Rice University: Architecture & Academic Houston

Behind a hedge of live oaks off Main Street sits one of the most beautiful college campuses in America. Rice University opened its doors in 1912, endowed by the fortune of a murdered millionaire and planned by the Boston firm of Cram, Goodhue and Ferguson, who dreamed up a warm, cloistered architecture of rose-and-gray brick, arched loggias, and Mediterranean domes unlike anything else in Texas. This walk crosses the historic Academic Quadrangle and the surrounding streets, tracing the story of William Marsh Rice, the first president who broadened his vision, the buildings that gave the campus its look, and a 1962 day when a president stood in the football stadium and told the nation it would go to the moon. Wear comfortable shoes and look up — the details in the arches reward it.