Visiting the Yale University

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American universities are famous all over the world and those in the Ivy League are the best.
Ivy League, or the Ancient Eight, is a title of the eight oldest, prestigious universities of the United States. Yale was founded in 1701 and is located in the city of New Haven, Connecticut, less than two hours from New York, we visited it last Summer during our trip on the West Coast.
We all know the reputation and habits of the American college campus through movies and TV series. Yale is definitely in my heart because it is the university that Rory Gilmore attended. I could not miss it!

You can freely visit university campus in US (we have been at Stanford in California – maybe my favorite one, the Columbia University in New York, Harvard and the MIT – Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston) it’s really exciting seeing in person these mythical places! Don’t miss the chance to visit them during a trip in the United States!

Yale is located in the city of New Haven. The University campus and the city come together, you can have a campus tour with one student who will bring you around. For all the information contact the Visitor Center.

The Yale campus is famous for its neo-gothic architecture, many buildings were built at the beginning of ‘900 and they managed to make them look older with different techniques: with fire, acid, breaking the windows and then repairing them in medieval style, creating niches and leaving them empty to give the feeling that over time the statues have been lost or stolen!

Walking around the campus is like having a real architectural tour. Here you will find, among others, buildings by Eero Saarinen (former student at Yale) and Louis Kahn.

Every year more than 20,000 students send their applications but the University takes less than 2,000 new enrolled. Each college has its own dorms and buildings, each one with dining hall, study rooms, library and student facilities. Only during the first year all freshmen live in the same buildings this promotes new friendships. There are many famous graduates of Yale: 3 presidents, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, Bill and Hillary Clinton, Victoria Queen of Sweden, Mario Monti, Eero Saarinen, Sir Norman Foster, Josef Albers, Jodie Foster, Edward Norton…

During the campus tour we did, accompanied by a student of the second year, we visited the Sterling Memorial Library, a true “cathedral” of culture! 16 plans and more than 4 million of books! The architect, Bertram Goodhue, dreamed of building a cathedral, proposed it to the Yale University but they declined the offer but highlighted they needed a new library. The architect lowered the tower and the architect’s dream come true!
We’re curious, you know! Walking around the campus we found another “cathedral” building: the gym with the huge basketball court and the bulldog Handsome Dan, the mascot of the university … stuffed in the entrance!

Do not miss the Yale University Art Gallery, maybe the best part of the campus! Here you can find from ancient art to modern and contemporary art. It is located in a beautiful building designed by Louis Kahn in 1953, the triangular ceilings are his exclusive signature. You can admire masterpieces all other the world: African masks, oriental art, ancient sculptures, paintings by Van Gogh (the famous “Night Café” is here!), Titian, Pollock, Warhol, Rothko, Mondrian, Picasso, Manet, Magritte, Klee, Hopper … this list could be very long!
The museum management is perfect, the entrance is free and the building is fabulous.

Don’t miss the bookstore: two floors of books and Yale branded merchandising! I love T-shirts and sweatshirts from US universities and this was the perfect place for some shopping!