Best campuses

Went to Dartmouth’s 250th celebration yesterday, and it really is a lovely campus in a nice, albeit small town.  Kinda in the middle of nowhere though.  

Ann Arbor for overall college town experience, but Boulder is pretty close. Kinda Ann Arbor with mountains and a lot more sunshine in winter.

For campus only, someone beat me to Pepperdine (I've only driven past it along the oceanside highway) but I'd throw in Yale and University of Chicago for architecture, Virginia Tech from pictures I've seen, and Middlebury for a quintessential New England small college campus. 

It depends on what you want in a campus. UofM is great because it's got grass and trees, but is also smack dab in the middle of a great city like Ann Arbor. There are many public and private schools that would I consider having nicer actual campuses like UVA, Wake Forest, University of Richmond, etc. but they all lack the proximity to such a great college town in walking distance

I've been to University of Washington (I live near Seattle now), Michigan State, UCLA, Berkeley, Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Caltech, Clairmont, Claflin, McMaster, U. of Colorado Boulder, UC Irvine, UC Northridge, UC Santa Barbara.

Many of those have nice features.

But of all of those, Michigan is my favorite.  The campus is great, and the environment around it is great.

Princeton is a beautiful campus. Kind of reminds me of of Michigan if you were to remove all the town aspects of it and just left the university diags and buildings.

Grand lakes university is probably the most beautiful campus I’ve ever seen. 

Also has an awesome dive team. 

Madison is quite nice, and has lakes. 

Many of the UCs are quite beautiful.

Stanford is ridiculous but too sprawling.

Harvard and Princeton feel old school but are quite nice.

Madison is awesome.  Sitting on Memorial Union Terrace along Lake Mendota is the best. State Street mall heads to the Capitol with lots of shops and restaurants. Farmer's Market around the Capitol.  Lakeshore path is  beautiful for jogging from the Union to Picnic Point. Camp Randall is fun but can't beat the Big House. Hard to compare the two campuses as they are both great.

With all the developements in downtown Detroit, WSU’s campus is getting cooler.

I thought that I was indecisive, but 21 campuses???

Stanford. Absolute best IMO. But you can’t just drive through it. You have to walk it too. The iconic places, but all the other nooks. It’s just special. But so many beautiful one’s on the East coast as well.

a ton of personal preference goes into opinion, of course. Pepperdine, as mentioned has that setting on a hill with a ridiculous view. UCSB is another with a beautiful ocean setting—not on a hill, but still. 

Michigan is iconic, classic and beautiful. But so many others too.

You could not narrow the choices to maybe five or six? To me 20 campuses seems beyond obsessive. 

Hudson U. In NYC has the best fake campus in all of television. Lots of crime there, however. 

Nothing beats UC Santa Barbara

For adventure... hiking, rock climbing, biking, etc., the Air Force Academy is top notch.  

Best view from a football stadium?  Either Provo or Logan, Utah.

I used to work for TIAA which required travel to many universities. I always liked Vanderbilt University and University of the South was very unique.

I've had the best of both worlds - went to school undergrad in the best big city for colleges (Boston) and grad school in the best small college city (Ann Arbor).

Visited UVA a little over a month ago as we make the rounds with my soon-to-be senior in HS son.  I must say that campus is very nice.  Not nearly as big as U-M's, but everything is walking distance.  I will say that I thought Charlottesville - the city itself - can't really hold a candle to Ann Arbor, though.

I've been to a few Pac-12 campuses since I moved to California in 2007. I still think Michigan has the best campus in the country and Ann Arbor is the best college town in the country, hands down. Palo Alto is blah. Berkeley is a dump. Westwood is everything that's wrong with LA. USC is in the ghetto. 

Of course, as a 2x Michigan alum and Ann Arbor native, I'm not exactly unbiased. 

It's hard to beat UM/A2, If you want a big school social/academic environment in a liberal "town" in the Midwest.

Agree with most of other observations regarding Stanford, UVA, Princeton and the like and also have enjoyed these other campuses for different reasons: Northwestern, Dartmouth, Texas , Duke and UNC, UCLA, Claremont schools ( actually the SoCal schools deserve their own list and USC is not even top 10). 

Curious if anyone has had experiences living/going to school around Salem and Eugene, OR? 

USC

Cornell

My top 3:

UCLA

Wisconsin 

Georgia 

Eastern has that water tower. 

I actually liked Kansas, it’s a sprawling campus but nice, and Lawrence is a neat little town

Miami (ytm) also nice

princeton was the most beautiful campus I’ve been to.

i thought Carnegie Mellon campus was decent, but I was surprised how much I liked pittsburgh 

I’ve visited both the naval and Air Force academies, and both has great campuses

 worst campus I’ve been to was Case Western, Cleveland is just such a a total shit hole

You mentioned Cornell, so yeah, I think you've seen the best the NE has to offer. I guess NYU is great if you like city campuses that aren't really campuses (which I do).

This thread has a bias toward larger schools, which isn't surprising. But my daughters broke my heart when they opted for small, liberal arts colleges, one to Vassar and one to Carleton. Don't tell my daughter who went to Carleton, which certainly has a pretty campus, but Vassar is truly breathtaking. I have seen many campuses. None can compare. Not much of a college town, but what a gorgeous campus.

I worked in higher ed out of college and have been to over 100 campuses of varying size, shape and degree. It’s hard to separate the college from the town that it’s in, so places like Kansas have a beautiful campus and also an awesome town. But if we are going for truly beautiful campuses, here are ten in no particular order:

UCLA, UNC, Washington, Stanford, Pepperdine, Furman, San Diego, Ole Miss, Virginia, Sewanee

A lot of love here for Bloomington — I don’t get it.  It’s nice... not one of the most beautiful (I think Northwestern is nicer).  And take two buildings off of Notre Dame and it may be the ugliest, not to mention it’s surrounded by hours of corn fields in every direction.  Stanford and Pepperdine top my list.   Also a few of the Ivy’s.  Michigan right up there in that next group with Duke, UVA, Chicago — all mentioned.  And if we’re talking small schools, I was very taken with Emory.  

Love Ann Arbor’s campus how they integrate the city and campus together.

UF in Gainesville is pretty cool too (sister goes there). The game day experience is awesome.

I was in awe of ND’s campus when i visited. Idk despite what others have said, it just has that something that is really grand about it..,..buuuut to hell with ND!

I really like how UCF’s campus is laid out. Their whole campus is all built upon a “circle” and you can get everywhere walking.

FSU has a gorgeous campus.

U of Miami is small and high class. It’s also too far away from the city if Miami for my taste.

Western Michigan needs to build newer. Most of their buildings are old.

Im curious if any has every been to Alabama’s campus and how is it?