Princeton University and the Crisis in Architecture: 1960-1970

David G. Thom, ARC/ART 409, January 10, 1995

Of all the U.S. universities that have been addicted to Collegiate Gothic architecture, Princeton has probably had the longest and most severe withdrawal pains. - Architectural Forum, August 1967

When the College of New Jersey became Princeton University in 1896 the tradition of building campus architecture specific to each decade was halted for over half a century; no longer would Princeton accumulate a collection of architecture of various quality from numerous eras. Whether a reaction to the eclectic buildings of the campus or simply a decision to create a new look for newfound status, the Georgian, Federalist, Colonial, Classical and Victorian structures were forgotten in the minds of students and alumni as Collegiate Gothic spires became the "proper" dress for Princeton. (Fig 1)

After the second World War the university exhausted its funds trying to maintain an expensive Gothic look on a few new buildings while students and faculties were starving for new space in an overcrowded institution. There was a crisis in architecture as the school realized it had to build to accommodate new growth, but could not decide in what style to build in. The demands for space finally pushed Princeton to build in 1960-64, perhaps before it was ready. The resulting architecture, as exemplified by Old New Quad, Woolworth Center, McCormick/Architecture and the E-Quad, was so badly received by architects, students and alumni that the university responded with a vigorous campaign to redeem itself. The solutions posed in the following six years were epitomized in four campus buildings by prominent architects: The Woodrow Wilson School (Yamasaki, 1965), New New Quad (Stubbins, 1964), New South (Barnes, 1966) and Jadwin-Fine (Warner Burns Toan Lunde / Stubbins, 1970). These buildings represent the steps Princeton took to secure first-rate architecture for academic, dormitory and administration buildings, and offer direct improvements over their predecessors.

Before the second world war, campus architecture was a fairly straightforward thing for school planners. Depending on locale and the trustee's personal taste, a university could clothe itself in either a rational neo-Georgian or Classical architecture, or the brooding monastical spires of Collegiate Gothic. Both styles were impractical in some way but they were adequate for the small institutions of the time. Duke University stands as an excellent example of the choices in college architecture circa 1920; when it expanded to two campuses it built a medieval castle for the sciences and a symmetric, Classical academy for the women's college. (Blackburn, 20)

After the second world war, enrollments at colleges nationwide increased dramatically and there were sudden and tremendous expansions in resource-demanding departments such as the sciences and engineering. In fact, all departments increased in size and a building boom to accommodate them resulted (Turner, 249). Many American universities have several buildings built in the first decade after the war, and most of these reflect the new modernist changes taken in architecture during the 1930's such as the International Movement, the Bauhaus, and changes in building material from stone and wood to concrete and steel.

Until 1960 Princeton was something of an exception, maintaining the popular Gothic image at any cost. Frightened of Bauhaus and other new trends, the trustees blocked new building attempts and a great demand for space grew in both faculty and dormitory space. The only buildings completed in 1945-55 were the new Library and the rebuilt Gymnasium, both of which were covered with a Gothic facade because any other type of decoration would have been unimaginable. From 1945 to 1960 not a single dormitory or laboratory building was erected and the school was in danger of losing its academic reputation if steps were not taken to fix the space crisis. But in what style?

Finally demands were so great for growth in physical space the school amassed $53 million dollars to be used for building a new physical plant to include everything from a new indoor stadium to large dormitories for graduate students (PAW, 25 Feb 1964). The "$53 million for Princeton" campaign began with the construction of such important buildings as new dorms, an engineering complex, a new art/architecture complex and a music center. Before critiquing the actual buildings of this time, the goals of the building program should be examined. The new University architect Douglas Orr, appointed in 1957, created a series of guidelines a year later for the building program which would create what he termed "Campus of 1963" (PAW, 20 May 1960).

The master plan tried to keep the current campus land-use patterns and scale. Dorms would expand to the south in a large grouping centered on a new social center; the playing fields would simply be pushed farther south to compensate. Anchored by a new Engineering Quad at the east end and a renovated McCormick Hall in the west, academics would spread the length of McCosh Walk. Athletic facilities displaced by all of this building would be relocated around Palmer stadium and a new domed gym. (PAW, 3 July 1959).

Quite simply, the siting for the new buildings was fixed by the attempt to keep interdependent departments together and the whole campus within a 10 minute walk. This was seen as more important than preserving open space however, and the resulting compromise was to designate '79 Field and the area west of McCormick as expansion areas on the inner campus (PAW, 20 May 1960).

