A New Standard in Collegiate Women’s Sports

By HNTB

Clemson University’s world-class Women’s Sports Complex demonstrates its unwavering commitment to equity in sports

Within 18 months of introducing two new women’s sports programs—lacrosse and gymnastics—Clemson University had planned, designed, and broken ground on a world-class Women’s Sports Complex.

“When Clemson Athletics commits to facilities, best is the standard,” said Clemson Executive Senior Associate Athletic Director Eric Sabin. “The new Women’s Sports Complex reflects our dedication to lacrosse and gymnastics and to women’s sports overall. Our strategy was to design the best in the country for those student athletes.”

To ensure that the complex would fit within the athletic district, an area on the west side of campus that is home to all Tiger athletic facilities, the Athletic Department chose a site overlooking Lake Hartwell, adjacent to the women’s rowing building. Project leaders established a scope that included not only lacrosse and gymnastics facilities, but also a rowing center renovation and a new 10,000-square-foot elite athlete training and recovery center.

Clemson held a groundbreaking ceremony in December 2022. By January 2024, the women’s lacrosse, gymnastics and rowing programs cut the ribbons on their new and updated, state-of-the-art facilities, setting a new US standard for women’s sports and an industry precedent for how fast visionary architecture can be designed and delivered.

Fast-track design and construction

HNTB and South Carolina-based architectural firm Garvin Design Group were tapped to design and build the new spaces on a fast-track timeline. The HNTB-Garvin project partnership allowed the two firms to complete plans for three new buildings, the rowing center renovation, and the lacrosse stadium in just nine months.

To accelerate construction, the design team leveraged the speed and efficiency of pre-engineered metal buildings. The prefabrication engineer shared standard baseline details, and the team tailored those details to align with design goals. 

The structures were highly customized with high-end exterior and interior finishes, light wood tones, added windows and energy-efficient systems, resulting in a first-class, aesthetically pleasing complex. Each building has its own distinct space, personality, scale and interior detailing, giving athletes in each sport an individual sense of identity while maintaining commonalities with other Clemson buildings to unify the new sports complex with the rest of the campus.

Empowering athletes through design

“In every endeavor, Clemson holds itself to a standard of excellence,” said HNTB Design Principal Eric Maxwell. “When they start a team, their posture is to invest and position the athletes to immediately be competitive and win.”

The 21,000-square-foot gymnastics operations and training facility boasts a lobby, practice gym, offices, locker room, lounge and training room. A large expanse of polycarbonate panels on the south and southwest sides allows sunlight to filter through a line of trees outside, bathing the interior in an ultrasoft light that helps enhance performance.

The gymnastics coaches wanted the exercise floor to be the centerpiece of the training space. Designers brought that vision to life by creating a light-filled lobby that provides spectators and visiting summer camp families with unobstructed views of the exercise floor.

To accommodate practices, when gymnasts require a mirrored wall, the design team created a sliding partition of mirrored panels that expands for practices and contracts for compact storage. The training space also features hydraulic lifts that allow for effortless adjustment to the landing pad height, enhancing the flexibility of practice techniques for the gymnasts.

“The gymnastics facility is a great example of the HNTB/Garvin display of teamwork and commitment to the project,” Sabin said. “Garvin echoed the Athletic Department’s desire for a lot of natural light, and HNTB’s experience using polycarbonate panels and other substrates allowed that light to be diffused so it did not interrupt training in the facility.

“Together, they created the most beautiful aspect of the Women’s Sports Complex. Driving up the hill toward the complex, people see the wall face of polycarbonate panels with the largest Clemson paw graphic we’ve ever placed on a facility. Inside is the perfect shadowed outline of that paw through the polycarbonate, with all this natural light coming in. It’s very well designed.”

