We absolutely agreed with this when we first saw Harvard’s campus and walked into the main quad areas. We also loved all the shops nearby and the smaller city feel with easy walkability . It is a beautiful campus, and has more charm and character than many other schools (30+ Campuses for two kids, most the highly-ranked variety and the vast majority northeast/mid Atlantic, so we havent seen large sprawling pristine southern campus styles other than UVA because neither wanted that type of school.).
UVA was fine but not wow and did not have the homey feel like William&Mary, which in our opinion is very pretty, with a charming, older, ivy-type campus feel.
MIT is definitely not beautiful, but that isnt a reason not to go there: the academics and fit factors more than make up for the ugly factors for my kid who toured.
Harvard’s campus with the brick and historical feel is a plus where MITs more modern buildings are not a plus.
I think campus beauty is very much an individual opinion, based on all of these Harvard-is ugly posts!
With all this chat about “beautiful” campuses I am reminded of my one trip to Stanford University. It was in the summer so not many students around. After that visit I have always referred to Stanford as Stepford University. Everything was just so “perfect”.
When we were planning our move to Boston in 2019 after six expat years in Europe, we let our S22’s high-school search guide the process. I didn’t get to go on the school-tour trip, but I ended up very glad that he preferred Brookline to Cambridge. Cambridge is OK to visit, but the housing stock is dreadful for as expensive as it is. Walked through Harvard Yard a couple of times and found it fine but not especially impressive.
Neither of our kids were much driven by campus aesthetics in their college searches. D19 is finishing up at Parsons and S22 just started at NYU, and neither of them cared about the lack of a verdant, contained campus. It isn’t for everyone, but our kids are urbanites and very comfortable being fully integrated into the city.
@TomSrOfBoston, we visited Stanford when S22 went to a basketball camp there, and D19 had the same impression. She isn’t at all averse to luxury but found the campus too aggressively nice, and too large. And our tour guide was sports-obsessed, which didn’t go over well with her.
I loved Harvard when I attended back in the 80s! My oldest son didn’t care at all about campus aesthetics, went to Columbia. My d18 was incredibly picky on every aspect of the search including the aesthetics and went to Georgetown. S23 doesn’t seem to care about aesthetics but def has preferences re setting - not too rural or remote, etc. All are too snarky to be into “traditions” .
I remember going to an academic conference at Stanford, which I’d never been to before, and it was good weather and I had time to kill so I walked from my hotel. That entrance! Just stunning.
It held the top spot in my mental list of prettiest large campuses until I visited Miami in Ohio.
I am surprised more folks don’t talk about Pepperdine amongst the prettiest campuses. When taking the setting into account (moreso than the buildings themselves) it’s an absolute knockout.
My best friend from middle school went to Harvard in the 70s and on my first and only visit to the place, he took pains to show the Yard and not much else. To me, it was reassuringly familiar: old buildings facing each other across a green. IIRC, landscaping was at a minimum; there were no floral displays with a big “H” in the middle; no fountains; not a single sign warned students off the grass and the evidence abounded. So, I’m always astounded when people travel all the way across the country to visit these centuries old American campuses and complain that they look “worn”.
When I was looking at colleges I watched the movie “The Paper Chase”. I remember kind of internalizing Harvard as the quintessential feel a college should have. I ended up at Miami of Ohio. It just felt like I imagined a university should feel. I didn’t graduate from there (my fault) so obviously looks aren’t everything.
It’s funny how peoples’ tastes vary. I went to Stanford and I didn’t like its campus at all! Hot and dry, too spread out, and it seemed sooooooo far to bike to Palo Alto through that weird forest area. It also always irritated me how there is a really big parking lot next to Tresidder, to me it made the whole place feel like a commuter campus The Stanford quad and memorial church front is pretty, and I liked the shaded walkways around the quad… thankfully there is SOME shade somewhere on campus as it was otherwise just too hot for me (I grew up in the Pacific NW).
When we visited and later dropped off our S at Stanford we were struck at how nice the weather was, cool for sure with lots of green, and trees. We were, at the time living in Phoenix (think crazy hot). The parking at Tressider is much needed for any large events with not much outside parking available.
Funny thing is we moved away from PNW as it was way too gloomy for me. I must have suffered from SAD. At least that’s what my wife thought.
I love college traditions and my kids do too. Would they pick a school for traditions? Probably not, but they would pick a school with traditions over a school without any for sure.
The Stanford quad and memorial church front is pretty, and I liked the shaded walkways around the quad… thankfully there is SOME shade somewhere on campus as it was otherwise just too hot for me (I grew up in the Pacific NW).
