Construction of Bellarmine Centro officially begins as trustee chair Pat Mulloy, student government president Amanda Martin, university president Dr. Joseph J. McGowan and Fr. Clyde Crews break ground. 
Bellarmine Centro conceptual rendering. Construction on Bellarmine Centro - a new $25 million, three-story building in front of Horrigan Hall - is officially underway after a Tuesday morning groundbreaking ceremony.
Construction Impact
NOV-DEC 2014
Site preparation: landscape removal, protection of significant oak tree, excavation and rock removal.
Noise will be kept to a minimum during final exams.
JAN 2015-FALL 2016
Construction of new building; removal of existing Horrigan Hall elevator.
Visitors will enter Horrigan Hall on the south side of the building, near the security office, where a temporary elevator will be available.
All parking lots will remain available for use during construction; crews may block a few faculty/staff spots near the flagpole for construction access.
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The 47,300-square-foot building is one of the most significant construction projects in Bellarmine’s history. The project includes a beautiful new building connected by a three-story atrium to a renovated Horrigan Hall, forming a true campus center and creating an excellent environment for 21st Century learning.
Bellarmine Centro, when completed in fall 2016, will include space for:
- new state-of-the-art classrooms and offices
- student gathering areas
- an admissions welcome center
- a career development center
- campus ministry offices
- W. Fielding Rubel School of Business
- Institute for Advanced Analytics
"The college experience encompasses many things, and chief among them, I believe, is the personal growth that occurs when we encounter people, ideas and beliefs that are different from us and from our ideas and beliefs," said Dr. Joseph J. McGowan, Bellarmine's president. "Centro, like no other place on the Bellarmine campus before, will provide the perfect setting for these encounters and these conversations, for resident students and commuting students alike. It will become, truly, the beating heart of this university."
McGowan said that Centro's name and design draw inspiration -- like other recent campus construction -- from the hillside towns of Italy's Tuscany region. He also noted that -- for visitors arriving via Newburg Road -- the new building will mask the not always beloved yellow brick on Horrigan Hall, which was constructed beginning in 1953.
Centro has been designed to showcase an old oak tree adjacent to Horrigan Hall. The new building’s north facade will curve around the tree, which has been pruned to protect it during construction. Arborists will monitor the tree’s health during the project, which will be developed in multiple phases.
VIDEO: See Centro, inside and out.