page_title: Wellesley College
section_title: Campus
hierarchical_section_title: Wellesley College / Campus
caption_attribution_description: English: Davis Museum at Wellesley College
context_page_description: Wellesley College is a private women's liberal arts college in Wellesley, Massachusetts. Founded in 1870 by Henry and Pauline Durant, it is a member of the original Seven Sisters Colleges. Wellesley is home to 56 departmental and interdepartmental majors spanning the liberal arts, as well as over 150 student clubs and organizations. Wellesley athletes compete in the NCAA Division III New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference. Wellesley's endowment of $2.2 billion was the 49th largest among colleges and universities in the United States.
  Notable alumnae include Hillary Rodham Clinton, Madeleine Albright, Katharine Lee Bates, Cokie Roberts, Diane Sawyer, Nora Ephron, Pamela Melroy, Marjory Stoneman Douglas, Soong Mei-ling, Diane Ravitch and Bing Xin.
context_section_description: The 500-acre (200 ha) campus overlooks Lake Waban and includes evergreen, deciduous woodlands and open meadows. Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., Boston's preeminent landscape architect at the beginning of the 20th century, described Wellesley's landscape as "not merely beautiful, but with a marked individual character not represented so far as I know on the ground of any other college in the country". He also wrote: "I must admit that the exceedingly intricate and complex topography and the peculiarly scattered arrangement of most of the buildings somewhat baffled me". The campus is adjacent to the privately owned Hunnewell Estates Historic District, the gardens of which can be viewed from the lake's edge on campus.
  The original master plan for Wellesley's campus landscape was developed by Olmsted, Arthur Shurcliff, and Ralph Adams Cram in 1921. This landscape-based concept represented a break from the architecturally-defined courtyard and quadrangle campus arrangement that was typical of American campuses at the time. The 720-acre (2.9 km²) site's glaciated topography, a series of meadows, and native plant communities shaped the original layout of the campus, resulting in a campus architecture that is integrated into its landscape.
  The campus offers multiple housing options, including Tower Court, which was built after College Hall burnt down, the Quad (Quint, including Munger), the “New Dorms”, referring to the east-side dormitories erected in the 1950s, and multiple “Branch Halls”, including both a Spanish and French-speaking house.
  The most recent master plan for Wellesley College was completed in 1998 by Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates. According to the designers, this plan was intended to restore and recapture the original landscape character of the campus that had been partially lost as the campus evolved through the 20th century. In 2011, Wellesley was listed by Travel+Leisure as one of the most beautiful college campuses in the United States.
  Wellesley is home to Green Hall, completed in 1931, the only building bearing the name of famed miser Hetty Green; the building was funded by her children. Part of the building is the Galen L. Stone Tower, housing a 32-bell carillon instrument which is routinely played between classes by members of the Guild of Carillonneurs.
  Houghton Chapel was dedicated in 1899 in the center of the college campus.  The architectural firm of Heins & LaFarge designed Houghton of gray stone in the classic Latin cross floor plan. The exterior walls are pierced by stained glass windows. Window designers include Tiffany; John La Farge; Reynolds, Francis & Rohnstock; and Jeffrey Gibson.  The chapel can seat up to 750 people. Houghton is used by the college for a variety of religious and secular functions, like lectures and music concerts, and is also available for rental. The lower-level houses the Multifaith Center.
  In 1905 Andrew Carnegie donated $125,000 to build what is now known as Clapp Library, on the condition that the College match the amount for an endowment.  The money was raised by 1907 and construction began June 5, 1909. In 1915 Carnegie gave another $95,446 towards an addition. This renovation added a recreational reading room, offices, archives, a reserve reading room, added space for rare books and additional stacks.  The building underwent renovations from 1956–1959, that doubled its size. From 1973 to 1975 a major addition was added to the right-hand side of the building.  In 1974 the building was renamed for Margaret Antoinette Clapp, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and member of the 1930 class who served as the 8th college president from 1949–1966.
  The Davis Museum, opened in 1993, was the first building in North America designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Rafael Moneo, whose notion of the museum as a “treasury” or “treasure chamber” informs its design.  The Davis is at the heart of the arts on the Wellesley campus adjacent to the academic quad and is connected by an enclosed bridge to the Jewett Arts Center, designed by Paul Rudolph. The collections span from ancient
caption: The Davis Museum art collections are open to the public
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