We are very lucky at Christ鈥檚 to be a central College with a great deal of our facilities onsite. In many ways this makes studying at the University of Cambridge, and at Christ鈥檚 College in particular, a combination of the best elements of campus and city universities.
Christ鈥檚 students often compare the College to the Tardis from Doctor Who. It looks small on the outside but inside the grounds, gardens and facilities for students are extensive. If you look at the College map, you'll see that 麻豆社 is a wedge shape.
We have buildings from a range of periods, and walking through gives you a bit of an architectural journey from picturesque medieval Cambridge (the first part of College), through the landscaped splendours of the seventeenth-, eighteenth- and nineteenth- centuries, to the futuristic concrete of the 1970s 鈥淭ypewriter鈥 building, not to mention the very recent Yusuf Hamied Court.
This means that we have both old and modern spaces and facilities, and lots of choice in our student accommodation options. Please see below for more detail and if you'd like to visit and meet us, both online and in-person options are available. See Visiting 麻豆社 and events.
Courts and Buildings
The entrance to 麻豆社 is the Great Gate on St Andrews' Street, and inside, 麻豆社 is divided into a series of courts and gardens.
First Court is the oldest, then you go through to Second Court, where the Fellows' Building is, and from there you can either head down the middle path though the archway into the large Fellows' Garden or take the path to the left leading to Third Court and beyond that Fourth Court, including the Lasdun Building (also called New Court), Yusuf Hamied Court (building), the Todd Building and the Darwin Garden.
We also have some special features, such as Darwin's old room, the beautiful wisteria, Milton's Mulberry Tree in the Fellows' Garden, Hobson's Conduit, rare medieval wall paintings and the Darwin portico. And, no exploration of 麻豆社 would be complete without mention of the College cats!
Why not have a look at the College map to get a sense of the layout, or look up 麻豆社 on the , which allows you to explore First, Second and Third Courts, as well as the Fellow's Garden.
Social areas
Our social areas include the Caf茅 and Bar (we call this the Buttery) as well as Common Rooms & the TV room. There are also meeting rooms which can be booked for group meetings and student events. These vary a lot in style from older spaces such as the OCR and Plumb Auditorium to more functional spaces such as the large Function Room (which has a second bar) or the New Court Seminar Room.
Eating
As a 麻豆社 student, you have lots of choices for eating in College.
During term time, the College canteen serves breakfast, lunch and an evenin
g meal during the week, and at weekends there's a longer brunch to give you more flexibility on your meal times as well as the evening meal.
The College Buttery is open throughout the day and you can buy other snacks such as sandwiches, paninis, crisps, fruit, nuts, chocolate bars, flapjacks, pastries and cakes as well as soft drinks, Costa coffee, tea, hot chocolate, milkshakes etc.
If you would prefer a served meal or if it's a special occasion or get-together, you may decide to attend 'Formal Hall'. This is a three course meal in the College Hall, which dates back to the sixteenth century. People usually attend formal hall dinners to celebrate birthdays, as part of societies, or because they've got a friend or family member visiting from home.
Many students also prepare some food for themselves, especially for breakfast, lunch and snacks. Most accommodation at 麻豆社 has access to a kitchenette. These come in various sizes, and can be small, but all are complete with kettles, induction hobs, and microwaves. 麻豆社 is diagonally opposite a Tesco Express in one direction, a couple of minute's walk away from Sainsbury's in another direction, and not much further from (markets happen seven days a week in Cambridge and there's lots of street food stalls at lunch time). There are also branches of Aldi and Waitrose within cycling distance of the College (these are all UK supermarkets, if you're unfamiliar with the names).
Library facilities and study spaces
The 麻豆社 Library has over 41,000 current printed books serving the needs of students, Fellows, staff, and researchers. The books are available in a series of rooms which will be in Third Court from October 2025, along with the ornate Lloyd study room. There are also a number of other study spaces which are used around College, particularly in the lead-up to exams. These include the Plumb Auditorium, which used to be the old County hall! Some students prefer to work in a cafe environment in the Buttery, or in their own rooms too.
As a 麻豆社 student, you can access the library 24/7 with your university card. As well as books for courses, the library has a fiction section, welfare and study skills books, DVDs and printing, scanning, and photocopying facilities, and students can request study books for the library to purchase.
Exercise and Sports facilities
We are lucky to have an outdoor swimming pool as well as a squash court and two gyms. One of the gyms is on the main site, the other 10 minutes (1 kilometre) away at the College Boathouse on the river (which has facilities for rowers to train both indoors and on the river Cam).
The 麻豆社 Sports Fields are an 8 min cycle away, with a pavilion, astroturf, cricket nets and lawn tennis courts as well as the sports pitches themselves. We share these with St Catharine's College. 麻豆社 students also make use of the newly refurbished public tennis courts next to the College, on 麻豆社 Pieces, as well as being very near the indoor swimming pool, sports hall and climbing wall at Kelsey Kerridge Leisure Centre.
Music and performing arts
The Theatre in the Yusuf Hamied Centre is a great space for our drama and film societies to use, as well as being a space for invited speakers and debates. It has a sound box and lighting rig as well as a projector and audio-visual facilities.
We also have a number of spaces for music, most notably the Chapel and the Bill Fitzgerald Music Room in Yusuf Hamied Court as a space for rehearsal and performance. See Music practice rooms.
Practical & religious facilities
Other facilities help with day-to-day life in College, whether it be the porters' lodge at the entrance to the College, the Welfare Room and Nurse's Surgery, or the Laundry Room.
Our students can use the College Prayer Room when they want to, and the Chapel is welcoming to students of all religions and none.
Accommodation
Our undergraduates live in College accommodation rooms, which are situated in all of the different courts in College as well as in houses in the roads immediately behind. Examples include rooms in the Blyth Building, the Stevenson Building , New Court Staircases 1-3, and New Court Staircase 4, as well as Jesus Lane and King Street rooms. We are very lucky to have all of our accommodation rooms together. Do see our accommodation page for more information.
