Deleted food and nutrition posts as OT
Wonderful article on a lost mid-century modern masterpiece. One look at the original walnut walls (without the tschakes) and inlaid fireplace of the living room and any Wesleyan graduate would think they were looking at one of the Foss Hill dormitory lounges:
MoMA Built a House. Then It Disappeared. Now It’s Found. - The New York Times (nytimes.com)
Eons ago, when I attended a LAC, my dorm was in a beautiful 1920s building nestled in a gorgeous campus. Rooms were large and unique. But there were roaches in the bathroom and mice in the dining hall. Sometimes a tour doesn’t tell the whole story … but somehow at age 18, I was able to shrug it off.
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For anyone reading this thread who is still looking at colleges, Bowdoin’s dorms are fabulous and so is the food. Tons of space. For freshmen, you are either in a double or a quad. The doubles have a “living room” with a (nice, new) futon, desks, closets and then the bedroom is separate with the beds and bookcases. There’s a door between the “living room” and bedroom. Clean and spacious. The quads are the same. One giant “living room” for the four and then a double bedroom on either side. And the food is really really good.
Housing after freshmen year ranges from as good to even better.
We felt really good about having S living in a nice place and eating great food.Say it doesn’t matter all you want but, when a student is busy and/or stressed out from school, it’s pretty nice to come back to comfort.
We didn’t get to go into Colgate’s dorms yet but I’ve seen photos and they look pretty nice. Food might not be as good but D21 can eat any time she wants with the cafeteria open 24 hours a day so that’s a bonus!
I’m sure kids do just fine in any accommodations but I also don’t think it’s wrong to judge housing. It does make a difference. We definitely know families whose kids would call home stressed out about bad living arrangements and/or bad food. I guess you could just say suck it up but college is expensive and some places are pretty gross.
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Hi Homer! Your description of Bowdoin’s doubles sounds suspiciously like what we used to call “single room doubles” back in the day. IOW, roommates would draw straws and the loser would move their bed and desk into the living room for greater privacy (and less chance of at least one roommate being sexiled.) At the end of the year, we would move the furniture back where it belonged. Maybe, times have changed.
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I should clarify something I posted up-topic. When I wrote “pretty much everyone says the same thing,” I meant they describe those buildings as motel-like. No aesthetic judgment was intended.
Shabbiness of building was never part of my kid’s decision process. The dorm D1 lived as a freshman in 2012 was the same I had lived in 1985 and it was identical. D2 lived a dorm that could best be described as “institutional blandess” But never one of them would trade their college experiences for anything.
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Found a photo of one of the Wesleyan lounges. Straight out of “Mad Men”:
WESLEYAN-BUTTERFIELD-STUDENT-LOUNGE.jpg (1920×996) (kbarch.com)
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I lived there in the early '90’s…affectionately known as “Butt”, it doesn’t look as if it has changed too much in 30 years!!
However, made great friends there, took awesome classes and loved Wes!!
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What is the glass box on the lower right in the picture?
Wheelchair lift
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