Pittsburgh – Cathedral of Learning
May 23, 2014, Pittsburgh, PA, Sunny
In addition to Carnegie, steel, dinosaur exhibits … Pittsburgh has this Cathedral of Learning, a 42-story educational building belonging to the University of Pittsburgh. It is the tallest educational building in the western hemisphere and the second tallest educational building in the world. The building contains classrooms, a theater, a food court, administrative offices, computer labs … The building is supported by a steel frame covered with the limestone (considering in 1921 when this building was planning, the University of Pittsburgh campus contains mainly wooden structures) . The building is designed by Charles Klauder, a famous Gothic architect at that time from Philadelphia.
The ground floor is this grand Gothic Commons Room for studies. At some moment, I was pulling out my computer and thought about working a bit here. Then I had this feeling that Harry Potter and Voldemort could show up any minute to cut the walls open (explosion) so it is not safe to work here after all (smile).
Interestingly, at the first and third floors, there are 29 nationality class rooms, where each room is decorated with a country, for example
These rooms are open to the public and attracted many visitors daily. When I was touring the rooms, I met a University of Pittsburgh alumni. He was telling his girlfriend that it was super exciting to take lectures in these rooms but the chairs are not as comfortable as normal classrooms.
The elevator is also open to the public so we can go up to the top of the building and have a great view of Pittsburgh.
After you visit Cathedral of Learning, remember to stop by at this Conflict Kitchen, located between CMU and Pitt campuses, to have some food from the countries that have a “conflict” with USA, guess what are they? Importantly, I heard they did update menu based on the news! 