Bouquet Gardens is a major student residential complex of the

University of Pittsburgh The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a public state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The university is composed of 17 undergraduate and graduate schools and colleges at its urban Pittsburgh campus, home to the univers ...

consisting of eight, 4-story garden-style gabled-roofed apartment buildings (Buildings A through H) clustered around progression of courtyards connected by an interior pathway as well as a four-story apartment-style residence hall (Building J). Each gabled-roofed apartment-style building contains sixteen 4-bedroom apartments while the 155 bed Building J contains amenities for use by residents of the entire complex. Designed by Renaissance 3 Architects, P.C., the combined complex houses 651 upper-level undergraduate students in 172 units located on the lower campus close to

Posvar Hall Wesley W. Posvar Hall (WWPH), formerly known as Forbes Quadrangle, is a landmark building on the campus of the University of Pittsburgh in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. At it is the largest academic-use building on campus, provid ...

, the

Barco Law Building Barco Law Building is an academic building housing the University of Pittsburgh School of Law on the campus of the University of Pittsburgh in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The $8.5 million ($ million today) six-story building was opene ...

, and adjacent to

Sennott Square Sennott Square is a major academic building on the campus of the University of Pittsburgh in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The building designed by the architectural firm JSA was dedicated on September 5, 2002, and was the largest ...

History

The Bouquet Gardens complex sits on a property bounded by Oakland Avenue, South Bouquet and Sennott Streets which was acquired by the

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

General State Authority in 1967 by invoking eminent domain for the reasons of expediting Pitt's expansion following the university joining the

Commonwealth System of Higher Education The Commonwealth System of Higher Education is a statutory designation by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania that confers "state-related" status on four universities located within the state: Lincoln University, the Pennsylvania State University, ...

as a "state-related" institution in 1966. Additionally, the state declared that only academic buildings could be developed on the lot. For years, use and development of the land was disputed by the city and

Oakland Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third largest city overall in the Bay ...

community, and as funding for the development lagged, some existing structures on the property were rented by the university to community groups. Following a renewed pledge of state funding by Governor

Tom Ridge Thomas Joseph Ridge (born August 26, 1945) is an American politician and author who served as the Assistant to the President for Homeland Security from 2001 to 2003, and the first United States Secretary of Homeland Security from 2003 to 2005. ...

in the mid 1990s, university plans to for student housing and the south edge of campus were renewed

Intended to architecturally blend the new south edge of campus into South Oakland, the original facades of the buildings were redesigned following community input in order better reflect the eclectic mix of brick and Victorian townhouses and low-rise apartment blocks of the mostly residential South Oakland neighborhoo

http://www.pitt.edu/~copc/pittsburgh%20case%20--%20University%20as%20Developer.pdf] The university also provided assistance in relocating community groups who had rented space on the property from the university as construction plans moved forwar

Ground was broken on the first phase of the complex, which included 3 buildings, on December 1, 1998 and was completed and opened in the fall of 1999 for $5.3 millio

https://web.archive.org/web/20110930032205/http://mac10.umc.pitt.edu/u/FMPro?-db=ustory&-format=d.html&-lay=a&-sortfield=issueid::issuedate&-sortorder=descend&keywords=bouquet%20gardens&-max=50&-recid=38200&-find=] The first phase of the construction represented the first new on-campus structures built in 7 years. The second phase added five buildings at a cost of $9.2 million and opened in the fall of 2000 bringing the total beds for the gabled-roofed apartment-style buildings to 496 in 124 units.

Amenities

Each unit is air-conditioned, furnished, and includes four single bedrooms, a kitchen with refrigerator, stove and microwave, a living room and dining area, two bathrooms, and cable and internet connection

Building J expansion

In November 2009, the university approved the purchase of a $1.4 million three-quarter-acre parcel of land contiguous to the existing Bouquet Gardens site for expansion of the housing complex. The project, designed by

Perkins Eastman 'Perkins Eastman'' is an international architecture, interior design, urban design, planning, landscape architecture, graphic design, and project management firm. Headquartered in New York City, the firm is led by founding Principals Bradford Per ...

, paralleled the design of the garden-style Bouquet Gardens apartments and added a four-story, building. The building, which is designated as "Building J", has 155 beds in 48 three- and four-person apartment-style units. The residence hall opened for the fall semester of 2011, increasing the total number of the university's Pittsburgh campus beds to 7,396. The building also includes a resident director's apartment, a campus police substation, laundry and mail facilities, an indoor bicycle storage area, and a fitness room for Bouquet Gardens residents' use.

References

Bouquet Gardens Overview, University of Pittsburgh, www.pitt.edu

External links

Bouquet Gardens on Pitt's virtual Campus Tour
{{Pittsburgh University of Pittsburgh residence halls University and college dormitories in the United States Residential buildings in Pittsburgh