It was completed in 1984 at a cost of $7.2 million after the college received money from a fund bequeathed to it in the will of California cardiologist and professor Seeley G. Mudd.

[9] The College planned to cover the costs not paid for by the Mudd Fund with a $100 million development fundraising program that spanned the entirety of the 1980s.

[8] Smith had previously selected engineer Fred Dubin to aid the school in constructing a more environmentally friendly chemistry building.

[9] Dubin initially tried to have it placed on the south side of Sanders Physics Building, but that site was deemed unworkable in part because of its proximity to the school's Shakespeare Gardens.

"[22] A contemporary review in Architecture commented that Mudd "responds on a variety of levels to its context, but it does so without sacrificing its own unique and powerful identity.

[15] She went on to positively comment on the building's aesthetics, saying, "the eye can feast on the mingled sparkle and luminosity drawn from minimal outdoor exposures used to maximum effect.

In more public areas, where crisp glass-block and lucent glass ignite clear deep-timbered tones and pretty pastels, the feast becomes a banquet.

"[15] Crosbie in Architecture noted "some instances of shoddy drywall work and sloppy painting" but otherwise praised the building's "bare-bones" and "nuts and bolts" interior as functional and environmentally friendly.

[14] The Platt Byard Dovell White report found that Mudd's glass walls "seem to function particularly poorly" as a passive heat control system but otherwise noted that the structure's expressive postmodernist ambitions marked it as "a strong, compact if busy building [that] makes it more than a bit of a tour de force.