Princeton University Residential Colleges by TenBerke

A Landmark Expansion in Princeton’s 2026 Campus Plan

In 2022, Princeton University unveiled two new residential colleges—Yeh College and New College West—designed by TenBerke as part of the institution’s ambitious 2026 Campus Framework Plan. Spanning 485,000 square feet over 11 acres, this transformative development accommodates over 1,000 students, representing a significant expansion of campus facilities and a profound architectural response to the university’s evolving vision of community and inclusion.

The project marks a pivotal moment in Princeton’s 40-year effort to establish a comprehensive four-year residential college system, where all undergraduates are not only affiliated with but live within one of the residential colleges. TenBerke’s design aims to recenter student life within these academic villages, reinforcing identity, support, and social cohesion throughout a student’s academic journey.

Designing for Community, Belonging, and Autonomy

Village Concept: Cohesive Yet Distinct

The two colleges were conceived as parts of a contemporary academic village—interconnected yet individual in character. While they share a common material palette and spatial philosophy, each college asserts a unique architectural identity. New College West, located at the woodland’s edge, is taller and more vertical, featuring soft-grey metal “treehouses” nestled within the landscape. In contrast, Yeh College is more horizontal and outward-facing, presenting active façades to the campus on all sides.

This thoughtful duality—“cousins, not twins”—allows each college to maintain its own sense of place while participating in a larger network of shared values and experiences.

Reimagining Campus Circulation and Social Space

Opening Up the Ground Floor

One of the project’s most defining architectural departures from traditional Ivy League design is its commitment to transparency and visual connectivity. Unlike the inward-looking, often hermetic campus buildings of the past, the residential colleges are designed to invite participation, with common areas located on highly visible, accessible ground floors. Through glass walls and open layouts, students can see and be seen—an architectural strategy that empowers them to engage on their own terms.

A Fully Accessible, Inclusive Landscape

In collaboration with landscape architects Field Operations, TenBerke designed the site to eliminate physical barriers, ensuring universal access without relying on stairs. The project gracefully resolves a 20-foot grade change by manipulating the terrain through sloped, interconnected walkways that guide all users along the same paths. This seamless approach to movement reflects the broader social ethos of the project: equity through design.

A central courtyard anchors both colleges, revealing the site’s topographic drama. The dining halls, sunken slightly into the slope on either side of the courtyard, are filled with natural light—celebrating both architecture and landscape as integral to student life.

Everyday Innovations for Student Living

Reconfiguring Privacy and Community

Inside the residences, TenBerke introduced subtle yet impactful innovations. Student rooms along corridors are arranged to form “virtual suites”—when doors are opened, the hallway becomes a shared living room. This layout fosters spontaneous interaction while preserving the option for privacy.

Bathrooms are gender-neutral, thoughtfully arranged to balance openness with seclusion, demonstrating a deep sensitivity to the diversity of student identities.

Art, Color, and the Language of Belonging

In place of traditional collegiate heraldry, the new colleges express identity through a relational and artistic visual language. Hand-painted colors, prisms that refract sunlight, and sculptural installations invite personal interpretation and create moments of delight and reflection. Soft seating with eclectic fabrics, unexpected material contrasts, and vibrant spatial interjections animate the calm, grounded architecture.

These gestures are not prescriptive—they do not dictate how students should interact—but instead offer freedom and discovery, enabling students to make the space their own over time.

A Contemporary Ethos Rooted in History

While the design echoes the forms and textures of Princeton’s older campus, the residential colleges are resolutely contemporary in tone and intent. They speak not of tradition for its own sake but of a future-oriented, inclusive academic culture. Their greatest architectural success lies in the way they foster belonging and autonomy simultaneously—creating spaces that say, implicitly, "this is yours, you belong here."

By embedding values of accessibility, openness, and community into every architectural gesture, TenBerke’s design ensures that these colleges are not just places to live, but places to grow, connect, and thrive—for this generation and those to come.

All Photographs are works of Christopher Payne, Chris Cooper