Images: Did SCAD copy + paste an Atlanta building in Savannah?

Josh Green

Thu, 12/05/2024 – 08:00

Atlantans arriving in Savannah for the first time in a while might find themselves doing a double take—and wondering if they aren’t on Spring Street in Midtown.

Maybe that’s a stretch, but one of the newest and tallest landmarks on the Hostess City of the South’s skyline does appear a copy + paste job by a leading Georgia university known for creativity. At least from a distance.

The 640 Indian St. tower in question is a Savannah College of Art and Design project called, simply, River. When it opened during the spring semester, SCAD officials described it as a “monumental” and “spectacular” residence hall with “breathtaking views of the mighty Savannah River and gloriously sprawling Lowcountry beyond.”

What wasn’t mentioned is that it looks strikingly similar to SCAD’s Forty building in Atlanta, the first phase of the school’s considerable recent growth spurt just east of the downtown Connector freeway.

The 17-story River project opened earlier this year as a hive for up to 800 SCAD bees. Josh Green/Urbanize Atlanta

Atlanta’s SCAD building in question as seen in 2021, during construction of other mid-rise dorms next door. Josh Green/Urbanize Atlanta

In Savannah, the 17-story student housing building stands a couple of blocks west of adaptive-reuse Plant Riverside and the most bustling stretches of famed River Street. The (post) industrial area counts attractions like Service Brewing Co. and an influx of multifamily development that includes projects such as Olmsted Savannah. It’s changed a lot in a decade.

Both the Savannah and Atlanta buildings share a similar paint scheme and modern aesthetic, with a white, slightly askew top-floor event space set atop the buildings like the world’s largest crooked shipping containers.

But upon closer examination, the Savannah project is actually much larger than ATL’s: three floors taller with more than 200 additional student beds, for a total of 800 homes for coastal SCAD bees. It’s also L-shaped, versus Forty’s rectangular form. Plus way more palm trees.

We reached out this week to SCAD officials to learn additional ways in which the buildings are similar, or different, but have yet to hear back.

Savannah news station WTOC-TV reported when construction ramped up in 2022 the project was an effort by SCAD to ensure that at least 50 percent of the student population lives on campus (classroom buildings are nearby) by 2025, and to alleviate parking issues in the area.

The River building in relation to Savannah’s iconic Talmadge Memorial Bridge. Josh Green/Urbanize Atlanta

River, in the distance, stands out on Savannah’s skyline. Josh Green/Urbanize Atlanta

Another TV station, WSAV, relayed in April the building had instantly become polarizing among students, who either applauded its contemporary design or felt it clashed with Savannah’s more fanciful, historic aesthetic. One student opined: “I feel like it kinda sticks out like a sore thumb.”

Find a closer comparison of SCAD’s Savannah and Atlanta residential cousins, separated by 250 miles, in the gallery above.

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