Architects: Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture
Client: The Renaissance District
AS+GG is leading the new campus design of the former Studebaker corridor, located on the southwest edge of downtown South Bend in an area known as the Renaissance District, for Union Station Technology Center, the largest data center in northern Indiana and the second largest carrier hotel in the state
The Studebaker corridor redevelopment will provide a platform for a new wave of data and technology companies to thrive in South Bend.
The redeveloped area will be part of a mixed-use campus consisting of more than one million square feet of Class A office, education, technology, research grade manufacturing, data center, and live-work spaces.
The Studebaker Corporation was the nation’s fourth largest automobile manufacturer, employing as many as 23,000 people in South Bend prior to its closure in 1963.
The adaptive reuse of South Bend’s only remaining Studebaker manufacturing facility and its surrounding area honors the legacy of the company that built South Bend and embodies the continuity of innovation that began in the mid-1800s.
That innovation will now live on by transforming a once abandoned facility into a large scale, sustainably designed tech hub that promises to spur a second economic boom for South Bend and the surrounding region.
The Renaissance District’s vision demonstrates how cities must renew themselves in a vibrant, yet sustainable way. The project hopes to become an example of how companies with growing data and energy needs can reduce their carbon footprint and energy costs while revitalizing a community.