Colorado State University’s new three-story Veterinary Hospital and Education Complex (VHEC) deftly combines both an active animal clinic and teaching space. This scope of work also includes the new Livestock Veterinary Services (LVS) building, which is designed to accommodate animals with basic livestock care, specialized procedures, surgeries, and internal medicine.
CSU’s vet program consistently ranks in the top five of national veterinary health programs, emphasizing the impact that this 100,000 square-foot renovation and 213,000 square-foot addition provide. This facility will allow CSU to increase its Doctor of Veterinary Medicine enrollment up to 170 students supported by two large auditoriums, three wet-labs with walk-in cadaver coolers, and a Dedicated Makers Lab with five 3D printers. For students, the building also offers lockers, café seating, shower and changing rooms, and a sleeping room. The new space positions the school to face the unprecedented shortage of veterinary health experts worldwide along with two animal specialty services–ophthalmology and dentistry. The output will be practitioners that are leaders in the profession, the beneficiaries of a highly integrated education, advanced clinical practice and groundbreaking research.
Its fear-free-inspired design prioritizes animal wellbeing with calming color tones, expansive access to natural light, and advanced sound-absorbing walls, among other anxiety-mitigating considerations. In addition to the custom glazing frit pattern throughout the facade, CSU’s health campus also houses exterior heated dog runs, a pharmacy with a premanufactured ISO7 cleanroom, and six isolated exam rooms to isolate communicable diseases. Once completed, the new building will be LEED Gold certified and a Bronze candidate for the WELL Building Standard—which would make it the first veterinary hospital in the country to achieve WELL certification.
