As a freshly matriculated architecture student, I have become fascinated by the varied architecture of the university’s colleges and how their styles are believed to be indicative of their character and the students who go there. All Cambridge students know of the artificial hierarchy of the old colleges over the new, according to the fascinating principle that old equals beautiful, which seems to apply only to the arts – and wine. I have long found beauty in the simplicity of buildings from the 20th century. Surely nobody who’s seen an Alvar Aalto or Louis Kahn building could disagree. Having recently learnt about the buttresses, vaults and arches of the Gothic style, of which there are countless examples in Cambridge, I’d like to instead look at the modernist architecture of the new colleges, and the many modern buildings within the old colleges. As, contrary to popular belief, the new isn’t just tucked away on the outskirts of the city or used to hide away the mature students in car park prison monoliths. In fact, it sits side-by-side the cloistered courts of Queens’ and the brick towers of St John’s, which, though beautiful, were designed by people who wouldn’t have called themselves architects.

“Rather ironically for a women’s college, the octagonal building upon which the dome is perched is flanked by four phallic towers”

If you decide to venture North of the melange of medieval architecture that is Magdalene, you find the unashamed modernism of the Hill colleges, in particular, Medwards. One of only two all-women’s colleges in Cambridge, it was designed by Chamberlain, Powell and Bon – the architects of the Barbican – and it features a prominent concrete dome, which is separated into eight elegant petals. Rather ironically for a women’s college, the octagonal building upon which the dome is perched is flanked by four phallic towers with half domes on top. Despite this minor misstep by the architects, fountain court is a well-articulated continuation of the building’s character. The college also features beautiful gardens scattered with modernist sculptures from the likes of Barbara Hepworth.

As does Churchill, whose Hepworth piece is made up of five intersecting, pierced slabs, which the members are encouraged to physically interact with. The STEM-oriented orderliness of the college reflects its original intention of a strong science and technology focus, according to the wishes of its founder and namesake. Winston Churchill even played a part in choosing the architects and supported their initial decision to leave the college without a chapel to reflect a modern sense of secularity. This decision was reversed however when, in 1958, Varsity labelled this decision ‘deplorable’, even going so far as getting the vicar of Great St Mary’s to write for them about the scandal. The compromise reached was to build an interfaith chapel at the edge of the site and refer to it as the chapel at Churchill college rather than of Churchill college.

“They reflect the architects’ of the new colleges ambitions of creating functional yet sculptural architecture, with little restraint from the wealth of past precedents in Cambridge”

Occasionally mocked for their brutality and incongruity in the historical context of the city, I have found that the hill colleges represent an entirely sincere and modest approach to the design of educational institutions. None more so than Fitzwilliam, whose original, rather austere courts were designed by Sir Dennis Lasdun – architect of the National Theatre and Christ’s New Court. These buildings were left incomplete however and were added to by various architects in later decades. The most interesting architectural feature of the college is without doubt the concrete, hooded parabolic pods framing the dining hall’s clerestory windows. They reflect the architects’ of the new colleges ambitions of creating functional yet sculptural architecture, with little restraint from the wealth of past precedents in Cambridge.

If you instead choose to travel West, once you pass the backs and the hodgepodge of styles that is Sidgwick site, you will come across a great red brick monolith to late modernism: Robinson. A wedge of brick geometry wraps around the generous gardens, from which you can escape the college’s endless corridors, passageways and doors but still feel protected by its fortress-like presence. The (recently) grade II* listed building’s most striking feature is the huge, angular stained glass window in the chapel, though not quite as striking as the infamous Robinson bops which take place just a few yards away. It is the ubiquitous bricks though, that are of particular importance to Binsonites, so much so that they are anthropomorphised by the Robinson facebook group, affectionately titled ‘Love from the bricks’.

All these colleges were designed to reflect a rapidly changing world, and the success of the original aims of their architects could be debated, especially given the way in which the chosen materials age. There is an undeniable difference between the aged stone on the old colleges and the weathered concrete of the new. Yet, it can’t be debated that the buildings meet the needs of their members and have a certain satisfying geometric simplicity and earnestness, which contrasts the pomposity and grandiosity of some of the more ancient colleges.