CLIFFE HOUSES

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

As two who welcome "the growing inevitability" of Radcliffe's merger with Harvard, we respect your Tuesday editorial on Radcliffe financial policy as an effort to gave the way. But we question whether your criticisms of Radcliffe's house projects is not misdirected.

There seems no reason to assume that Mrs. Bunting has not been interested in the viability of a united Harvard-Radcliffe for some time. The house projects, like the one much-criticized Hilles Library project, seem well conceived to suit that long-range interest of the community... Not only can these new and renovated houses be more private an flexible, but, also, by incorporating student suggestions for such things as cooking facilities and recreation spots for neighborhood charges, they stand a chance of furthering the movement which Hilles has begun of shifting the intellectual and social center of gravity further north.

Such efforts seem not misguided but essential if Harvard and Radcliffe are ever to unify living resources. Architecturally, Radcliffe already offers potential attractions, when its existing small buildings are contrasted with the large Harvard houses, and when the separated units of Currier are compared to the more monolithic design of Mather. Institutionally, Radcliffe may soon be in a position not simply to imitate Harvard houses, but to compete with them and cooperate with them. Since Harvard's houses seems likely to remain in one form another, isn't this new source of influence one to be strengthened and encouraged? Peter and Ann Wood '64