Transforming the Tobacco Warehouse

What do you do with a 100-year-old tobacco warehouse?

Renovate it, of course! Smith Warehouse was redesigned by Lambert Architecture, which received the magazine’s Educational Interiors Showcase Award for Students Centers/Service Area. After the company transformed the warehouse—the ten-year project completed construction Fall 2010—it became a home to many student organizations and resource offices.

“We used shutters that were salvaged from the building's exterior for the major building directories," said Lambert Architecture representative Stuart McCormick in an email. "Warehouse lights were incorporated in the interior Bay signs and industrial type materials used in their construction. Another major theme was the use of color."

Smith Warehouse was built in 1906 by James B. Duke and was home to a growing tobacco industry in Durham, according to the Duke University Facilities website. Duke’s American Tobacco Company once controlled 90 percent of the American tobacco market but Duke sold his interest in the tobacco company near the turn of the century.

Utilizing the industrial past of the building as inspiration, Lambert redesigned Smith Warehouse with the goal of flexibility in mind.

“The interiors of either can be customized through the use of furnishings to accommodate user needs, but having that consistency helps," McCormick said. "For example, there are two primary office sizes and three principal open office sizes.”

How does the building fare to his inhabitants?

“It’s open, but there’s no privacy," said Brittany Painter, staff assistant of the career center. "There are confidentiality restrictions the building doesn’t conform to. If I could change something, I would put up walls instead of cubicles to tune out all that white noise.”