Dining Hall, Darwin College

The dining hall, designed between 1965 and 1966 and built between 1967 and 1969, is the work of Bill Howell of Howell Killick Partridge and Amis, with Felix J Samuely and Partners acting as engineers. The building is constructed with a lead-covered roof, a reinforced steel frame faced in grey-brown brick and shuttered concrete.

The hall has a roughly octagonal footprint and is raised above a ground-floor car park by four reinforced-concrete pilotis. A spiral stair projects from the east side. The lead-covered roof is nearly pyramidal, topped with a central octagonal-pyramid glazed lantern. Oversailing eaves feature horizontal bands of shuttered concrete to their fascia and joists projecting through a glazed clerestory. The brick walls of the hall are coloured with greenish mortar, intended to cool the overall tone, with bands of shuttered concrete under the clerestory and at the plinth. The west elevation, facing Newnham Road, is largely blind except for two full-height vertical slit windows in each chamfered corner. The east elevation, overlooking the garden, features a large glazed opening with metal-framed folding and sliding French doors, a shuttered concrete lintel, and a large rectangular overlight. Again, the chamfered corners have two full-height vertical slit windows. A canted stair landing and a wide spiral stair, with a terrazzo covering and plain metal handrail on slender stick balusters, descends to the ground-floor car park. A glazed link, approximately 1.5 metres wide, connects the south elevation of the dining hall to the first floor of Newnham Terrace. The underside of the hall and pilotis are of shuttered concrete within the undercroft.

Inside, the dining hall has unplastered brick walls and a natural pine ceiling supported by reinforced concrete beams. Timber beams splay upwards to a central octagonal lantern. Four strips of roof lighting illuminate the hall from above, complemented by the narrow slit windows in the chamfered corners, which offer views of surrounding trees. Small clerestory windows above the slit windows can be opened for ventilation from within the room. Each chamfered corner contains a concrete hood incorporating a large mirror, designed to create a series of reflections. Large folding and sliding doors on the garden side lead to a stair landing and balcony overlooking the garden and river. Access is provided from the Hermitage through a flat-arched opening with a shuttered-concrete lintel on the north wall; a corresponding opening on the south wall was formerly filled with glass but now connects to Newnham Terrace via a glazed link.