In August, students moved into the first new dormitories on campus since the fall of the Berlin Wall. After years of planning and discussion, Jamestown North and Jamestown South are finally home to 387 upperclass students.

The new buildings are mirror images of each other and were planned to cater to what today's students are looking for in a dorm, according to Sam Sadler '64, M.Ed. '71, vice president for student affairs. No new undergraduate dorms had been built at William and Mary since 1989, when Nicholas and Preston halls were added to the Randolph Complex. Much has changed in the intervening years, and the Jamestown project was unlike any other.

"We designed it so we have a lot of flexibility," Sadler says. The dorms feature 90 single and 148 double rooms. Some rooms are part of multi-room "blocks" of housing, which can be assigned in several ways: as a single group unit, individually or as special-interest housing. The Italian house and the Mosaic multicultural group will occupy special-interest housing in the Jamestown buildings during the 2006-07 academic year.

Perhaps most significant in the new dorms' opening is that, for the first time in decades, returning students did not move into the Dillard complex this fall. "Bringing them back from Dillard is something we've been working on for 15 years," Sadler says.

"It's a little upgrade from Dillard," says Stefanie Gera '07 with a hint of understatement.

The Jamestown dorms are unique among dormitories on campus: Jamestown North has two soundproof music practice rooms. The buildings were designed to make special use of nearby buildings and surrounding space, which had never been done before, according to Sadler.

"We set out from the start to recreate the quality of old campus," he says. The new building has "a glimpse of modernity and a look to the future" as well.

The planning stages of the new dorms were marked by considerable controversy, given the location on a segment of Barksdale Field. To preserve as much of Barksdale as possible, the buildings are oriented so that there is enough space on either side for a full-size soccer field. The area bounded by Phi Beta Kappa Hall, Rogers Hall and the new dorms will often be used by Recreational Sports programs, while the field on the other side of the dorms toward Barrett will be used for "open, casual space," according to Sadler.

The ground-floor windows on the west side facing Phi Beta Kappa Hall were designed to accommodate seating areas, both inside and outside the building. Rocking chairs will be available on a sort of covered patio for students hoping to watch the sun set over New Campus.

Students were sold on the building even before the semester had started. Pat Donaldson '08, a resident assistant in the North building, liked his dorm so much, he named Director of Residence Life Deb Boykin '76, M.Ed. '82 an honorary member of his hall.

Fellow RA Christina Bolton '07 positively glows about the building, and for good reason: her second-floor room has a massive floor-to-ceiling window.

"The South building gets absolutely gorgeous sun in the afternoon," she says.