Reach for the sky

DBox for Robert A. M. Stern Architects, LLP.

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Look out, Harkness Tower—there may soon be a new phallic symbol on the Yale horizon. The latest design for Yale’s two new residential colleges includes three towers, the tallest of which will top out at 190 feet (a deferential 26 feet shorter than Harkness). School of Architecture dean Robert A. M. Stern ’65MArch, whose firm is designing the colleges, says it’s all about landmarks: the towers will line up with streets on central campus, with the tallest one visible from York Street on the other side of the Grove Street Cemetery.

“We hope the towers will help people see where the new colleges are and how close they are to central campus,” says Stern. To complement the carillon of Harkness, the university envisions a set of bells in the tallest tower where students can learn to ring the changes, Oxbridge style.