While a student at Sandburg, Missy Paris remembered the Loft Café not exactly looking like the most welcoming spot on the Galesburg campus.
“I don’t want to be mean to the space, but it was definitely outdated,” said Paris, who graduated from Sandburg in 2018. “It was affectionately called the ‘dungeon.’”
Thanks to the design eye of an alumna, efforts led by the Student Government Association (SGA) and contributions from the Sandburg Foundation, a tired space got a dramatic makeover ahead of this academic year.
Previously, the Loft Café featured deep-red walls, dark carpet, dim lighting and sets of circular tables with chairs. While it served as a convenient place for people to eat, it didn’t offer much in the way of functionality and was ultimately under-utilized.
“I felt like that space was abandoned. Nobody was really paying attention to it,” said Stephane Massamba, president of the SGA. “It was abandoned, but not rejected. I wanted to see life sitting in that space.”
GRANTED A NEW LOOK
To help breathe new life into the area, SGA members applied for a Sandburg Foundation innovation grant, which are awarded annually to launch new and innovative ventures to drive student success.
The Loft Café project was one of 12 grants awarded last year. In total, the foundation awarded $88,500 for those projects.
“We wanted to have a brand-new place,” Massamba said, “a place where students can feel even more at home.”
With funding secured, SGA advisor Genny Stevens, director of student engagement & leadership, knew exactly who to turn to for help with the redesign: Paris, a former SGA president herself, who now works as an interior designer. She gathered input from SGA members, other students, faculty and staff about how they wanted to see the Loft Café used and what it should look like.
A MEANINGFUL MAKEOVER
“Instead of just diving headfirst and saying, ‘We want a couch and a table,’ it’s more about figuring out how you need to use the space. They wanted it to be flexible. The questions they asked were so intelligent and thoughtful, and their vision and eye for design was incredible,” Paris said. “Sandburg is always going to be a part of me. The opportunity to come back and make a difference at the place that did so much for me was so special.”
The dark walls were replaced with a much lighter, neutral shade to make the room seem bigger and brighter. A variety of seating types now gives it more of a lounge look than a cafeteria feel. Low-hanging light fixtures gave way to lighting closer to the ceiling, allowing for greater versatility in the room.
Suddenly, the “dungeon” looks demure.
“It’s like an old house that didn’t have a value. Then you buy it, you rebuild it, renew it and now it has value to it,” Massamba said. “We wanted to leave a legacy behind where students will say, ‘Hey, I remember there was a group that did this. We can do this too before we leave.’ We wanted to feel that way and challenge everybody to do something in their time while they’re here.”
