Haynes & Garthwaite designed the recent renovation of the President’s House on Webster Avenue.

In the long term, wouldn’t that building make a great center for student religious life (a new Edgerton House, for example) or a headquarters for an academic institute (a new home for the ISTS)? Either function would be able to handle the noise of Webster Avenue better than a college president can. Land is available to the west to add two more houses if more space is needed.

The president, in turn, could be installed in a new house in the residential neighborhood on Choate Road, near the Dean’s House. Purpose-built for fundraising, the President’s House could share the former Choates dormitory site with some appropriate new student housing.

This map, based on the official campus map (pdf), shows Edgerton House, the President’s House, and the site proposed for the new President’s House in red. The new President’s House would anchor the northern terminus of the Great Mass Row Axis, also in red. Some of the other student religious centers are shown in blue.

Other possible sites for a new President’s House include the Dragon area, considered during the 1920s before the Webster Avenue site was selected; the south end of Occom Pond; the northwest corner of Rope Ferry and Clement Roads, a marvelous and prominent site that cries out for a building; and the northeast corner of Rope Ferry and Maynard.