Today

USC Village marked the end of an era for USC.

At the pinnacle of the long-awaited grand opening of USC Village on August 17, 2017, streamers and marching band music filled the square in celebration of the newly built plaza. Hecuba, Queen of Troy and counterpart to Tommy Trojan, was unveiled, signaling the establishment of a development grand enough to rival the original heart of campus. The festivities were punctuated with a speech from then-president Max Nikias filled with congratulation and aspiration.

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He touted the “history” this new development would add to the University through its design, as well as evoking its ties to classical civilization, in addition to cementing USC as a nationally-acclaimed university. “In the development we dedicate today, we can witness the echoes of antiquity. We can feel the presence of thousands of years of civilization … And we believe that it will be admired around the nation, standing as a symbol of the very best among institutions of American higher education.” His goals of architectural revamping and imitation were complete. 

By that point, Max Nikias had raked in $7 billion in donations, constructed 13 other projects between the University Park and Health Sciences campuses and elevated USC to the upper crust of research universities. But this story is a familiar one, however one worth retelling. While Nikias’s tenure also brought with it money, sex, and scandal, it irrevocably changed the face of USC, literally, for better or worse.

USC Village became what is often referred to as the crowning jewel of Nikias’ legacy. It was a project that sought to expand the University in an opulent, perhaps even obtrusive, way — it is the largest single development in the history of the University. USC Village became emblematic of Nikias’s vision of a campus that exudes prestige and history. It became a tool of advertisement.

Nikias inflated the University’s resources immensely, but at the cost of its image. The transition of power to now-President Folt was a rebranding of sorts, one of a forward-thinking university that had shed its controversial and fraught past. As opposed to the lavish, ornate, Gothic village, President Folt will realize her mission through the sustainable and outwardly modern Ginsburg Hall. Long gone are Nikias’s extravagant flourishes, replaced by curtain walls and sleek finishes.

Parallel to the shift in administrations — or more so as a result — the face of USC will be forever marked by this transition, shaping the very fabric of the University’s identity, and adding another chapter to the storied history of USC’s campus architecture.

Back Then

USC was established in 1880 with a single wooden building, known today as the Widney Alumni House, that sat in the middle of a mustard field. The House hosted all learning, and as classes slowly grew with the demand for higher education in the bustling townscape of Los Angeles, the University had to expand.

The second building raised for USC was perhaps more important for the development of its architectural identity. The College of Liberal Arts, known simply as the “Old College,” was built in 1887, where Taper Hall now sits. While demolished in 1948, the Old College was the first building to bring the Romanesque style of architecture to USC, with its semicircular arches and stout yet charming frame. Despite its short life, the Old College marked the genesis of USC’s red-brick building style, and served as a stylistic template for nearly all of the buildings that followed.

Trudiy Sandmeier, a professor of practice at the USC School of Architecture and the director of graduate programs in heritage conservation, explains that the reason for USC’s earliest buildings being built in the Romanesque style as opposed to any other was simple.

“In Los Angeles, we had several prominent brick manufacturing firms … so it was a local material that could be acquired easily and less expensively. And brick is a very versatile medium.” 

This era of architecture is one that is made evident across Los Angeles from other campuses, such as UCLA and El Segundo High School, and even a Westwood Ralph’s built in 1929.

In the 1920s, the current historical core of the University was established, designed primarily by John and Donald Parkinson, a father-son architecture duo responsible for many classics such as Zumberge Hall, the Physical Education Building, the Student Union Building and the Bovard Administration building. All continued the Romanesque legacy of the Old College.

Another crucial development in the evolution of USC’s campus was the induction of USC’s architecture program in 1919, the first of its kind in Southern California. Due to its uniquely exclusive access to the rapidly expanding surrounding city, graduates of the school began settling themselves and establishing prominent firms that, in turn, came back to influence the design of USC’s campus.

After the building boom of the ’20s, development in the area ground to a halt as the Great Depression eliminated demand for new buildings — but after the end of World War II and the resurgence of the American economy, Los Angeles and USC rapidly accelerated their rates of construction. And with the growing prominence of the School of Architecture within L.A., it became instrumental to the look of campus in the decades that followed.

The ’60s saw one of the most prolific periods of construction up to that point. “[William Pereira] had been on the faculty of the School of Architecture for a long time, and he was brought in to build some of the signature buildings — later buildings — in the campus’s evolution, up to and including a lot of the engineering buildings, [which] have a very cohesive [yet] distinctive look to them,” Sandmeier said.

Sandmeier iterates that these buildings were modern in form, but sought to connect with the University’s aesthetic heritage through the inclusion of brick. Architecture alumnus Edward Killingsworth designed the highly praised Religious Center, as well as the infamous Watt Hall. This building boom was capped off by the work of another Architecture Dean, Quincy Jones, who designed the first Annenberg building, and whose design just about abandoned all ties to heritage and embraced the trends of the time.

The post-war period thus became one defined by the architectural dialogue between the University, its architecture program, and the city of Los Angeles as the growth and evolution of all three became more finely intertwined. But that legacy would not survive the end of the century.