New facilities and the restored eucalyptus path at Kapiiolani and Richards roads
Portion of campus in 1949
New entry at Kapiiolani and Richards roads
Temple to Music

Mills College
Landscape Heritage Plan

Services
Planning
Landscape Architecture

Size
135 acres

Completion
January 2008

Presentations
“Celebrating the
Cultural Landscape Heritage
of Mills College”
Society of College and University Planners
National Conference,
July 2009
Southern Regional Conference, October 2009
Pacific Regional Conference, April 2008

Awards
Society for College and
University Planners Merit Award in Excellence in Planning for Restoration/ Preservation, 2009

American Society of Landscape Architects Honor Award in Analysis and Planning, 2009
American Society of Landscape Architects
Northern California Chapter Honor Award, 2008

Purchase: Book

Top: Richards and Kapiolani roads with new facilities and restored eucalyptus path
Bottom: New entry at Richards and Kapiolani roads

Top: Mills Hall, 1870s
Middle: Mills Campus, 1949
Bottom: New Temple to Music

This landscape heritage study provides a framework to guide future development in balance with historic preservation. Since 1868, Mills College founders, Cyrus and Susan Mills, and those who followed, thoughtfully and carefully shaped the campus with Picturesque-era exotic and native plantings and with distinguished architecture. This shared vision of 140 years sets forth a mandate for the future of Mills College to preserve, enhance, and build upon its unique campus setting and its many legacies.

Funded by the Getty Foundation, this study defines the essence of a campus’s identity manifested in its physical and cultural characteristics and tests and guides the development within and adjacent to the historic core. Research revealed important features of the cultural landscape that came about by the creativity of nationally and regionally recognized individuals skilled in architecture, landscape architecture, and botany, respectively, Bernard Maybeck, Julia Morgan, Walter Ratcliff, Jr., Howard Gilkey, and Howard McMinn. The study is published and available through the Mills College Center for the Book.

Educational outreach included four public lectures and course curricula.

Location: Oakland, California
Responsibilites: Planning and Design; Assisted in the grant submittal to the Getty Foundation
Consultants: Vonn Marie May - Cultural Landscape Research, Assessment, and Guidelines

Mills Hall, 1870s