Fifty-four rooms in rows make up the Range beside you, a community at the University of Virginia for graduate students. Designed by Thomas Jefferson as part of the original design of the Academical Village, the Range unfolds as fifty-four rooms that run parallel to the Lawn in neat rows. Six "Hotels" punctuate the line—three on each side—originally used as dining facilities.
Today those Hotels include administrative office spaces and house the Jefferson Literary and Debating Society. Walk the line in your mind and you’ll pass rooms once occupied by well-known residents: Edgar Allan Poe at 13 W. Range, Woodrow Wilson at 31 W. Range, and Malcolm Brogdan at 40 E. Range. You can also note that Pi Kappa Alpha maintains 47 W. Range, the room where it was founded on March 1, 1868.
This place is both domestic and institutional, rooms clustered side by side and threaded into the life of the Academical Village. Stand here and feel how Jefferson’s lines shape daily rhythm: rooms in rows, the Hotels anchoring the run, and the Lawn running just beyond. Notice the parallel rows leading toward the Lawn and the rest of the Academical Village.