Quadrangles

The campus is organized around a number of quadrangles. The Academic Quadrangle, anchored by a statue of founder William Marsh Rice, includes Ralph Adams Cram's asymmetrical Lovett Hall, the original administrative building, to the east; Fondren Library to the west; Herzstein Hall, the physics building and home to the largest amphitheater on campus, to the north; Sewall Hall for the social sciences and arts to the southeast; Rayzor Hall, for the languages, to the southwest; and Anderson Hall of the School of Architecture to the northwest. The Humanities Building is located behind the southwestern corner of the Academic Quad, adjacent to Fondren Library and Rayzor Hall.

The Central Quadrangle lies to the west of Fondren Library, anchored by Brochstein Pavilion, a coffee shop and meeting space. Constructed in 2008, the glass pavilion is bounded by outdoor seating spaces, designed to revitalize the once-underused area. It is bounded by the Rice Memorial Center and Ley Student Center to the north and Herring Hall, designed by César Pelli,^[8] to the south.^[9]

Further west lies the West Quadrangle, surrounded by McNair Hall of the Jones Business School to the north, the Baker Institute to the south, and Alice Pratt Brown Hall of the Shepherd School of Music to the west.^[10] The eastern section of the quad adjoining Alumni Drive contains Jamail Plaza, donated by Lee Hage Jamail, wife of prominent attorney Joe Jamail, which includes a large globe-shaped fountain and public space connecting the Baker Institute to the Jones School.^[11]

In the Engineering Quadrangle, located north of the Inner Loop and west of Duncan College, a trinity of sculptures by Michael Heizer, collectively entitled 45°, 90°, 180°,^[12] are flanked by Abercrombie Laboratory to the east, the Cox Mechanical Engineering Building to the west, and the Mechanical Laboratory to the north. Ryon Laboratory and Keck Hall also frame this quadrangle at the northwestern and southwestern corners, respectively. Duncan Hall is the latest addition to this quad, housing offices, classrooms, labs, and lecture halls for the Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, and Statistics departments.

Residential colleges

Roughly three-quarters of Rice's undergraduate population lives on campus. Housing is divided among eleven residential colleges, which form an integral part of student life at the university.^[13] The colleges are named for historical figures of and benefactors to the university. While there is significant variation in their appearance, facilities, and dates of founding, the colleges are an important source of identity for Rice students, functioning as dining halls, residence halls, and sports teams, among other roles.^[13] Each residential college, with the exception of Sid Richardson, possesses its own quadrangle, which provides a dedicated outdoor social and recreational space for members. Rice does not have or endorse a greek system, with the residential college system taking its place.

Five colleges – McMurtry, Duncan, Martel, Jones, and Brown – are located on the north side of campus, northeast of Lovett Hall. Six more colleges – Baker, Will Rice, Lovett, Hanszen, Sid Richardson, and Wiess – are located south of the Inner Loop and Academic Quadrangle. The south colleges are organized with respect to a pair of axes outlined in the original plan of the university. An east-west axis runs from Hanszen to Will Rice, while a north-south axis runs from the Inner Loop to Sid Richardson.^[14] The north-south axis contains the John and Anne Grove, a wide decomposed granite promenade covered by a thick canopy of cedar elm and oak trees.^[15]

Graduate housing

Rice provides off-campus housing for graduate students at two apartment complexes. Rice Graduate Apartments (RGA), constructed in 1999, is a 220-unit garden apartment complex located on Bissonnet Street north of campus.^[16] Rice Village Apartments (RVA), constructed in 2010, is a 137-unit mid-rise building located west of campus on Shakespeare Street in Rice Village.^[17] Both complexes are served by the university shuttle system, and Rice Village Apartments (which is a LEED-certified green building) discourages car use by providing new residents with a free bicycle.^[17]

Rice Village Apartments, the designated unit for families,^[18] is within the Houston Independent School District.^[19] Residents are zoned to Roberts Elementary School,^[20] Pershing Middle School (with Pin Oak Middle School as an option),^[21][22] and Lamar High School.^[23]

Previously the university had another graduate housing complex, Morningside Square Apartments, which had rooms larger than the other complexes and was also designed for families.^[24] Morningside Square had 54 units. The university purchased Morningside Square from Geoprime Properties in 2001.^[25] It closed and the municipal demolition permits were issued in 2017.^[26]

Sports facilities

The on-campus football facility, Rice Stadium, opened in 1950 with a capacity of 70,000 seats.^[27] In 2006, seating capacity was reduced to 47,000 by covering areas at each end of the field with tarps.^[27] Seating capacity was permanently reduced by the construction of the Brian Patterson Sports Performance Center in 2015, which occupies a formerly-tarped seating area behind the north endzone. The new 60,000-square-foot (5,600 m²) facility, completed in 2016, replaces dated training facilities elsewhere on campus and includes a large new scoreboard mounted to its roof.^[28][29] Rice Stadium was the site of a speech by President John F. Kennedy, "Address at Rice University on the Nation's Space Effort", on September 12, 1962, in which he challenged the nation to send a man to the moon by the end of the decade. In 1974, the stadium hosted Super Bowl VIII.

Reckling Park, located south of Tudor Fieldhouse along University Boulevard, is the home of Rice Owls baseball. Opened in 2000, the stadium has a capacity of over 7,000.^[30]

Tudor Fieldhouse, known as Autry Court prior to 2007, is home to the basketball and volleyball teams.^[31] Other stadia include the Wendel D. Ley Track & Holloway Field and the George R. Brown Tennis Center. The 120,000-square-foot (11,000 m²), 14-court Tennis Center, located east of Rice Stadium along Rice Boulevard, opened in 2014; it replaced the Jake Hess Tennis Center adjacent to Recking Park, which became the site of the Moody Center for the Arts in 2017.^[32]

The Barbara and David Gibbs Recreation & Wellness Center, opened in 2009, is a 103,000-square-foot (9,600 m²) facility featuring a 9,000-square-foot (840 m²) weight and cardio room, multipurpose fitness and dance rooms, indoor and outdoor basketball, racquetball and squash courts, a soccer and hockey arena, an Olympic-size competitive swimming pool, a recreational pool, and offices for counseling and wellbeing services.^[33] The complex was designed by SmithGroupJJR and LakeFlato Architects.^[34]

Other facilities

In 1994, the university and Houston Independent School District jointly established The Rice School, a kindergarten through 8th grade public magnet school, in the neighborhood of Braeswood Place south of campus.^[35]

Academic

Administrative

Residential

Athletics

Dining and services