Knowles recalled visiting the building right after the crack was found, early in the renovations. Twenty steel beams had to be used to prop the building up, he said.

Though the Loker Commons are located underground, they are bright and airy. The wood paneling, in contrast to the Great Hall upstairs, is a pale shade.

"The primary feature in this space is light," Zewinski said.

Light filters into the seating area through stencils cut out of a floor-to-ceiling wood panel at the entrance to the Commons.

"We've kept natural light in here," Knowles said. "[From the coffee house], there are funny, interesting shapes of light as you look outside."

Upstairs, in the Great Hall and in the transept between the hall and Sanders Theatre, ancient details and decorations, long lost under layers of grime, have been recovered.

The ceiling is again its original blue with black stenciling. The walls, likewise, have stencil designs on them.

"It used to be black because it was sooty and horrible," Knowles said.

In the transept, workers uncovered shiny white slabs inscribed with the names of the Union dead, also covered by years of dirt.

Despite the dark wood, the Annenberg Hall, as the first-year dining hall will be renamed, is as bright as the Commons downstairs. The stained glass windows have been cleaned. And new wagon-wheel shaped chandeliers aim light both at the ceiling and down on the floor.

The Mystery

In a hallway underneath Sanders Theatre stands a piece of the bell which hung in the old Memorial Hall tower, which burned in 1956. The bell was discovered by workers during the renovations.

"It was tucked under a stairway," Zewinksi said.

Likely, the bell fell through the tower during the fire and landed on the transept floor, where it broke.

"It bounced along like a live animal," Knowles said. "It was red hot."

But Zewinski pointed out, "It's a mystery nobody can confirm."

Katherine Bogdanovich Loker, who donated money for the student center, has also given $1 million to begin a fund to rebuild the tower