Rendering of Ruffner Hall, 1968 Caudill Rowlett Scott with Rawlings, Wilson and Fraher, architects; rendering by Walt Bell Ink and wash on paper, 19 3/4 x 29 5/8 in. (facsimile) Courtesy of U.Va. Facilities Management

After decades of cramped and dispersed quarters, the Curry School of Education unified in the early 1970s. Oriented to Emmett Street with a large parking lot, the red brick and light-colored concrete Ruffner Hall relinquished a traditional monumental entranceway for an abstracted series of piers that recalled the Lawn. With the development of new teaching methods and technology, the growth of the Curry School has necessitated renovations of Ruffner Hall and the construction of the Robert A.M. Stern-designed Bavaro Hall. Built in the school’s former parking lot and screening Ruffner Hall from view, Bavaro Hall doubles the size of the Curry School and more recognizably shares the architectural vocabulary of central grounds.