Orr and the trustees felt that to preserve Princeton's character it was best to scatter small buildings around rather than "squash" the central campus with towering complexes. Orr saw almost every existing Princeton dormitory as being at a "human scale", which allowed the park like atmosphere to dominate. This concept eliminated one proposal for a new McCormick complex which would have occupied an entire block from Dod Hall to Brown to McCosh walk. It was thought that a better solution would be to split this large mass up into a small detatched architecture building, a new Museum wing and a new Library wing (PAW, 20 May 1960). In another case, the large Engineering Quad could not be reduced in size but was instead placed in the middle of the largest open space on the campus, University Field. The new dormitories would be placed at the northern edge of the playing fields, again to give them plentiful space. The units were limited to a number of small units of no more than four floors, to keep the human scale and traditional courtyard feel (PAW, 20 May 1960).

The buildings that immediately resulted from this plan were built very quickly and produced a great deal of controversy. In order of completion, the structures were:

This $6 million dormitory complex was built to relieve the critical overcrowding situation in the older student dormitories (Fig 2). A group of five flat-roof, salmon-pink brick buildings was built around a social and study center to create the first "residential college" which would act as an alternative to the clubs and house enough students to relieve overcrowding elsewhere. Completed in 1961, a second phase of three more identical dorms to the south of Wilcox (the social center) was planned for construction in 1964 (PAW, 23 Oct 1959). (Fig 2)

An $8 million behemoth, the E-Quad began life on the drawing board as an attractive interrelated complex (Fig 3); expansion plans and need for space revised the plans and the E-Quad became the largest building ever built at Princeton at the time. Its design went through a number of designs and sites but was finally completed with five interconnected units and a large library located on the former University field. A very practical building with plenty of expansion room, it was nonetheless architecturally bland (Fig 4). (Daily Princetonian, 12 Jan. 1962).

The music department needed to expand out of Clio Hall but needed a location that was central to the campus core and close to the music library in Firestone. As a result it received a building on '79 Field that was small but adequate. The design primarily stems from acoustical design of the interiors and is colored to in an attempt to conform with nearby Palmer and 1879 Hall (PAW, 25 Feb 1964). Fig 5 shows both a proposal for Woolworth and the version actually built.

This building was a compromise solution to the problem of trying to keep Art and Architecture together without building a massive building. After a relatively quick design evolution it was built for $1.5 million alongside Woolworth on '79 Field to create a new courtyard there (Fig 6,7). The most important design criterion according to the architect was making the building fit with the parallel McCosh Hall. (PAW, 25 Feb 1964)

This expansion consisted of a series of small two-storey wings to house the Art Museum, a new teaching wing and the expanded Marquand Library (Fig 8). A series of new courtyards resulted from the new wings but many vistas were also lost. Total cost was $3.5 million for the sprawling pink-granite expansion (PAW, 25 Feb 1964).

There were several other buildings completed at this time such as the junior faculty apartments and the tower for married graduate students but they are not in the main campus area and are not well-known to the community. Perhaps their poor architecture can be excused for this reason.

The names of the architects who did the above buildings are certainly not well known; it is doubtful whether they were chosen on the strength of their portfolios. Indeed, the Voorhees firm's previous laboratory building at Harvard is widely regarded as an ugly structure that is not only architecturally tasteless but does not conform to its neighbors (Architectural Record, 20 July 1960). Since the trustee's minutes are sealed until the year 2010 the selection process remains a mystery. One suspicious fact remains that an alumni or trustee was closely involved in most of the architectural firms: Voorhees '00, Ballard '27, and Smith '30 had maintained close ties with the school before their hiring (Daily Princetonian, 12 Jan 1962) Interestingly, no competitions were held for any of the buildings completed in 1960-64, despite the importance and size of the building campaign. Prominent architects were seemingly avoided by the trustee selection committee. Why? Campus architect Douglas Orr was quoted as saying that he did not want "big-name" architects because they used reinforced concrete, which would crumble in this climate. The trustees felt that competitions were not needed, because "the rules of the profession are more limiting than Princeton is willing to accept...it will be understandable that the trustees insist upon retaining the full right of selection." (Daily Princetonian, 12 Jan 1962) This approach was not unusual; public competitions for academic buildings were rare, and Aldous Huxley had once told a Johns Hopkins president that rather than waste money on a flashy architect for academic buildings, he should instead "get an honest bricklayer".

Reaction to the new architecture was intense and varied. Three different groups, alums, students and faculty, and the architectural profession, took different approaches in appraising the new architecture. Basically, the alumni wanted to preserve the old Princeton, the faculty and students wanted more say in the design and selection process and the professionals wanted to see the university throw off its Gothic bonds and enter the real world of modern architecture.

