The University of Virginia Photo Gallery by Steve Ainsworth at pbase.com

The University of Virginia

This gallery contains images of the University of Virginia, widely considered one of the most beautiful campuses in the country. The original campus was designed by Thomas Jefferson, and contains many buildings and features that are splendid examples of neoclassical architecture. Jefferson was self-trained in architecture and heavily influenced by his travels in Europe, particularly in France, where he served as U.S. Ambassador for five years. I attended graduate school at UVA in the late 80s, and this was my second visit to the school since that time.

Entrance to the Campus.jpg	Brick Path Toward the Rotunda, #1.jpg	Brick Path Toward the Rotunda, #2.jpg	Brick Path Toward the Rotunda, #3.jpg
Serpentine Wall, #1.jpg	Colonnade, East Side of the Lawn, #1.jpg	The Lawn, Looking toward Cabell Hall.jpg	The Rotunda, #1.jpg
Pavilion, West Side of the Lawn, #1.jpg	Pavilion, West Side of the Lawn, #2.jpg	Walkway Under the Rotunda.jpg	Brick Walkway Along the East Lawn.jpg
The Lawn, Looking toward The Rotunda.jpg	The Rotunda & East Lawn Faculty Housing.jpg	The Rotunda, #2.jpg	Colonnade,West Side of the Lawn, #3.jpg
The Rotunda, #3.jpg	View from East Lawn Stairwell.jpg	West Lawn Columns.jpg	The Rotunda, South Entrance, #1.jpg
The Rotunda, South Entrance, #2.jpg	Cabell Hall, Dedication Tablet.jpg	Cabell Hall.jpg	Stairway Exit, East Lawn.jpg
The Rotunda, South Entrance, From the West Lawn.jpg	Hallway View.jpg	Lattice.jpg	Lattice Detail, #1.jpg
Lattice, Detail, #2.jpg	Lattice & Portico.jpg	Serpentine Wall, #2.jpg	Top of Stairway & Window, #2.jpg
University Chapel, #1.jpg	University Chapel, #2.jpg	University Chapel, #3.jpg	University Chapel, #4.jpg
Brooks Hall, The Old Natural Sciences Building.jpg	The Rotunda, #4 (The North Entrance).jpg

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Alan		28-Dec-2010 03:23
Steve, like others, I really enjoy your photos of UVa. I was lucky to live on the Lawn my 4th year. I would love to make a collage out of some of your photos of the Lawn and Grounds. Is it possible to buy any of these in a higher resolution? Thanks

Alan		27-Dec-2010 18:15
Steve, like others, I really enjoy your photos of UVa. I was lucky to live on the Lawn my 4th year. I would love to make a collage out of some of your photos of the Lawn and Grounds. Is it possible to buy any of these in a higher resolution? Thanks

Guest		03-Sep-2009 00:28
I love your pictures.I am only ten,but after seeing your picture I dream of going there. : )

Steve Ainsworth		09-Mar-2009 01:57
Thanks again, Frank. I agree--UVA is one of the finest campuses I've seen. The older part of Indiana University's campus is up there, too. It's more wooded than UVA, and the native limestone buildings and their setting are very attractive. I hear Pepperdine is nice, too, although I haven't seen it. I hope to return to UVA some day soon--my time on campus was too brief and the mid-afternoon light was harsh; I need to go there in early morning or near sundown.

Guest		08-Mar-2009 02:34
Steve, my pleasure; keep up the good work; your photos do justice to UVa and to Jefferson; now that I live in Pennsylvania, your images transport me right back to the Lawn which I used to see about once a year when I lived in northern Virginia; UVa is such a treasure; I think it is the finest campus in America, indeed one of the world's great architectural monuments, and I have seen many of them; best of luck, F.M. p.s. how about shots of the individual pavilions plus the gardens behind them? each is as unique and beautiful as the pavilion in front of it; and come to think of it, there is the challenge of capturing the inside of the spectacular domed library with the oculus; if you look south across the Lawn from the window of the old library, and somehow imagine the scene without Cabell, you will see the Lawn as Jefferson originally envisioned it, an open-ended horseshoe rooted in Classical Antiquity at one end, and expanding without limit at the other into an untamed new land

Steve Ainsworth		08-Mar-2009 00:36
Thanks, Frank, I clarified the titles as you suggested.

