Designed by renowned Finnish American architect Eero Saarinen and built in 1960, Hill College House at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, underwent a 15-month, $80 million, LEED Gold certified renovation. The internationally recognized landmark reopened to 500 student residents in August 2017. One of 12 undergraduate houses at the university, Hill College House combines residential, academic, and social programming under one roof, an integral part of Penn’s “College House” system.
The five-story, 195,000-square-foot brick residence underwent a comprehensive renovation, preserving Saarinen’s revolutionary design vision for communal living with numerous public spaces at varying physical and social scales. The first purpose-built women’s residence at Penn, Hill College House features an allegorical entry bridge over a landscaped moat with a protective spiked metal fence. Student lounges and seminar rooms surround a vast central atrium that overlooks a dining area on the lower level.