most famous event in the university’s history, the Free Speech Movement protests of the early 1960s that heralded the start of a decade of unrest on campuses across the nation. 

The request for proposals just posted on the university’s website calls for an architect to develop a master plan for design and construction of a revised plaza, including the demolition and replacement of Eshelman Hall along the lower plaza’s southern edge. 

The call for an architect follows a preliminary study completed in November which sketched out a variety of alternative designs, all of which called for the demolition of Eshelman. 

The other structures encompassing the site are: on the north, the Cesar Chavez Student Center; on the east, the Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union, and on the west, Zellerbach Hall. 

The request for architectural services and the 2007 study are both available online at www.cp.berkeley.edu/RFQ.html.