page_title: The Lawn
section_title: Jefferson's design
hierarchical_section_title: The Lawn / History / Jefferson's design
caption_attribution_description: University of Virginia, Charlottesville. teel engraving, 3 3/4x 5 5.8. Published by H. L. Hinton &amp; Simpkin and Marshall. Special Collections, Edwin M. Betts Collection
context_page_description: The Lawn, a part of Thomas Jefferson's Academical Village, is a large, terraced grassy court at the historic center of Jefferson's academic community at the University of Virginia. The Lawn and its surrounding buildings, designed by Jefferson, demonstrate Jefferson's mastery of Palladian and Neoclassical architecture, and the site has been recognized as an architectural masterpiece in itself. The Lawn has been designated a U.S. National Historic Landmark District, and is part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site along with the original buildings of the University of Virginia and Monticello, Jefferson's nearby residence; this designation is due to the site's architectural and cultural significance.
  Jefferson originally designed the Lawn to be the center of the university, and as such it is surrounded by housing for students and faculty. Its most famous building is the Rotunda, which sits at the north end of the site, opposite Old Cabell Hall. Framing the other two sides of the Lawn are ten Pavilions, where faculty reside in the upper two floors and teach on the first, as well as 54 Lawn rooms, where carefully selected undergraduates reside in their final year.
context_section_description: Jefferson's design for the Lawn sought to find an alternative to traditional single-building college architecture, such as that he experienced as a student at the College of William and Mary, due to its being "noisy, unhealthy, vulnerable to fires, and affording little privacy." The overall model for the Lawn (the U-shaped plan with a central dome) is similar to, and may have been influenced by, Joseph Jacques Ramée's design for Union College and Benjamin Latrobe's design for a military academy, as well as by the designs of Palladio and by his own house, Monticello. Along the legs of the U, the colonnades provide sheltered, but outdoor, communication between the pavilions and the student rooms, and while everything in the Lawn communicates with the Lawn or the outside world, there is privacy afforded by the walled gardens.
  Jefferson separated the buildings of the lawn into 10 units, or Pavilions, to reflect his classification of the branches of learning, and designed the relationship between them and the rest of the Lawn. Each of the ten Pavilions has a unique design, intended to give individual dignity to each branch of study, and the whole was intended to serve as a sort of outdoor classroom for architectural study, as he wrote to William Thornton, architect of the United States Capitol:
  What we wish is that these pavilions, as they will show themselves above the dormitories, shall be models of taste and good architecture, and of a variety of appearance, no two alike, so as to serve as specimens for the architectural lecturer. Will you set your imagination to work, and sketch some designs for us, no matter how loosely with the pen, without the trouble of referring to scale or rule, for we want nothing but the outline of the architecture, as the internal must be arranged according to local convenience? A few sketches, such as may not take you a minute, will greatly oblige us.
  — Thomas Jefferson, Letter to William Thornton, 1817
  Thornton obliged with designs for two pavilions, one of which was adapted for the design of Pavilion VII, the first to be built. Jefferson also solicited designs from Benjamin Latrobe, who had worked with Jefferson on the chambers for the United States House of Representatives. Latrobe responded with a sketch showing the plan of the University, with a domed structure resembling Palladio's Villa Capra "La Rotonda", and sent a second large drawing in October 1817 showing at least five Pavilion elevations, and maybe 10 (while he had promised Jefferson "seven or eight" Pavilions, the actual drawing has been lost). It is believed that Latrobe's drawings were used for the designs of Pavilions III, V, IX and X Further, it is speculated that many of the eastern Pavilions were based on Latrobe's designs, as Jefferson prepared the drawings for all five buildings in a mere three weeks. Throughout the process, Jefferson adapted the designs to fit the site, adjusting the width, specifying the entablature, and providing the detailed design of the interior of the Rotunda.
  The area between the Pavilions and the Ranges was designated as garden space in Thomas Jefferson's original plans. The current design of the gardens is a result of an initiative begun by University president Colgate Darden to return them to something approximating the original Jeffersonian design.
  The overall effect of the different portions of the Lawn, the Rotunda, Pavilions, student rooms, and the physical site, is, in the words of Garry Wills, "paradoxical ... regimentation and individual expression ... hierarchical order and relaxed improvising. ... But it is the reconciliation of these apparent irreconcilables that is the genius of the system."
caption: Steel engraving, 1831
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