Frank Morgan		07-Mar-2009 23:33
Notes: 1. Slide 5: The "serpentine" shape was evidently chosen by Jefferson because it enabled him to build the wall using only one wythe, or thickness of brick, in addition to the beauty of the shape 2. Slide 6: this depicts the colonnade on the east perimeter of the Lawn, not the Lawn per se (the title is confusing); "colonnade" is the word used by Jefferson himself to describe the covered walkways linking the "pavilions" 3. Slide 7: Cabell Hall is an early 20th-century addition not part of Jefferson's plan, which originally intended an open-ended vista looking from north to south; Cabell Hall was designed by the firm of McKim, Mead, and White which specialized in neoclassical designs 4. Slides 9 and 10: These both show a "Pavilion" (it looks like no. 2 of 10); Jefferson used the word "pavilion" to denote the individual structures which housed separate academic departments (10 departments, 10 pavilions); each "pavilion" was individually designed to illustrate some important point of classical architecture, so students could gain a "mini-education" in architecture as they walked around and be inspired by classical antiquity at the same time 5. Slide 11: this is the underground passageway that passes directly under the south portico of the the Rotunda, linking the east and west colonnades; the original inspiration was evidently the "crypto-porticus" in Hadrian's Villa which Jefferson first incorporated into the design of Monticello more later-

Guest		13-Jun-2008 06:50
unesco world heritage site

Jonah Lee		10-Apr-2008 17:37
Great pictures.

a friend		02-Mar-2008 03:47
Nice pictures of the University of Virginina. Unfrotunately, you have misidenfitifed many of the shots. All the photos you identify as "Range" are the inner rows of rooms, known as the "Lawn." The "Range" are the outer rows. You can easily correct this by changing the word "Range" to "Lawn" in each of the photos. You have all Lawn photos and no Range photos...and the walls are not known as "curvy "walls, but "serpentine" walls.

a friend		02-Mar-2008 03:46
Nice pictures of the University of Virginina. Unfrotunately, you have misidenfitifed many of the shots. All the photos you identify as "Range" are the inner rows of rooms, known as the "Lawn." The "Range" are the outer rows. You can easily correct this by changing the word "Range" to "Lawn" in each of the photos. You have all Lawn photos and no Range photos.

Steve Ainsworth		04-Aug-2007 01:11
Thanks, Bryan, I'm glad you like the photos. Your terminology is undoubtedly more technically accurate than mine. A couple of my titles are informal descriptions--I wasn't trying to be technically precise or scholarly . For example, although the campus is referred to as "the Grounds", it is in fact a college campus and I prefer to use this informal terminology on a public website that is decidedly non-scholarly. Same thing goes for "curvy walls" vs. "serpentine walls". I was being purely descriptive and, in that sense, curvy and serpentine are synonymous. I will try to correct the other titles as you suggest--thanks again.

Bryan Hunter		03-Aug-2007 20:24
Beautiful photos, and in an environment that's surprisingly challenging to photograph, I should add. I, too, am a 'Hoo. But may I respectfully submit that some of your terminology is slighly off in your titles? For example, Mr Jefferson's masterpiece is always referred to as "Grounds," not "The Campus." Also, the "Curvy wall[s]"--there are actually 20 of them--are referred to as "the Serpentine Walls." The photos you IDed as "Ranges" are actually of the "Colonnade" and "Lawn." The Ranges actually lie parallel with and exterior to the Colonnade and Lawn--flanking the East and West Lawns, if you will. So even the photo, for example, titled "East Range stairwell" should actually read "East Lawn Stairwell." Again, thanks for the photos. They're really some of the best I've seen of Grounds.

Teila K. Day		24-Jul-2007 07:24
wonderful photos..... UVA = my first pick for law school... maybe someday as a xnsfer student I'll get in eh? ;) good work on your part. thank you for posting photographs of this wonderful campus.

Zainudin		02-Jan-2007 17:14
Indeed a beautiful campus and your shots too. You have made it even more beautiful in photograph. GMV!

Barbara Read and Fred Schaad		02-Jan-2007 03:44
Beautiful campus! V

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