30 Most Beautiful Spring College Campuses

The innovative architecture of Frank Gehry juxtaposes with Tudor revival structures from the eighteenth century on the rural set thousand plus acres of the Bard College campus. Rafael Vinoly and Robert Venturi have also contributed architectural works to this arts focused university. The picturesque Italian garden of Blythewood mansion features manicured paths that offer the intrepid explorer views of the Catskill Mountains and lovely Upper Hudson Valley scenery.

Bryn Mawr College was founded by Quakers and has retained its identity as a women-only college. Aesthetically, the reputation of the campus grounds ties at least somewhat to its private liberal arts status. Known for the cherry blossoms in the spring, this campus is rife with examples of early collegiate gothic architecture and even a duck pond. With a 135 ace site to work with the school brought in Central Park architect Frederick law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux to design the landscape of the women’s college campus  which has since been designated as an arboretum Bryn Mawr in Welsh for “big hill” and the school lies just on the outskirts of the Philadelphia suburbs.

Broken down into the Ancient Campus, the Old Campus, and the New Campus, history takes on new meaning at the College of William and Mary. Traditional Georgian, and Anglo-Dutch architecture feature largely as does a sunken garden by architect Charles M. Robinson. Crim Dell Pond with its accompanying bridge are landmarks of the 1200 acres of this campus along with manmade Lake Matoaka. The Sir Christopher Wren Building is the oldest college building in the country, built in the 1700s. The entire institution predates all the schools in the country, save Harvard. Many of the new buildings recently constructed on campus rank highly for energy efficiency.

According to legend, when Eisenhower visited the 269 acre campus of Dartmouth College, he said that it was “what a college was supposed to look like.” The 5 acre Dartmouth Green is the heart of campus. The college owns more land in the rural town of Hanover than any other private entity. The campus is comprised of original Georgian colonial style buildings, a theme which was continued with later additions.

Known for the four spired 210 foot tall Duke Chapel with bell tower that is reminiscent of Notre Dame, Duke University sits on 8600 acres on three connected sub-campuses in the Durham, NC area. The West Campus is marked by the well known Gothic architecture and the East Campus’ signature is Georgian architecture. Many of the landmarks of this campus, including Duke Chapel, were designed by Julian Abele, one of the first African American architects to come to prominence in the US.

The signature sight of Indiana University in the spring is bright red tulips lining the Sample Gates (made from Indiana limestone) at the entrance. Maxwell Hall on campus is also constructed from this locally quarried stone. Built on 1933 acres, much of the campus was built during the Great Depression by the Federal Works Progress Administration. A red brick path will lead visitors through Dunn’s Woods and the Old Crescent Historic District in a tour. The school also houses the Kinsey Institute on Sex, Gender and Reproduction.

A hilltop campus in the Collins View neighborhood of Portland atop Palatine Hill, this hidden gem shines in its forest setting. From the Rustic Tudor style president’s mansion to the environmentally minded John R. Howard Hall, Lewis and Clark College’s 137 acre campus is beautiful from a natural setting viewpoint and an architectural one. One building on the campus is a former convent. The college participates in a campus wide commitment to sustainability. On this 100% wind powered campus, you will find a terraced reflecting pool with wisteria (beloved by bees) where viewers can catch panoramic views of Mount Hood.

Moving to their current beachfront location in 1972, the campus of Pepperdine University is known for palm trees and Pacific views. Utilizing Mediterranean revival architecture with white stucco and red tile roofs, the campus is situated on the Pacific Coast Highway. Stauffer Chapel, a campus focal point,  has over 3,000 feet of stained glass. Because of its southern California location, brush fire plans are built into the landscape architecture..

Full of a mix of Collegiate Gothic and Victorian Gothic buildings, and close to the former home of former President Barack Obama in Hyde Park, Chicago, the 217 acre main campus features an iconic duck pond. Eero Saarinen developed a new master plan for the school’s design aesthetic in 1955. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe designed a building that houses the School of Social Service Administration and the largest building on campus is an outstanding example of the school of brutalism designed by Walter Netsch. Some of the gargoyles on campus watched over the Columbian Exposition of 1893, which the campus housed before it opened as a school.

Starting with a single square mile of land, and now measuring in at 1200+ acres for the campus, the University of Mississippi at Oxford contains vast swathes of greenery and Greek Revival style architecture including the campus’ signature building the Lyceum. Also featuring works from the Georgian Period of the nineteenth century and also the Georgian Revival period of the early 20th century. There are also more modern structures, a golf course, and an airport in the University’s property portfolio. The school takes great pride in its landscape service whose sole purpose is the maintenance of the campus grounds.

Rife with cherry blossoms in the spring, the University of Washington features  Tenino sandstone gracing many of the French Renaissance Revival style buildings. Sitting on 703 acres in Seattle, the heart of the university is Red Square where the broken obelisk and the statue of the state’s namesake reside. On the shores of Union and Portage bays with mountain views In the 1960s, the school moved away from Collegiate Gothic style and into Modernist style with the building of the new library which housed a nuclear reactor that led to that building eventually being demolished in 2016. Washington Park Arboretum is on campus and is owned by the city and run by the school.

