Flawn Academic Center

Flawn Academic Center is a building at the University of Texas in Austin that provides study spaces, computer labs, and multimedia services across multiple floors. Students and faculty members find resources for learning and research work plus an art gallery.

The building opened in 1963 and 1964 and was groundbreaking because it contained the first open-stack undergraduate library at the university with direct access to shelves. Its opening marked a shift in how universities made their collections accessible to students.

The Leeds Gallery on the fourth floor displays a reconstructed study workspace of writer Erle Stanley Gardner and Charles Umlauf's sculpture The Torchbearers for visitors to explore. This exhibition connects literary and visual art in a central campus location.

The building is centrally located on campus and easy to reach on foot; visitors should know it has different areas for various work tasks. During peak hours study spaces can be fully occupied, so it is better to come earlier in the day or during quieter times.

In 2005 the building underwent a major transformation, relocating 90,000 books to other libraries and introducing modern digital learning infrastructure. This change shows how academic buildings adapt to new forms of learning and how the focus shifted from printed books to digital resources.