Architecture
Designed by the firm of Coolidge Shepley Bulfinch and Abbott and constructed in 1930 for $3,620,000, the House was named for the prominent Lowell family, closely identified with Harvard since John Lowell graduated in 1721. The busts of President Abbott Lawrence Lowell (1909–1933) and poet James Russell Lowell, are featured in the main courtyard. In the Dining Hall are portraits of President Lowell and his wife; his sister, poet Amy Lowell; his brother. astronomer Percival Lowell; and his grandfather John Amory Lowell.
Prior to the 1996 transition to randomized House assignments, Lowell's central location, picturesque courtyard, elegant dining hall, and charming traditions made it a popular housing choice.
The Lowell House arms are those of the Lowell family, blazoned: Shield: sable, a dexter hand couped at the wrist grasping three darts, one in pale and two in saltire, all in argent. Crest: a stag's head cabossed, between the attires a pheon azure. Motto: Occasionem Cognosce. (In more prosaic terms: A shield with black field displaying a right hand cut off at the wrist and grasping three arrows, one vertical and two crossed diagonally, in silver. Above, a male deer's head mounted behind the ear, and between its antlers a barbed, broad arrowhead in blue. The motto means "Recognize the opportunity.") The house colors are blue and white.
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Famous quotes containing the word architecture:
“They can do without architecture who have no olives nor wines in the cellar.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“It seems a fantastic paradox, but it is nevertheless a most important truth, that no architecture can be truly noble which is not imperfect.”
—John Ruskin (1819–1900)
“I don’t think of form as a kind of architecture. The architecture is the result of the forming. It is the kinesthetic and visual sense of position and wholeness that puts the thing into the realm of art.”
—Roy Lichtenstein (b. 1923)