Stata Center

CSAIL is housed in the Stata Center (directions here), designed by renowned architect Frank Gehry, whose other structures include the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao and the Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles.

Its striking design features tilting towers, many-angled walls and whimsical shapes.

Opened in 2004 and built on the site of MIT's legendary Building 20, Stata is meant to carry on that space’s innovative spirit and foster cross-disciplinary collaboration. 

It is also home to MIT's Laboratory for Information and Decision Systems (LIDS) and the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy.

What's here

The Stata Center has five classrooms, a cafe/food court, a pub, an athletic facility and a 350-seat auditorium.

Its focal point is the Charles Vest Student Street on the first floor, with ample seating, open space, regular fairs and events, and the Forbes Family Café, a 220-seat dining facility for breakfast and lunch. 

The building also has several unique outdoor gathering spaces, including the Dertouzos Amphitheater and the Grier Garden. The 4th-floor "R and D" pub is open to the MIT community during the academic year for drinks and light fare.

Stata occupies 720,000 square feet and 2.8 acres, and is made of 2.6 million pounds of steel and 1 million bricks. In 2005 it received the American Council of Engineering Companies’ Grand Award for Engineering Excellence and the Gold Award for Sustainable Site Design.

The Boston Globe's Robert Campbell has described it as "a work of architecture that embodies serious thinking about how people live and work, and at the same time shouts the joy of invention."