The Princeton Alumni Weekly led the discussions on what to do about new architecture years before ground was broken on any building. A 1957 article entitled "After Gothic, what?" examined the quandary: Alumni are very emotionally attached to collegiate gothic but it is not practical anymore and form needs to follow function more. In addition, costs have risen and to reproduce Firestone, a thoroughly modern building, in 1957 at the same cost as in 1948 would require using cement block as exterior trim and throughout. The article also pointed out new steps taken in architecture at Princeton's rival schools, Harvard, Yale and MIT (Fig 9). Thoughtfully, the author notes that at Stanford alumni were resisting modern designs without red tile roofs, yet when those roofs were built, Princeton was 150 years old and had not a single Gothic structure (PAW, 19 April 1957). This raises the issue of the permanence of the Gothic buildings, whose imagery was so powerful as to suggest that they had been there for centuries. Indeed Woodrow Wilson had commented that the Gothic buildings had, in a few short decades, added thousands of years to the university's age (PAW, 17 May 1957).

Reaction to this article and other architecture pieces in the PAW awoke the alumni and a hail of furious letters resulted - all before a single new stone was laid. John Elliot '18 quoted Ralph Adams Cram in describing the confusion of styles used before the unifying choice of Gothic. He predicted a return to the architectural chaos that existed before Princeton became a university (an unfortunately prophetic statement) . His letter was followed on the same page by one from G. Moment '28, who applauded any new steps in architecture the school took. He felt that Gothic was useful for overcoming an early sense of academic inferiority to the Europeans but had since outlived its usefulness (PAW, 17 May 1957). Modernity would "destroy this Princeton heritage" fondly remembered from the days of F. Scott Fitzgerald. Brice Clagett '54, a young alumnus studying at Harvard, claimed that the modern example set by Harvard and other schools was the best reason not to follow that path. Another alum, Andrew Green '44, hoped Princeton will not build the "cute" and "smart-alecky" buildings such as the MIT auditorium and chapel (PAW, 17 May 1957).

Worse came once the alumni actually saw the new buildings. The E-Quad was described as "a prison yard" and "such a blot on the earth that even Alexander Hall would probably look good in comparison." (!) The architect Philip Cotton '54, after seeing the designs for the E-Quad and School of Architecture, worried that Princeton would settle for mediocrity in standards and quality, no matter what style (PAW, 20 May 1960). Some alums in favor of the new architecture asked why no great architects were being given commissions. Claimed Aaron Stein '27:

Where Princeton should have led, she hasn't even followed. Dartmouth with Nervi, Harvard with Corbusier, Yale with Rudolph and Penn with Kahn have made the step from the imitation of architectural beauty to the creation of it. (PAW, 25 Jan 1966)
Overall, the alums were unhappy either with the quality of the new buildings or modernity altogether.

The worst alumni reaction came from the Poor Princeton Society, an association of eighteen prominent alums and faculty who attacked the school's policy on architecture in a three page letter sent to one in every five alumni (5,000 people). The letter contained criticism from a new book on architecture and called for advising by architects and not trustees on new buildings (Poor Princeton Society, 1961). Under attack, the young President Goheen defended Orr's planning and established a committee to advise on campus architecture.

After seeing the new music and architecture plans, the Princetonian described the architecture faculty as "spitting fire" over the new designs . A visiting professor, Enrico Peressutti resigned in 1960 over the poor quality of the new designs. In his resignation letter to President Goheen he stated that "my fundamental convictions and principles, and ... responsibilities I have as a teacher at this university have been misshaped and completely reversed by the actual developments on the campus." (Daily Princetonian, 23 Feb 1960) The resignation made international news when it appeared in Architectural Forum. Peressutti was chiefly dissatisfied with the new architecture building design, which he wanted to be done by Frank Lloyd Wright or another prominent architect (Architectural Forum, Feb 1960). Many other faculty felt that the building planning was too hasty and not thought well planned for future permanence. A rumor was even started in the faculty that the architects for Woolworth and Architecture had never even seen each other's plans.

Despite Orr's efforts, students felt that they were losing the vistas and charm of the campus without so much as being consulted. This sentiment was mostly confined to Prince editorials and architecture students though, since the rest of the student body was more concerned with the functionality of the new architecture. The graduate students in architecture, however, did nearly picket the dedication of Wilcox Hall; they agreed not to if the PAW printed their handbill of protest (Daily Princetonian, 23 Oct 1961). It contained such criticisms as:

[The new buildings] are changing our campus' rural atmosphere of tree, grass, informally mingling areas and carefully planned vistas to one of rigid walls, monotonous buildings and claustrophobic spaces. Furthermore the buildings projected fail to offer the excellence in modern design which must be the responsibility of a great university....Princeton stands alone in its backwardness. Yale, Harvard, Dartmouth and Pennsylvania, MIT and Wellesley are ... entrusting their building programs to the best of the world's architects as Princeton once did.

