When it comes to public spaces on Georgia Tech’s urban campus, recent years have seen additions that include a towering sculpture by legendary alum John Portman and the EcoCommons, a 7-acre greenspace that confronts an ugly racial past in the area.
But the campus has never seen anything quite like this.
Georgia Tech’s newest permanent art installation—a sweeping piece with important, evolving messaging near the John Lewis Student Center—is scheduled to be officially unveiled Monday, as Women’s History Month 2025 unfolds.
Titled Pathway of Progress: Celebrating Georgia Tech Women, the shimmering mosaic includes 3,000 mirrored tiles, pathways, and functional seating with a backdrop of campus structures and Atlanta skyscrapers.
An overview of the Georgia Tech installation, as shown in a rendering. Courtesy of Georgia Tech
As seen today, an aerial of the project by Merica May Jensen, GT MGT 2008, M. ARCH 2011.Photo by Parrish Ruiz de Velasco, courtesy of Gray Matters
The work is by Merica May Jensen, a Georgia Tech alumna and lead project artist-architect and a founding creative director at New York City-based design studio Gray Matters.
The reflective piece (symbolically and not) aims to honor decades of Georgia Tech women’s achievements—and to inspire and inform students on campus today. Input from current faculty, staff, and students helped inform the design, as Georgia Tech reps tell Urbanize Atlanta.
On the official opening day, the installation will feature 168 tiles with stories and brief passages from the inaugural female honorees. More stories will be added on an annual basis.
Courtesy of Georgia Tech
Photo by Parrish Ruiz de Velasco, courtesy of Gray Matters
The project, spearheaded by alumna Andrea Laliberte, includes a large mosaic ribbon that rises from a local silver cloud granite table and ends in granite from Barre, Vermont, where Laliberte was born.
“There are, and have been, amazing women here, but no one knows about them,” said Laliberte in a recent announcement. “My hope is that their stories inspire the next generation.”
In the gallery above, see how the artistic tribute turned out—from up close and high above.
Courtesy of Georgia Tech
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