Architect Charles Klauder from Philadelphia brought the Tuscan Vernacular Revival style to the University of Colorado – Boulder using sandstone that is textured and more of that Indiana limestone. Another stellar sight is the Dalton Trumbo Fountain Court, named for the blacklisted Hollywood writer who is also a former student at the school. The collegiate gothic style was used for the oldest buildings on campus. The University of Colorado Museum and Natural History located in the Henderson Building has an unparalleled collection in the region of the history of natural aspects of the area’s flora, fauna, and people. This school is the flagship institution of the Centennial State.

With its Palladian influenced Rotunda and 1682 acre grounds, Thomas Jefferson founded the University of Virginia to be a model for other campuses that would follow. The only other college in the country founded by a US president is the University of Buffalo which was founded by Willaim Henry Harrison. One room on campus, 13 West Range (of course)  is maintained by a group of students called the Raven Society, as for one semester in 1826, it was occupied by one Edgar Allan Poe. The campus is referred to as The Grounds. Jefferson designed much of the unique original architecture himself. The University of Virginia is the only US institution of higher learning to be on UNESCO’s World Heritage SItes list.

Neo-Gothic inspired architecture spreads across the 13,000 acre campus.of Sewanee: the University of the South. The All Saints Chapel designed by Ralph Edwards Cram is a signature piece of the campus. High atop the Cumberland Plateau and overlooking the Tennessee Valley, the school houses an official school of theology for the Episcopal Church. The campus is known as either The Domain or The Mountain. Created in 1857 as a Southern university ”free of Northern influence.” The cornerstone for the school was laid in 1860 and blown up by Union soldiers in 1863 in a definitive move by the North to assert its influence. Tennessee Williams bequeathed his estate to the school in his will and an arts center on campus bears his name.

Numerous lakes and fountains stud the 656 acre campus of Elon University which is a designated botanical garden. The oldest building on campus is Johnston Hall, which was established in 1926 to serve as an orphanage. Students have been forbidden to swim in the Fonville Fountain since 1986. At home in the North Carolina Piedmont region the campus is within an hour of the area known as the “Research Triangle” of Raleigh, Durham and Cary. The campus set up into seven “neighborhoods” and was the setting for the college scenes of the Spike Lee Joint He Got Game.  

Known for its distinctive archways and highly decorative columns, the 295 acres of Rice University feature an on campus arboretum and Mediterranean Revival style stone and brick campus buildings. Located near the Houston Museum District, there are many woodland aspects to the campus. The legend goes that there is a tree on campus for every student who attends. The truth is the students are outnumbered by the trees. Byzantine style architecture in pink and tan brick tones is arranged around several quadrangles, and the university takes pride in the green space it offers to the students and larger community.

The first member of the “seven sisters” collection of East Coast women’s colleges, Mount Holyoke College boasts a school wide commitment to sustainability. There is an organic garden on campus that is totally student run. The 800 acres of the campus were landscaped by Olmsted and Sons in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, featuring two on campus lakes, wooded riding trails, and a golf course which hosted the 2004 US Women’s Open.

Picnics and hammocks abound on High Point University campus where much expansion has taken place in this century. Ranked the #1 most luxurious college campus by collegemagazine.com, the site boasts an on campus steak house and concierge services for the students. Affiliated with the United Methodist Church, the campus sits on  430 acres in a suburban setting. Billing itself as the “Premier Life Skills University,” each freshman at High Point University must enroll in a Presidential Seminar which is a course in competencies like financial literacy and professional communication.

Operating out of two main campuses – West and Medical, the University of Cincinnati is marked by modern architecture and a stellar reputation for beauty.The school has vowed to commission new structures from prominent architects and it shows. Frank Gehry designed the Vontz Center for Molecular Studies. Dodgers hurler Sandy Koufax and the Greek god of walks, Kevin Youkilis both attended here.

A walk of cherry trees on the main quadrangle signify the city of Tuscaloosa’s long standing relationship with her sister city in Japan. Denny Chimes stands as a tall and melodic reminder of the campus’ storied football program. Looming large on campus are the schoolhouse door where George Wallace made his schoolhouse stand and the twin yellow sandstone buildings (Smith and Morgan Hall) facing each other behind the main library, housing the geology and English departments respectively. The Gorgas House is also a part of the campus where many alumni return to stage an outdoor wedding on the twin spiraling staircases that wrap the second story porch. This school’s 1970 acres in a small city setting is right on the Black Warrior River.

This 300 acre College Gothic style campus features maple trees with on campus syrup making reported in at least one case. Known as “the hill,” the site encompasses several ecosystems like: wetlands; native tallgrass prairie; and wooded expanses along the borders of this campus which gets 30 percent of its energy from a single turbine. The Greek Revival columns on the porch of storied Steensland Hall do not exactly scream Norwegian American culture, but that is classic American melting pot in architecture form.

