The new cutting-edge 600,000 SF academic precinct, comprised of the ISEC, EXP and PedX helps establish Northeastern University as a premier research institution in Boston, while enhancing the Columbus Avenue corridor of the campus. Constructed on an urban brownfield site that consisted of a surface parking lot set between two parking garages, the 234,000 GSF Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Complex (ISEC) and PedX represent the completion of the first two phases a long-term vision to link the University’s Huntington Avenue Campus with Columbus Avenue, span the MBTA and Amtrak rail lines, and connect the Fenway and Roxbury neighborhoods.
As described in a recent News@Northeastern article, Phase 3 of the precinct – the 350,000 SF EXP research building is currently in design. The building will enable a diverse network of innovators to connect and collaborate, bringing a range of knowledge, experiences and perspectives to the discovery process. It will include teaching and research labs, a café, a faculty club and green space between Ruggles Station and the Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Complex which was named COTE Top Ten Recipient and Harleston Parker Medal, an honor that recognizes “the single most beautiful building or other structure” in Boston.
This is how we want the world to see us.
James C. Bean, Northeastern University Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs
Our project team, led by PAYETTE President Kevin Sullivan and Principal Bob Schaeffner, designed the Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Complex, pedestrian bridge and the new EXP building to harmonize with the neighboring structures. The EXP is entered directly from the PedX at level two, immediately highlighting multi-level maker spaces and robotics labs, and employs a similar vocabulary of elements and transparencies to ISEC culminating with a two-story robotics maker space facing Columbus Avenue.
It’s very exciting, and it’s going to help us attract more top faculty and more top students because those great facilities will make it easier for them to do world-class work. It will enhance interdisciplinarity and expand our capacity so we can continue to grow.
James C. Bean, Northeastern University Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs
Learn more about the EXP Building.
We are honored to share PAYETTE has received two 2026 Green Good Design Awards from The European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies—Land’s Sake Farm and The Ragon Institute of Mass General, MIT, and Harvard.
“Green GOOD DESIGN identifies and emphasizes the world’s most important examples of sustainable design and works to develop a public awareness program that informs the general public about which global companies are doing the best job in ecological and sustainable design for our world. Architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning projects, as well as product, packaging, and graphic design projects from over 30 nations were honored with the 2026 Green GOOD DESIGN Award.”
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