The students were clearly feeling the pressure placed on Princeton by the professional press after the stunning successes of new architecture at other schools. This was clearly outlined in the 1961 book The Architecture of America - a Social and Cultural History, authors Burchard and Bush-Brown said the following:

In the end the arch-citadel of reaction remained at Princeton, cozy in its Gothic... A notable compromise that lacked conviction appeared at Princeton in 1960, where Douglas Orr...sought to placate young demands for a modern architecture while assuring old tigers that their house was safe from 'chaos and a jumble of new and daring styles, each screaming for a place in the magazines'...Gothic was gone, but its replacement..was worse, however much it tried to be all things to all men. In 1960 Saarinen was to do the new colleges at Yale, Harvard had commissioned LeCorbusier to design its Fine Arts Building, Pei and Stubbins were designing for MIT. But the pockets of resistance remained, particularly at distinguished Old Nassau where the trustees resolutely covered their ears and eyes that they might hear and see no evil.
Architectural magazines of the time also reviewed Princeton's new buildings rather harshly. "Princeton's first attempts at compatible modern were not very successful" cried the July 1967 Architectural Forum. Certainly creating the first modern buildings on the campus was a difficult problem but for various reasons Princeton failed where Harvard, Yale and others were successful at integrating the old with the new.

Many American schools underwent very rapid growth at this time and the physical plant increased dramatically on the campuses of Princeton's contemporaries. MIT, Harvard and Yale in particular were expanding with new buildings of high architectural quality. Where Princeton looked to limit new architecture in an effort to preserve traditional spatial relationships and appearances these schools gave independence to their architects, resulting in structures that contrasted and stood on their own (Turner, 262).

MIT built quickly in the 1950's with the showpiece Baker House (Alvar Aalto, Fig 10), Auditorium and Chapel (both by Eero Saarinen, Fig 10). Baker House was a large dormitory that avoided the shoebox look and gave every student wide views of the Charles River. The Auditorium and Chapel were showpieces, works of art for public display (Zahran, 64).

Harvard was also building continuously after the war and was greatly aided by the importing of Water Gropius, Bauhaus founder, as chairman of its architecture department. A promotional tri-centennial brochure, "Building Harvard" focuses on Gropius' 1950 Graduate Housing, an international-style complex complete with pilotes and covered walkways (Fig 11). Flat roofs, severe geometry, strip windows and a lack of ornament are all present. This came not without controversy as at Princeton, but Gropius' Master Class students responded with questions such as "Must we take the word of our older alumni that the ivory tower is the only true architecture?" (Bunting, 229). The Loeb Drama Theater (1959) by Hugh Stubbins is also displayed in "Building Harvard". This difficult project was one of the first in Harvard's $82 million campaign incorporated a large theater into a small neighborhood by choosing setbacks and frontal elements to ease the building into its surroundings (Bunting, 252). The high-rise towers of Leverett House and Quincy House (both 1960) appear in Fig 12 as new ways to solve the space crisis without destroying the building aesthetic or functionality (Building Harvard, 1968). While none of these buildings may have been stunningly attractive or even fully practical, they were seen as fitting into the campus contextually and could also stand alone as famous works of architecture. Two buildings that make no attempt to fit in but are monumental by contrast are the Carpenter Center by Le Corbusier and James tower by Minoru Yamasaki (Fig 13). Carpenter was built with all of the characteristic Corbusier tricks - sunshades, ramps, rough concrete and so on - and stands as his only work in the US. The James tower is a fifteen story tower that makes no compromise to its environment but rather stands as a giant column, complete with interesting structural properties (Bunting, 240). The oddness of these buildings only enhances the theory that at this time schools were trying to get famous works so they could collect them like open-air art pieces.