The University of San Diego’s signature site is the Immaculata Church which captures the spirit of Spanish Renaissance style architecture. Situated on a mesa overlooking San Diego and Mission Bay, the school’s use of 16th century architecture in the Plater style is an homage to the city’s Hispanic heritage. The school was founded by the Catholic church working under the theory that lovely surroundings would contribute to the emotional well being of the students. Views of the Pacific Ocean don’t hurt either.

Lullwater House serves as the president’s mansion of Emory University and combines Gothic Revival and Tudor elements. The centers for disease control’s campus is directly adjacent to the campus which spans 600 acres (including Lullwater Preserve and Candler Lake) in the Druid Hills neighborhood of Atlanta. Designed around the Beaux Arts style by Henry Hornbostel, the school is redolent with oak, pine magnolia and buildings adorned with multiple shades of granite and Spanish tile. The school’s student center, built in 1986, is a departure from Beaux Arts in that it is a neofuturistic and postmodernist work by John C. Portman, Jr.

The Furman University campus has Received awards from the American Society of Landscape Architects for their grounds on the shore of a 40 acre lake. With Georgian architecture and an Asian-inspired garden, in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Bell tower, check. Snow in the winter, which is not a surety at all the southern colleges on this list, check. And environmental responsibility is not just a buzzword at this school which sits on 750 acres in a woodland setting.

A private research institution of higher learning with a mix of modern and traditional architecture, Washington University of St. Louis has horticultural maintenance that is on point at this urban retreat of a campus. Featuring a red granite and stained glass chapel, the school was named after the first president in the lead up to what would become the Civil War, in an attempt to bridge the deepening civic divide by tapping into the near universal positive sentiment surrounding President Washington.This apparently did not work. The school’s Collegiate Gothic Danforth campus was the site of the 1904 World’s Fair and Olympics. The campus has also hosted the highest number of presidential and vice-presidential debates, more than any other US institution of higher learning. Ranked highly for stunning architecture and attractive campus by Niche.com, number one and number two, respectively.

Fine examples of Collegiate Gothic buildings complete with leaded windows star the campus of Rhodes College. Also featuring the work of Charles Klauder who, along with Henry Hibbs designed Palmer Hall which is on the National Register of Historic Places. Resting on 123 acres in midtown Memphis, the campus suffered extensive looting and damage during Federal occupation while the Civil War and Reconstruction persisted. Faced with the losses that came with the war and the soon following first world war. The school decided to admit women in the early 20th century in a bid to reverse their failing financial fortunes. Rhodes College also owns Elvis’ Memphis area starter home where he lived before he built Graceland.

The grounds of Vanderbilt University serve as an arboretum, hosting the magnificent Bicentennial Oak Tree, which predates the signing of the Constitution. The school’s signature decorative rotunda embellishes a school founded in 1873 by Cornelius Vanderbilt to help heal the cultural rift between the South and the North after the Civil War. The only private school in the SEC, the 330 acre campus is less than two miles from the heart of Music City. Old Central is a structure that predates the University to the original owners of the property. The Main Building is designed by the same architect, Willaim Crawford Smith, who designed, just across Nashville’s main drag, West End, The Parthenon, a replica of the Greek temple in Centennial Park.

More early collegiate gothic stars on the Kenyon College campus, it may be the earliest example of its kind in the US. 1000 acres make up the campus, 380 acres of which are under the supervision of the Brown Family Environmental Center which is home to seven different types of ecosystems. There is a college seal on the ground outside a dining hall that tradition holds if stepped on, that student will not graduate from the school. A latecomer to the sustainability game, the school has recently taken up a biodiesel project and converted the computer labs to double sided paper usage. The college also operates a 10+ acre farm run by students that gives real time small scale farming experience. There is no ivy anywhere on the campus, since its removal after damaging the school’s signature stonework many years ago.

In the Finger Lakes region of the Empire State and on the shore of the largest Finger Lake, Cayuga, Cornell University features Greek Revival style architecture and is one of the few privately operated land grant institutions of higher learning born from the Morrill Act of 1862. In between to gorges and dripping with gorgeous greenery, the campus also boasts examples of Collegiate Gothic, Neoclassical, and Victorian architecture. Undertaking a number of environmentally friendly initiatives in recent years, for instance, shuttering the campus coal-fired power plant in 2009. The campus is divided into Central, North, and West campuses. The Cornell Botanic Gardens abuts campus adding to its springtime splendor.

With copious horse riding trails and bike paths on the 27,000 acres of campus, Berry College holds the records for world’s largest contiguous college campus. Literally thousands of deer reside on campus. Built mainly in English Gothic style, and featuring two disc golf courses, much of the campus is overseen by the Georgia Department of Natural Resources. Sustainability is a core tenet of Berry College’s value set. The student work program offers a guaranteed job to every Berry College on campus student who desires one. The picturesque campus has served as the locale for many movies and TV shows including the recent show Constantine, where the Old Mill was used as the title character’s secret hideout.