A former bread factory’s transformation into a home for Missouri University of Science and Technology’s award-winning design teams is now complete. The university’s new Kummer Student Design Center will be formally dedicated on Friday, May 20.

The new facility is located on the corner of U.S. Highway 63 (Bishop Avenue) and 10th Street. The dedication ceremony will be held at 1:15 p.m. Friday, May 20, and will include remarks by Chancellor John F. Carney III. The public is invited to attend.

Parking for the event will be available behind the center, on the corner of 10th and Spring streets. Access to the Kummer Student Design Center from U.S. Highway 63/Bishop Avenue will be blocked throughout the day and evening of May 20.

Missouri S&T’s Kummer Student Design Center is a 23,000-square-foot facility with retail space and room for the majority of the university’s design teams. Teams involved in the center include Advanced Aero Vehicle, Baja, Concrete Canoe, Engineers Without Borders, Formula SAE Racing, Human-Powered Vehicle, Robotics, Solar Car, Solar House and Steel Bridge.

The retail portion of the building includes a recently opened Jimmy John’s Gourmet Sandwiches restaurant.

The $2.75 million project was funded entirely through private gifts to the university, including a $1.25 million gift from Fred and June Kummer of Huntleigh Village, Mo. Fred Kummer is a 1955 civil engineering graduate of Missouri S&T and the CEO of St. Louis-based HBE Corp.

The original design center idea was spearheaded by three other civil engineers: Richard Arnoldy, a 1969 civil engineering graduate of Missouri S&T and retired CEO of ARCO Construction Co. Inc. in St. Louis; Robert Brinkmann, a 1971 civil engineering graduate and founder and president of R.G. Brinkmann Construction Co., based in Chesterfield, Mo.; and Barry Koenemann, a 1970 civil engineering graduate and CEO of United Construction Ent. Co. of St. Louis. Other major donors include Michael Bytnar, a 1968 mechanical engineering graduate and the retired president of Nooter Corp. of St. Louis, and the Sunderland Foundation of Ashgrove Cement Co., located in Overland Park, Kan.

Missouri S&T has built a strong reputation among technological research universities for its student design team success. S&T’s solar car team has won two North American solar races – Sunrayce’99 and the 2003 North American Solar Challenge – and its human-powered vehicle team has won several East Coast and West Coast championships in recent years. In 2009, Missouri S&T’s Advanced Aero Vehicle Group was the top U.S. team in an international competition among student-designed and -built radio-controlled aircraft.