Boylston To Face Changes

With the Barker Center for the Humanities nearing completion, the College is turning its attention to the renovation of Boylston Hall.

Most humanities departments will relocate to the Barker Center, but Boylston will house Romance Languages and Literatures, Classics, Comparative Literature, Literature and Linguistics.

A University planning committee, which includes members of the future Boylston departments, will meet with an architect at the end of this semester to discuss changes to the building, according to Capital Projects Manager Elizabeth C. Randall.

"We'll know more then," Randall said. "Now we're looking at what are the best uses for the space."

One proposal under consideration is the creation of a small coffee shop cafe in Ticknor Lounge.

"We're doing a cafe in the Barker Center, so people in Boylston are saying [they] want a cafe too," Randall said.

"It would be a good idea because in this building there is no cafeteria and it would be useful," said Hyunji Cho, a Law School student studying in Ticknor Lounge.

But not everyone likes the idea of adding a cafeteria.

"I think it's a ridiculous idea," said Debra Prager, a student at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. "We have Dudley House, Gato Rojo and Au Bon Pain, but we do not have a place for graduates and undergraduates to read comfortably. It's a university, not an amusement park."

Julie C. Kim '97 said she hopes Ticknor remains as it is.

"I think it's a very cozy space," she said. "I think it's conducive to students getting to know each other. It's one of the most intimate places on campus."

But Randall said any cafe would be small in order to keep most of Ticknor Lounge intact.

"We didn't see anything on the scale of Gato Rojo," she said. "We're in the business of education, not food production."

A spokesperson for Dining Services said Interim Director of Dining Services Leonard D. Condenzio has not yet been notified about the creation of a new cafe.