New North Capitol Building in Utah throws its doors open

“For me, it’s connection,” said Dana Jones when explaining what the new North Capitol Building brings to the people of Utah.

“It’s all about connecting the complex,” added Jones, the executive director of the Capitol Preservation Board. “It is all connecting to the Capitol.”

Wednesday afternoon, Jones led a media tour of the recently completed building, as well as both the central and north plazas. She shared that the purpose of the whole construction project was to connect the people of Utah and other visitors to the Capitol building and the complex as a whole.

The construction project included the North Capitol Building, an underground parking garage, two outdoor plazas and a belvedere. The final budget for the project totaled $320 million.

There will be a formal ribbon-cutting ceremony Friday for the new building, then it will officially open to the public with the start of the state legislative session on Tuesday, Jan. 20.

The building includes four floors, a basement and a penthouse level at the top, which is all base isolated to help preserve the building and those inside in case of an earthquake. Inside the building, there are multiple public spaces, including the new Museum of Utah that will open this summer. The building’s upper floors will not be open to the public and contain a variety of offices.

Andy Marr, director of the Division of Facilities Construction and Management, shared that this new building and the whole construction project are the finishing touches of the Capitol Hill master plan.

How the public can use the new North Capitol Building

When visitors first enter the building, they will see a grand marble staircase that wraps around the side of the circular atrium. The staircase connects to two public floors of the building.

People who are standing in that main floor atrium can look up to see an intricate stained glass skylight.

Composed of 14,000 individual glass pieces, the 25-by-25-foot window carries the colors of Utah’s four central ecosystems, with detailed paintings of state symbols like the honeybee, sego lily and California gull against the backdrop of state and national parks like Wasatch Mountain, Goblin Valley and Bryce Canyon, as previously reported by the Deseret News.

The majority of the new building’s first floor will be taken up by the new Museum of Utah and gift shop, which will open to the public in June.

Along with the museum, there are various other public spaces in the building, including a lounge, a conference room and a state room.

Both the conference room and the state room can be rented out for personal and public use. The new parking garage also includes staff and public parking.

Two of the biggest public spaces included in the construction project were the north and central plazas. These two plazas include benches, walkways and grass spaces; the central plaza showcases a fountain in the middle.

At the far north end of the complex, there is an architectural belvedere, or viewing area, that looks out over the north plaza. The structure also features the names of all 29 of the state’s counties carved into its sides.

Jones said she hopes the new building will help connect the public “back to the elements of Utah and let them see why Utah is so special.”

Thousands of precious artifacts to be stored in the building

The museum displays won’t be the only place where the state’s treasured artifacts will be found.

More than half the building’s basement is taken up by a collection storage room for the Utah Historical Society and the Utah Division of Arts and Museums. It includes a variety of customized moving shelves, drawers and hanging racks for pieces of art, books, archives and historical artifacts.

After the around 950 artifacts are placed in the museum, the storage room will be filled with thousands of items. This will include around 30,000 artifacts, 28,000 books, 8,500 manuscripts, 23,000 pamphlets and many other items currently in the state’s collection.

“It provides opportunity for us to grow. All of the state’s treasures will be here and future state treasures will be here,” said Tim Glenn, director of the Museum of Utah.

A room in the North Capitol Building called the engagement room will be available for people to book an appointment to see a specific artifact or other piece in the state’s collection.

Glenn said this is meant for visitors who are doing research or “have an interest in a particular artifact or manuscript.”

The North Capitol Building is also prepared for earthquakes

The North Capitol building joins just a handful of other buildings in the state that are seismically base isolated. Underneath the building are 89 base isolator devices that separate the building from the ground in case of an earthquake to help keep the people and artifacts inside safe.

“We’re expecting big earthquakes in Utah,” said Jerod Johnson, the structural engineer on the project.

He explained that when a quake comes and violently shakes the ground, “because the building is sitting on these isolators and not directly connected to the ground, it just kind of lumbers back and forth very slowly compared to how the ground is moving.”

Other buildings in the area that are also base isolated include the Capitol building, the Salt Lake City Temple and the Salt Lake City and County Building.

What went into this major construction project?

At the 2022 groundbreaking of the building, the expected cost was $168 million. By mid-2025, that expected cost had risen to $281 million.

In the end, the total budget for the whole project, including the demolition of the old State Office Building, was $320 million. According to Marr, the budget grew through a number of approved appropriations from the Legislature as the project evolved.

The total size of the North Capitol Building is about 160,000 square feet.

One of the goals of construction was to have the new building match the Historic Capitol Building as closely as they could, and an important part of that was the stone used. The stone used in the exterior is from a quarry in Sardinia, Italy, and the interior marble is from a quarry in Georgia.

Those working on the project also worked to match the neoclassical architecture of the Capitol building. This includes the columns on the exterior and the grand staircase connecting the first two floors.

“We think we provided a building that’s going to be loved by many generations,” said Michael Despain, project manager with Okland Construction. “And the materials chosen for the building are extraordinarily durable. The mantra was a 100-year building.”