The most successful college at this game of hire-the-architect was Yale University. Termed an "architectural laboratory" by the Architectural Record, Yale "collected" many buildings from 1950-1965 from famous architects. The most prominent of these were the Yale Art Gallery (Kahn and Orr, 1953), the Rare Book Library (Skidmore Owings Merrill, 1963), Stiles and Morse College (Saarinen, 1960, Fig 14), the Ingalls Hockey Rink (Saarinen, 1958), Kline Biology tower (Johnson, 1964, Fig 15) and the Art and Architecture building (Rudolph, 1963, Fig 16) (Architectural Record, April 1962). President A. W. Griswold encouraged new architecture but did not force a constant hand on designers. Ironically, Douglas Orr was also the Yale architect at this time but was not consulted very much on new work, as Griswold wanted each work to stand on its own (Turner, 262). There were some serious practical failures with some of the buildings, such as Rudolph's brutalist fantasy of an architecture building which was so unusable the frustrated students tried to burn it down. But, as Charles Moore (chairman of Yale architecture) said, "It's a magnificent building with fatal flaws, which is much better than a good building with minor flaws." (Architectural Forum, April 64) But most of the buildings were well received. Morse and Stiles were much admired by the profession for their simplicity in echoing Gothic masses with economical structures that avoided the repetitive look of New Quad and elsewhere. (Architectural Forum, July 1960). The Kline Tower is considered by some to be Philip Johnson's finest work, an elegant 17-story structure that is bold, handsome and acts as a visual focus (Campus Planning, 120).

These buildings were all completed before 1964 and were recognized in the architecture profession as excellent designs that brought modern ideas in architecture to old campuses. Any comparison with the Princeton structures of 1960-64 is a mismatch. For example, Morse and Stiles Colleges complement the existing quadrangles, building materials and towers of Yale whereas Wilson College (Old New Quad) stood in weak contrast to its neighbors in almost every regard. There were lessons to be learned from Yale in this period which would affect future Princeton development.

Other schools had a few notable projects completed in 1950-1964 as well. Eero Saarinen created a giant indoor quadrangle for the University of Pennsylvannia's Women Residence in 1962 which created new standards in the social design of dormitories (Riker and Lopez, 130, Fig 17). Penn also had the biology building by Kahn in 1960 which was a leading design for a large lab and office structure that did not look bland or repetitive (Progressive Architecture, Sept 64). Cornell, on the other hand, took the path of continuously building but without well-known architects. The result was a series of indistinguishable international-style buildings that seemed to conflict greatly with the setting and older structures.

Evidently the trustees and Orr at Princeton were shaken enough by the strong reaction to the first set of buildings that some changes were made in policy. An architectural advisory board was established, old architects such as Sherwood, Mills, Smith were dropped and flashy new architects such as Stubbins and Yamasaki came to rebuild the new Princeton. The new architects were carefully selected to appease both those who wanted a prominent name and those who wanted buildings that would suit Princeton.

Stubbins was well known for his linear, masonry architecture which used modern techniques and construction in reinforced concrete but was always textured properly in brick to fit into its context (Fig 18). Born in Alabama, he graduated from Harvard architecture and later taught there. His first small commissions came in 1952 and soon he was well known for his Tangier Legation and the Berlin Congress Hall of 1957 (McCallum, 158). The Hall was a curving concrete auditorium that demonstrated Stubbins' knowledge of reinforced concrete and his creativity (Daily Princetonian, Feb 2, 1962). Some of his work immediately before coming to Princeton included apartments and a school in Brookline, Mass (1959), Gulf Coast Community College plan (1959), Church in Concord, NH (1959), Loeb Drama Center at Harvard (1959) (Architectural Record, Oct 1959). He also did the Senior Center at Bowdoin and the Harvard Countway Library of Medicine at Harvard in 1963, around the time of his design work for Princeton. Both were large stone and glass structures of large size - 16 and 10 stories (Progressive Architecture, Feb 1963). As usual, Stubbins used related materials and control of building height and shape to relate the library to its surroundings, the Harvard Medical School. (Progressive Architecture, Nov 1965) Stubbins had four criteria for a building: Be logically structurally; Perform its purpose well; Be aesthetically pleasing on the whole; and, be economically feasible. These elements consistentently appear in his buildings of the time. Impressed by his collegiate work, Stubbins was hired by Princeton to redo the new undergrad dorms to be placed on Goldie Field.

Barnes was a young, modern, Harvard-educated New York architect who was best known after his work at Princeton for office building designs (such as the IBM Tower next to Trump Tower in New York). He was brought to Princeton to build a small office tower that would stand as a new southern gateway to the campus. His selection was interesting, given that he had not done an office tower before Princeton although he had done some school buildings (Fig 19). These included dorms for St. Pauls in New Hampshire, the Hatstack School for the Arts and Crafts, and a dorm at Wayne State University. In 1958 he worked on the consul's residence in Tabriz, Iran. His quote that appeared in a Prince article on the new architects was:

There must be a strong architectural idea behind every project. It is not enough to have a decorative, historical or mathematical concept. An architectural idea is an expression of life in the building (Daily Princetonian, Feb 5, 1962).
While other architects developed more and more complex theory, Barnes kept simplifying problems to their pure core. His philosophy was that no architecture need by dysfunctional, and that form and function were interrelated closely (Architectural Record, Aug 1961).

