Watterson Towers

Watterson Towers

Watterson Towers, a student residence hall at Illinois State University, is one of the tallest dormitories in the world. Located in Normal, Illinois, at the corner of Fell and Beaufort Streets, it was completed in 1967. The 28-story complex holds over 2,200 students and stands at 91m (298.5 feet). Watterson Towers was named after Arthur W. Watterson, a popular professor and chair of the ISU Geography Department, who taught at the University from 1946-1966. The building was designed by Fridstein and Fitch Architects in Chicago.

Externally, the most noticeable feature of the building is that it consists of two separate towers. From the outside an observer sees that the two towers are connected at several points by breezeways (a misnomer, as they are not exposed to the outside in any way). However, to the residents, this division into towers goes almost unnoticed, as what is far more important is the internal division of the building into houses. Watterson is composed of ten of these houses, (five in each tower), and each is considered—in terms of campus governance—to be its own residence hall. The houses are named after the first ten Secretaries of State of the United States.

Each "house" consists of five consecutive floors of a tower. Houses at the same level are paired both physically (in terms of access, see below) and in terms of student governance. For example, the bottom five residential floors of the South Tower comprise "Smith House," and the bottom five residential floors of the North Tower comprise "Jefferson House." Collectively, these are referred to as "Smith-Jefferson," and some governance functions, such as Residential Assistant oversight, are organized on this paired level.

Within a house, most floors are divided into four "suites" consisting of six rooms each. The suites include four double occupancy rooms, a triple room, and a single occupancy room. However, on the middle (third) floor of each house, there are only two suites, as the area for the other two suites is taken up by other things, including the connecting breezeways and some study lounges.

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Campus View, from the Informal Level at the top of Watterson Towers

North Tower Houses
From top to bottom

• Madison House
• Marshall House
• Pickering House
• Randolph House
• Jefferson House

South Tower Houses
From top to bottom

• Van Buren House
• Clay House
• Adams House
• Monroe House
• Smith House

Elevator system

Watterson's unique design prevents it from having traditional elevator service, that is, the six elevators that operate in the building do not stop at every floor.

• There are five residential elevator stops. Each is at the 3rd floor breezeway of one of the following pairs of houses:

(A). Smith-Jefferson

(B). Monroe-Randolph

(C). Adams-Pickering

(D). Marshall-Clay

(E). Madison-Van Buren

However, only around 10% of Watterson's residents live on a 3rd floor. Nonetheless, other residents also get get off the elevator on the 3rd floor, but then take stairs to their floor—up or down—a maximum of two flights. For example, a resident who lived on Clay 4 would get off at the Marshall-Clay Breezeway and then need to walk up one flight of stairs to reach her room.

• In addition to the residential stops, elevators also bring residents to Service Level and Formal Lobby Level, and Informal Level. The Service and Formal Lobby levels both provide access to ground level exits, as well as the dining hall, Watterson Commons. The Informal Level, which is the topmost level accessible to residents, is the location of laundry facilities. Students can checkout keys to music practice rooms, some with a piano available. It also provides observers with the highest observation deck in the state outside of the city of Chicago.

Renovations

Watterson Towers, now more than 40 years old, is currently in the midst of a complete restoration, which will be completed using the houses as stages.