Site 4 at Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Kendall Square

Historic renovations and a soaring tower serve students and community in Cambridge.

Location

Massachusetts, USA

Client

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Architect

Perkins & Will

Project Status

Complete

LEED Certification

LEED Gold certified

Council for Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat Awards

Best Tall Building, 100-199 meters; and Best Tall Building, Americas

Centralized collegiate and community space

Kendall Square serves as a bridge between the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) campus and the City of Cambridge. Site 4, a mixed-use, multi-building development within Kendall Square, serves the campus while welcoming the broader community.

The Site 4 project included the renovation and reconstruction of two existing historic buildings, which primarily house retail tenants, MIT’s Admissions Office and an Innovation and Entrepreneurship Hub that provides spaces for student entrepreneurs, researchers and staff. The project also included a 28-story cast-in-place concrete tower, known as the Graduate Tower, which adds 454 units of graduate student housing to this area of the campus.

Hybrid structural solutions

The challenging structure consisted of a novel "hybrid exoskeleton," carefully engineered by WSP Building Structures in collaboration with the construction team to allow for unshored construction with a 50-foot cantilever of the tower on its south side. A concrete encased composite steel truss system at the fourth-floor mechanical level was constructed first, and supports the upper floors constructed as concrete flat plates. The exterior walls act as an "exoskeleton" to carry the cantilevered floors at each of the upper levels, sharing load with the truss system in an economical and innovative design.

Completed in 2020, the building is now the tallest structure in Cambridge, Massachusetts.