The 9,000-square-foot lacrosse operations building encompasses coaches’ offices, locker rooms, a player lounge, nutrition center, team meeting room, and athletic training room. Across the parking lot at the lacrosse building, the lobby serves as a jewel box display case for Clemson’s paw print brand mark and lacrosse team equipment displayed on interior walls. Interior spaces emphasize the building’s connection to the adjacent field: the head coach’s office and the team lounge feature full-height glass walls that open directly onto the field. A bold orange portal marks the entry to the “hype tunnel” between the field and the locker room. Custom lockers, showcasing player jerseys and a tiger stripe motif in Clemson purple, are illuminated by panels that divide niches for hanging lacrosse sticks. Tunable track lights run along the underside of an uplit pan ceiling, while warm wood softens the textured white tile and frames a wide clerestory window above the vanity in the bathroom. 

The stands and press box at the lacrosse stadium mimic the form of the adjacent buildings, but aligned with its function, the massing promotes views to the artificial turf competition field and lake views beyond. The stadium includes 1,000 spectator seats, spaces for concessions, restrooms and locker rooms for visiting teams and officials. The woods beyond slope down to Lake Hartwell and offer a unique backdrop to the athletic field. 

“Our facility is more than we could have ever dreamed of,” said Allison Kwolek, Clemson Lacrosse Head Coach. “Everything about it has been better than expected. For a young program to have a world-class facility like this is a game changer for recruiting top student athletes. The design team was genuine in wanting to know our thoughts and put an incredible effort into transforming our ideas into a meaningful and beautiful design.”

In February 2024, just one month after the ribbon cutting, the stadium hosted the team’s season opener, which the Tigers won decisively. Clemson is the only school in the country with a performance and stadium facility solely dedicated to women’s lacrosse.

The rowing facility was upgraded with a new sports medicine area that features taping tables, hydrotherapy, and administration offices.

The most innovative aspect of the project is the first-of-its-kind, 10,000-square-foot Athlete Recovery Center, a retreat for all Clemson student-athletes to engage in mental and physical wellness practices in an environment that emphasizes recovery and community.

“Athlete performance centers usually have the lion’s share of square footage dedicated to cardio and strength training, with recovery off to the side,” Maxwell explained. “The idea behind Clemson’s Athlete Recovery Center is that it’s a place to come take a breath, to retreat from the mental and physical rigors of their day-to-day lives, where they are always trying to get faster, stronger, and smarter, and take time to relax and truly recover.”

Acknowledging the need to serve the whole individual, the project team incorporated a large yoga space and the latest recovery equipment, including dry and wet float tanks, TheraLight beds, sleep pods, massage chairs, and cryogenic chambers. Coaches, doctors, and sports psychologists have offices on-site, and the building is positioned to take advantage of the view to Lake Hartwell. The recovery center also plays host to programs that focus on furthering Clemson student-athletes’ holistic development.

“Athlete first doesn’t just mean sports competition,” said HNTB Principal in Charge Todd Ballew. “Clemson and the design team focused on creating spaces that make well-rounded student athletes. The Women’s Sports Complex contributes to the mission of collegiate athletics and the mission of the university’s athletics program that all athletes, regardless of gender or pedigree or demographic, are prepared as they matriculate from school to take advantage of their athletic experience and be competitive in the workforce and their communities.”

The Women’s Sports Complex serves as a standout recruiting tool, helping Clemson sign some of tomorrow’s most promising collegiate women athletes.

A blueprint for success in women’s sports

Women now make up about 60 percent of US college students. Consequently, athletic departments across the country face the challenge of providing new facilities for female athletes—and building them quickly. Clemson’s history-making Women’s Sports Complex provides an efficient, cost-effective template for other colleges and universities to follow.

From its picturesque lakeside setting and campus feel to its state-of-the-art architecture and amenities, Clemson University’s Women’s Sports Complex has exceeded the university’s—and the athletes’—expectations. Intended to produce victories, the facility is a victory for the university and, most importantly, for collegiate women’s sports, giving the student-athletes the resources they have long deserved and providing an efficient, cost-effective template for other colleges and universities to follow.