Yamasaki was a very well known fashionable architect of the 1960's that designed mostly white classical temples adapted to modern building forms. Seattle born, his first work was remodeling brownstones in New York. His first big work was a St. Louis housing project, followed by the thin-shell St. Louis airport in the 1950's (McCallum, 165). Very quickly he developed a favorite building form, that of a small tower with idealized colonnades, surrounded by water on the outside and a skylit court on the inside. This same pattern was repeated at Wayne State University's College of Education (1962), Oberlin's Conservatory of Music (1962), McGregor Community Conference Center at Wayne State (1958), the Michigan Consolidated

Gas building (1962), the Reynold's Metal building (1959), Northwestern Life Insurance (1964) and others. He thought of his work as humanistic architecture, bringing human spirit back into the buildings by creating impressive spaces with an Eastern slant (Yamasaki, 45-60) (Fig 20).

Yamasaki felt that Japanese architecture taught him an understanding of scale and an understanding of serenity. He saw himself as a romantic architect fighting the rationalism common at the time, and his graceful reinforced concrete facades, while certainly not indicative of building function nor particularly unique to any one building, were beautiful and picturesque nonetheless. His white reinforced concrete with a repetitive decorative window pattern would appear often in the role of guiding or ending a vista, as it would at Princeton in the Wilson School.

Armed with these prominent names, the next set of buildings were completed from 1964-1970. The school was under tremendous pressure to get it right this time - there was even a special campus architecture of the Princetonian in which Douglas Orr promised "spectacular" new architecture was on the way (Daily Princetonian, 12 Jan 1962).

This $2 million phase II of the Wilson Quad was built to finally relieve the last of the overcrowding situation by creating room for 326 students. Stubbins' characteristic planar walls of brick and glass are very apparent. Made of brown brick over reinforced concrete, the tight scale and undulating surfaces and bays create a modern interpretation of the Gothic look (Fig 21). Thomas Gaines describes the Butler dorms in his book Campus as a work of Art:

When modern buildings are made to exhibit ancient allusions, care must be taken to avoid caricaturizing. Some of these buildings at Leo Butler are on the edge (Gaines, 33).

Princeton's acropolis functions both as a teaching facility and as an unofficial monument to Woodrow Wilson. The weight of the top floor is carried by 60 pillars ringing the building. The marble walls behind the columns have little strength and are not loaded. This allows a 90 ft span inside the building, which is useful for flexibility purposes (Woodrow Wilson School, 1965). The central court is extremely similar to those found in other Yamasaki buildings (Fig 22). Corwin Hall (Woodrow Wilson Hall) had to be moved on rails to construct this building.

This $1.8 million office tower was built to house the financial office and alumni records (Fig 23). It would house all services then occupying Pyne Administration Building, a site that was highly valued for academia but unsuitable for business. The design had trouble passing Princeton Borough, who refused at first to allow such a tall building to exist and at one point it was threatened to move the building 300 ft south to place it in Princeton Township (Princeton Packet, 15 Nov 1962). When finished the building was admired for its simplicity and brazen identity. Even Engineering News Record commented on the building, noting the ventilation and service systems that ran through the outer columns to free up space inside and preserve the architect's interior design (ENR, 26 Nov 1964). The building was either loved or hated, but generally loved by the architectural elite who saw in it a new ethic, quality and geometry lacking in other buildings (Architectural Forum, April 1964). Aaron Stein '27 stated in a letter to the PAW that Princeton had three great buildings of architectural note - Nassau, Alexander and Chancellor Green. "We may know have added a fourth to this pitifully small company - New South." (PAW 25 Jan 1966).

The lynchpin in a new science center, Fine-Jadwin filled in Fitzpatrick field by Palmer Stadium with an immense complex that had more square footage than the original E-Quad. Begun in 1966 and finished in 1970, the $22 million buildings drew much praise from the architectural community. Amazingly, two separate architectural firms produced buildings that complemented each other perfectly. A preivous, unexecuted design for Fine tower is not nearly as good in this regard as the one constructed (Fig 24). The dark brick and stone material was a good contextual match, the massing of tower and court was traditional Princeton and the quality of the workmanship was high (Fig 25). "The real importance of this new complex of buildings is that it proves an age-old adage - that the whole can often be greater than the sum of its parts." (Architectural Forum, July/August 1970). The complex almost didn't make it though due to town zoning. The university kept the size and location of the tower a secret for a long time and when the Princeton Packet leaked the details the students flew into a rage over the loss of a beautiful stadium vista while the town made every effort to limit the building's height. Eventually the town acquiesced and made the new height limit the same as Fine Tower's, but the students were left feeling ignored. An organization called SCAR (Students Campaigning for Architectural Responsibility) even tried to block the tower's construction (Princetonian, 13 Dec 1965).

