Columbia Law School has opened a fully renovated library, supported by a $15 million naming gift from Li Lu ’96CC, ’96LAW, ’96BUS.
The Li Lu Law Library, spread over three floors of Jerome L. Greene Hall, was officially dedicated on December 5. It is one of the most significant capital projects in the school’s history, encompassing fifty thousand square feet. Its open, light-filled design by lead architectural firm Perkins Eastman features a two-story reading room, striking views across Revson and Ancell Plazas, and more than six hundred study seats — an increase of 60 percent from the pre-renovation layout.
Li Lu, the founder and chairman of the global investment firm Himalaya Capital, grew up in China during the Cultural Revolution and was a prominent student activist who helped lead the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989. Soon after, he was invited to speak about his experiences at Columbia, where he later enrolled. He went on to become the first Columbia University student to earn three degrees simultaneously. “Columbia has been foundational to my life,” he says. “When I came to the US in 1989 as a refugee, it was this university that gave me an emotional and intellectual home and provided an enormous opportunity that I could not imagine before I arrived here.”
Li Lu served as a member of the University Trustees from 2017 to 2024. He received the John Jay Award from Columbia College in 2012 and the Distinguished Leadership Award from Columbia Business School in 2025.
He says that he hopes the new library becomes “a symbol, a gathering point, a platform for Columbia to lead in legal thinking for years to come.”
In total, more than fifty alumni and friends of Columbia made donations to support the library’s renovation.
