Students, faculty, alumni, and local business leaders, including principals from ARC/Architectural Resources Cambridge, celebrated the groundbreaking ceremony for a new student dormitory and faculty residence for the Portsmouth Abbey School at its campus.
The 28,000 s/f building, which will contain 30 student beds and 3 faculty residences organized along a central corridor, is designed by ARC.
Portsmouth Abbey School, a coeducational, Catholic Benedictine boarding and day school for students in grades 9-12, is located on a 500-acre campus along the shores of Narragansett Bay.
This is ARC's second housing project on the campus, having completed a 36-bed girl's dormitory, St. Brigid's House, in 2007.
The new boy's dormitory will incorporate similar design features including a large common room and central study, both of which reinforce the sense of community the school strives to foster. The design will integrate locally sourced building materials as well as elements of the existing architectural style of the campus. The building reinforces the new "campus green" that was developed as part of ARC's first residence hall on the campus.

Sustainable features include the use of roof-top solar panels which will provide anywhere from 60 to 100% of the building's hot water needs. Water saving toilets and faucets, energy efficient lighting and appliances, as well as very high efficiency boilers, will also contribute to the building's sustainable features. The new building is oriented to maximize passive solar heating and the super insulated building shell will minimize the need for supplemental heat.

Advanced Building Concepts is the general contractor for the project, which is scheduled for completion in the summer of 2012 and occupancy in the fall of 2012.