Although the new set of buildings were not directly related to the first-attempt architecture that preceded them, there are some interesting comparisons can be made between specific buildings that highlight the problems of the first effort and the answers suggested by the second. They are divided into four categories of building type: Dorm, Office/Lab, Academic Complex, and Academic Single Structure.

1. DORMITORY - Old New Quad to New New Quad

New New Quad was originally designed as an extension of Old New Quad (Wilson) as a group of four halls that would form a court to the south of Wilcox, thus making Wilcox the center of all the new undergrad dorms. The architecture and construction would have been exactly similar to the already complete Wilson dorms, a phase II in a way. The reaction from alumni, students, faculty and critics over the Old New Quad forced a change of planning around 1963 and the trustees dropped Sherwood Mills and Smith and instead gave the commission for the second new undergrad quad to Hugh Stubbins and Associates instead. The true reasons for the switch of architect will not be known until the 50-yr seal on the trustee minutes is broken, but the drastic switch of architect is consistent with the cry for better architecture in 1963.

An aerial view of Wilson clearly shows the squat, large dimensions of the buildings (Fig 26). The flat roofs and side walls contradict McCosh, Walker, Patton and Guyot without the slightest trace of context. The only Gothic-like touch in Wilson College is the windows, which are inadequate as devices to link the nearby Gothic with the new buildings. Butler / NN Quad is much better at forming undulating surfaces, bay windows, spires, nooks, towers and overhangs in an architecture that is not Gothic but is in the spirit of it. If Butler were actually next to Walker and Patton instead of being separated by Wilson this linkage would be much more evident.

The large field quadrangle of Wilson was too large in that it reinforced the horizontal elements of the buildings, especially the rooflines. The smaller Butler courtyard with is far more intimate and better reflects the scale of the older Princeton quads. The increased height and decreased footprint of the Butler buildings creates verticality which de-emphasizes the flat-roof construction

The materials used in the two quads are also crucial. Old New Quad is of pink brick for no contextual reason. The dark hues of Butler/New New Quad are simply a better choice for the Princeton campus of 1964. Additionally, Wilson/Old New Quad buildings are of steel skeletal frame yet have virtually no windows. Butler dorms have real load bearing walls which justify the occasional expanse of brick.

2. SINGLE-PURPOSE ACADEMIC BUILDING - Woolworth to WWS

When Woolworth was built a special note was made of how the architect tried to make it fit into place by using the same color brick and limestone as Palmer Hall and 1879 Hall. This only heightens the failure of the building to relate to its neighbors in any other fashion. The Woodrow Wilson School, a blazing white giant near Gothic buildings, complements its neighbors by way of stark contrast. The plaza highlights the Gothic of Frick by way of open view, and the classical-modern WWS Hall (Robertson) does not insult 1879 by trying to imitate it. This is an unusual theory, but it seems to work and 1879 Hall looks much better from Prospect Street than from the Woolworth side.

From a pedestrian vs monumental viewpoint, Woolworth ruined an important open space on the campus and even today seems to be in the wrong place. Palmer Hall is blocked from the north and Prospect House is ignored by this simple, bulky building. The monumental temple that is the Yamasaki building instead creates open space around it and does not intrude on another building's sense of place but rather makes its own. It may be a similar form to many other Yamasaki buildings but it is the perfect form for the site. A terminus to a campus viewpoint, and in fact the campus, is created by a piece of architecture that demands to be looked at (Fig 27). Woolworth demands only mediocrity.

3. DUAL-PURPOSE ACADEMIC COMPLEX -McCormick/Architecture/Art Museum to Fine/Jadwin

When the School of Architecture was built it was really part of a three building complex that held the expanded Art and Archeology department, the new school of Architecture and the Art Museum. All three were once in McCormick Hall but it was no longer possible to keep them in such a small space. To avoid having to duplicate resources, Architecture was built as near as possible to McCormick. The library in McCormick and audio-visual lecture hall in McCosh 10 were to be shared resources for both departments (PAW, 25 Feb 1964). This messy system did not work as well as the very functional Jadwin-Fine complex, where a large library and auditorium are shared between two interconnected departments in separate buildings. Fine and Jadwin look unified, their traffic patterns meet at the location of the library and auditorium, and they still function as a single complex to this day. The McCormick-Architecture system broke down soon after implementation with the result that each now has a large lecture room and library of its own, wasting resources and severing the architectural connection between the buildings.

