Edgewood Hall, Harford Community College's newest classroom building, adds a distinctive Frank Lloyd Wright look to the 1960s campus.
It captures the architect's influence with pitched, overhanging roofs, vertical arrangement of windows and doors, glass corners and an octagonal ceiling on a lecture hall.
"This building has been such a morale booster," said James F. LaCalle, HCC's dean of community and business services, who oversees the 34,000-square-foot building. "I think it will be a great landmark for Harford Community College."
The design also is symbolic and metaphorical, said designer Chris Lester, vice president of architecture at Columbia-based George Vaeth Associates Inc.
"It speaks . . . to the broad expanses of the surrounding campus and agrarian countryside in much the same way as Wright's Prairie School [of thinking] spoke to the flatlands of America," Mr. Lester said.
The $3.5 million building, formally called Edgewood Hall Apprenticeship and Training Center, opened last month.
A ribbon-cutting ceremony will be held Saturday with college administrators and elected officials, including County Executive Eileen M. Rehrmann; County Council President Joanne Parrott; Sen. William Amoss, D-Harford; and Harford Sheriff Joseph P. Meadows.
There will be tours of the building and refreshments.
The two-story building with a central atrium is the college's first .. new building since 1976, when the Learning Resources Center with the college's library opened.
Edgewood Hall houses the Harford County Sheriff's Academy and the Harford County Electrical Contractors Association in addition to the college's noncredit-course offices. They share the building's 10 classrooms with the college as part of a partnership with the business community, Dr. LaCalle said.
The building's lecture hall also is available to community groups, and the classrooms may be used for training sessions by local businesses, he said.
Mr. Lester, Edgewood Hall's designer, said he had a user-friendly look in mind for the building. Its "L-shaped plan with its centrally located main entrance add to the sense of welcome and community embrace," he said.