Fitzwilliam College

Fitzwilliam College stands in the north-west of Cambridge on a site once occupied by a Regency manor called the Grove. The college grew from a 19th-century scheme to let poorer students study at Cambridge without joining a college, later becoming Fitzwilliam House and then a full college in 1966. Today it has five linked courts around large rectangular gardens, most of them modern in style. The Grove itself, built in 1813, remains the centrepiece and houses the Senior Tutor’s office. A 2008 dig found traces of a 3,500-year-old farmstead beneath the lawns. The college has produced six Nobel laureates and educated three heads of state. Its alumni include the current UK Prime Minister, former Liberal Democrat leader Sir Vince Cable, and former Chancellor Norman Lamont. Fitzwilliam also won University Challenge in 1973 with a team of four undergraduates. The boat club shares the name, and the college’s boathouse sits beside the River Cam. A new auditorium and a graduate centre converted from a former hotel add to its facilities. Visitors walk through five interconnected courts that open onto quiet gardens. The Hall Building, designed by Sir Denys Lasdun, contains the dining hall, bar and kitchens. The 1991 chapel and the 2003 Gatehouse Court form the southern and northern edges of the site. The Grove’s Regency interiors still show Emma Darwin’s William Morris wallpaper. From Storey’s Way the college appears modern, but its grounds preserve earlier layers of Cambridge history.