When the Pappajohn Business Building opened in 1994, it was built for 1,600 students. The Tippie College of Business has long since outgrown it, and now crews are at work giving the college more room.
Tippie celebrated the groundbreaking of its $60 million expansion on Sept. 18, 2026. According to the college, the project will connect the Pappajohn Business Building and historic Gilmore Hall, adding more than 70,000 square feet of space for classrooms, student services and experiential learning. Construction is expected to wrap up in summer 2028.
Who's building it
The University of Iowa's Facilities Management project page lists the construction contract as awarded to McComas Lacina Construction Company and the architect as Neumann Monson Architects.
That page lists a project budget of $42,817,829, a total of 75,991 square feet and a substantial completion date of Aug. 14, 2028.
What's being built
The plan creates a one-square-block business campus. Gilmore Hall, built in 1910 as the university's College of Law, will add 43,800 square feet to the 228,800 square feet in the Pappajohn building, according to the college. About 28,600 square feet of new space will be built in the courtyard to connect the two buildings.
The student experience will literally be in the middle of it all. "From the new atrium, a student will be able to see student advising, the Frank Business Communication Center, career services, mental health and wellness services, and other student success resources," said Amy Kristof-Brown, the Henry B. Tippie dean of the college.
Kristof-Brown told The Daily Iowan the new spaces include a 150-person event space, four new experiential labs and new spaces for students to gather. Because most of the construction will be outside, she said, the Pappajohn building will stay open during the school year.
Growth is driving the project. The college had 4,700 students in the 2025-26 academic year, a number expected to keep growing. The Daily Iowan reported the expansion will increase the college's size by 33%. The last construction project at Tippie wrapped up in January 2018, when the Biz Hub was added.
"We've grown over 50 percent in the last six years in our undergraduate, on-campus population," Kristof-Brown told The Daily Iowan. "It became pretty clear about five years ago that we were going to need more space."
She said expanding into Gilmore Hall was much cheaper than the alternative of moving the business college across the street, which was estimated at $120 million. And she said reusing an existing building is more sustainable. "We are taking something that is already existing and reutilizing the space," she said.
The college says the project is funded mainly through private gifts, along with support from college reserves and university capital improvement funds. Kristof-Brown told The Daily Iowan that 90% of the money is coming from private donors.
"Our newly reimagined business campus will serve as the launch pad for the next generation of leaders, with spaces built to match the ambition of its students and programs," Kristof-Brown said when the Iowa Board of Regents unanimously approved the project on June 16.
Kristof-Brown has also pitched the building as a resource for the state. "Tippie will be open for business," she said in June. "We can't wait to show Iowa employers and businesses how easy it will be to access Tippie's resources to help solve your business challenges."
The departments that were in Gilmore Hall, including the Graduate College, the Department of Religious Studies, the Office of Undergraduate Research and the Division of Sponsored Programs, were expected to move to other buildings on campus in fall 2026.
Why it matters for Contractors
This is the kind of job that tests a crew: renovating a building from 1910, tying it into a 1990s building, and putting up a new courtyard addition between them, all while the Pappajohn building stays open to students. McComas Lacina Construction holds the contract, so subs and suppliers interested in the job should reach out to them. With substantial completion set for Aug. 14, 2028, it's a long-running job in Iowa City. The project is funded largely by private donors, and it shows how a fast-growing college can turn an older campus building into active work for contractors instead of starting from scratch.