A problem which both buildings have shared is the battle of new buildings vs space. The McCormick expansion was poorly received as it jut out in all directions, severing traditional vistas and walkways. It's "expansion" building for architecture filled in a crucial open space in the heart of campus to ill effect. The issue of vertical expansion was not even considered. Fine-Jadwin also filled in a former field but in a much smaller manner than would have been necessary if the great vertical height of a 12 story math tower and 6 story physics building were not used. The open space is preserved around the complex.

4. FUNCTIONAL BUILDING - Engineering Quadrangle to New South

The E-Quad was one of the first buildings to declare functionality as a prime concern and architecture secondary; form followed function. Indeed architecture was secondary as a very bland commercial-like building appeared on Olden Street. Reaction against this insensitivity for appearance led to the next truly functional building, New South, to place architecture in the forefront along with functionality. The appearance of New South may not appear pleasing today, but when designed it was described as a "stunning" addition to university architecture that would be remembered along with Nassau Hall and Alexander Hall as a great structure of its time. A clean break from "cozy" buildings elsewhere, the brutally simple tower matches in size and scale other lower campus buildings (Architectural Forum, July 1967). The building was perfect for non-academic departmental use but did not ignore appearance.

In terms of footprint, the E-Quad fills an entire former football field while New South fits into a small pocket of ground. This is largely due to the use of the vertical in the 9 story New South vs the 4 story mass of the E-Quad. Beyond saving open space this approach adds another tower to Princeton's collection.

There is also a difference in the spatial locations of these buildings. At the time of its planning, the E-Quad was supposed to open onto William Street as the end of a new academic axis stretching from East Pyne eastward. It ended up being moved slightly southward so that William Street today ends in a blank wall. This was seen as being completely insensitive to the campus and the error was corrected in New South, which was seen as a campus gateway from the beginning. Planning for a day when the railroad was gone, President Goheen saw New South as the new southern entry to campus for travelers and this idea of an approach was incorporated into the design successfully.

Reactions to the new "spectacular" architecture were varied but the overall opinion was of a new beginning that caught Princeton up to its contemporaries. The alumni were still divided over the invasion of modern over Gothic but were generally pleased with the positive attitude coming from the school again. The faculty were quiet, happily enjoying the increased functionality of their new structures. The student reaction had calmed down, and no more special architectural issues of the Prince came barreling down on the administration, although editorials now and then reminded the school that the students would like to be more involved in the selection process. (Daily Princetonian, 21 Oct 1965) The new round of Princeton buildings seemed to also be more acceptable to the profession of architecture - buildings at Princeton began being mentioned in the portfolios of Stubbins, Yamasaki and Barnes and in the architectural magazines without criticism. There were also multiple awards made and international recognition given to some buildings: Outstanding Concrete Structure in NJ 1965 for the WWS, and an Award of Merit from the AIA for Fine-Jadwin in 1966.

Modern architectural solutions that came after 1970 built on the lessons learned by the school during the tumultuous decade before. Princeton has tried to commission a well-known architect whenever possible for new buildings. I.M. Pei's Spelman (1977) and Robert Stern's Centre for Jewish Life (1992) are examples of this continuing policy. The concept of preserving open spaces is still active, and higher and higher buildings are being used to preserve this. For example, both Computer Science and Lewis-Thomas are four stories high yet have small footprints. The lesson of vertical expansion learned from Fine and New South has been remembered.

In my personal opinion, I think the second set of Princeton buildings of 1964-70 really saved the university architecturally. More than just new structures, these buildings gave the school back some of the pride and renown that had faded from the "Campus of 1963". Yamasaki's Robertson Hall is a trendy temple of white classicism in a Gothic monastery but it works very well and creates a sense of place that cannot be found in the bland brick buildings of 1960-64. New South is somewhat ugly today but that is partly due to a bad renovation. New New Quad is somber and more intimate than the vast expanse of flat roof that is Old New Quad, just as Gothic should be. And Jadwin-Fine is a pleasure for the eye with attractive stone facing, a useful plaza and a perfect relationship between the buildings. With the reconstruction of Wilson College in the 1980's and rebuilding of Woolworth in the summer of '95 we might finally get to see what Princeton would have looked like if the right buildings had been done first, an opportunity that was lost in the hasty attempts at solving the architectural crisis of 1960.

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