ON OCTOBER 20, the University celebrated the dedication of a major new campus building — the C. V. Starr East Asian Library / Chang-Lin Tien Center for East Asian Studies. The magnificent four-story, $52 million facility, funded entirely through private support, was designed by world-renowned architects Tod Williams and Billie Tsien. Set to open this spring, it is the first freestanding building ever constructed on an American university campus specifically for East Asian collections. (To see a photo flip-book of the library’s construction, visit promise.berkeley.edu/starr.)
With approximately 47,000 square feet of book stacks plus a variety of spaces including a reading room, a rare book room, and an electronic media research area, the facility builds upon the University’s long-standing ties to East Asia, its superb East Asian collections, and the distinguished research and teaching conducted by its Institute of East Asian Studies and Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures.
The library is named for alumnus Cornelius Vander Starr. The Starr Foundation, which he established in 1955, made the lead gift for the library. The Center for East Asian Studies is named for former chancellor Chang-Lin Tien, the first Asian American to head a major American university and one of the most admired chancellors in Berkeley’s history. In all, gifts from more than 1,200 individuals, corporations, and foundations, on both sides of the Pacific, made the project possible.
The dedication ceremony, which featured remarks by Chancellor Birgeneau, former U.S. Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta ’53, and Starr Foundation president Florence A. Davis, among others, was followed by a reception and self-guided tours of the new building.
