Eliot House

Welcome to Eliot

Eliot isn’t just a place to live. It's a community. Swinging between the Inn and renovations, home is wherever the Eliotites are. Without further ado, welcome to the DOMUS!

All Roads Lead to Dome

Perched right on the Charles River, Eliot House wakes up to beautiful natural scenery, yet is just within reach of the bustling Harvard Square. Named in honor of the longest-serving president of Harvard, Charles W. Eliot, Eliotites inherited his grandeur, accomplishments, and fancy bow ties (you’ll get it later!). Some famous alumni include track athlete Gabby Thomas ’19, actress Rashida Jones ’97 from “Parks and Recreation,” and conductor Leonard Bernstein ’39. Yes, as in the Bernstein who made “West Side Story” and left his piano in Eliot’s bell tower, or the Cupola that also doubles as a recording studio. Welcome to Eliot, where even the furniture has pedigree!

If that doesn’t scream iconic, Eliotites are also the friendliest people you’ll ever meet. “You could be a freshman, right, who comes in to enhanced dinner, and you just sit with a group of maybe juniors or seniors, and they will gladly invite you,” HoCo Co-Chair Drima P. Patel ’27 said. “I’ve done that so many times, and that is how we make friends, and that’s how we have become such a big family.” Sounds like orientation week at Berg…but with more charm and fewer awkward icebreakers!

The house itself also reflects this energy. Eliot prides itself on having a fully enclosed courtyard, so to get to the dining hall or dorms, you have to cross through it. There will always be people playing spikeball, volleyball, and football while tutors walk their dogs. Eliotites are always coming together full circle, just like the courtyard itself. But the Eliot family is incomplete without David and Bonnie — the most caring and affectionate faculty deans ever (think Bonnie and Clyde, but the Aquaman x Rapunzel version). First-name basis with a dean? Eliot: check. This actually applies to every staff member in the House because everyone is family.

Domus Where the Heart Is

Let’s talk about the elephant in the room. We know what you’re thinking: isn’t Eliot under renovation? Will the swing housing affect community morale? “If not, I’ve honestly seen more people come since swing housing, just because the house is really the people, not a place,” HoCo Co-Chair Dev S. Ahuja ’27 said. “People show up because they miss how much we see each other in the dhall and how much we would see everyone in the courtyard playing, so to make up for that, people are showing up to events and study breaks and stuff.”

The Class of 2029 may be afraid to miss out on a true Eliot experience, but they will actually get the best of both worlds. As a sophomore, you are effectively guaranteed a roommate in the Inn, which is basically a hotel with an indoor gym, yoga studio, library, and all the amenities you can imagine. But most importantly, there is AC! Imagine sleeping with a cold pillow in the Boston heat! That’s a new wonder of the world! Also, out of all the houses that resided in the Inn during their renovation period, students said only Eliot made it feel like a true home. Eliotites creatively took their emblematic mural with mastodons and iconic quotes from their basement and created a wallpaper to wrap it around the Inn dhall. Faculty also brought the original flags and banners, Eliot House’s poem, tin-type portraits, and even renamed the Inn to the Dome. All of this took months, but everyone strongly believes that Eliot is where the Eliotites are at.

Even the upperclassmen swing housing, the Prescotts, embrace the true Eliot spirit. Imagine this: a 2000s New York City apartment with wooden floors, warm lighting, massive windows with amazing natural light, tiled bathroom floors with a bathtub (bubble baths :) ), a full kitchen, a full living room, enormous bedrooms, and built-in cabinets. Isn’t that a dream? Some Eliotites hold high tea every day in their cozy and well-decorated common rooms, served in Eliot-branded tea ware. Let’s be real, who else got as much taste as Eliotites, literally and figuratively? No one. If there’s another massive snow day, everyone in Prescott will survive and probably make the best memories while cooking dinner together. Harvard builds houses, but Eliotites build homes.

Fortunately, renovations are on track to be done by the summer of 2027! So you guys will be the first to live in new Eliot, and as juniors and seniors, you’ll get the best rooms. Bathrooms will not be en-suite to ensure more singles, doubles, and suites. There may also potentially be a suite with capacity for more than a dozen residents and another suite in the tower. They are likely to become party suites, along with the famous Ground Zero, which has built-in bars. How awesome is that! Eliot will still maintain its dark academia and gothic aesthetic, underground tunnels, dhall, library, and all their historic spaces. However, there won’t be any exposed plumbing, elevators will be added, and hallways will be long, not high (stairs were sooo last year). The basement will look nicer with the grille area expanded. So the main takeaway: patience is a virtue.

Eliottle Bit Dramatic, But That’s Eliot

Did you know that back in the days, you had to apply and be interviewed to be a part of Eliot House? Crazy! But Eliot lives up to its name of being “more Harvard than Harvard itself” by continuing its rich and luxurious traditions.

Staying true to its River House roots, Eliot has a big rowing culture. Located right beside the Weld Boathouse, Eliot prides itself on the oars decorating its walls. Needless to say, it is ranked at the top for IM sports, and its team is headed for the Straus Cup!

Every house holds biweekly Steins, but no one does it like Eliot! The Eliot House Committee host these themed events where everyone gathers to have fun while being served bottomless everything. But unique to Eliot is a monthly enhanced dinner, an opportunity for Eliotites to reconnect with fellow Eliotites, faculty deans, staff, and even professors. Think Faculty Dinner, but livelier. Once a semester, there is a very special enhanced dinner that is more formal and lasts two to three hours, with fancy tablecloths, centerpieces, and special recipes made and served by Eliot staff, who also dress up for the occasion. Now, that’s a lot of dinners, but Eliotites most notably enjoy the Holiday Dinner and the Charles Eliot Dinner, which are the fanciest and most traditional.

But to also build community, Eliot’s faculty deans host Tiny Desk, where students show off their secret talents, like playing the accordion and performing parodies. This already sounds like an amazing night, but to make this even better, Eliot holds weekly screenings at the Golden Arm! It is known as the only house on campus to host student-run movie screenings, with customized movie theater chairs and movie-themed snacks and drinks.

Like every other Harvard student, Eliotites work late into the night, tackling classes and extracurriculars. After all, they are Ravenclaws, and Eliot’s bell tower was featured in “Legally, Blonde.” So... “what? like it’s hard?” Definitely not with the Eliot Grille, which keeps everyone powering through with late-night cravings.

And obviously, if there is one event that Eliot is especially known for, it’s got to be Fête! Eliot’s spring formal is a scene straight out of The Great Gatsby, but like the outdoor country club version. As a matter of fact, the renovation is a blessing in disguise because Eliot has its budget rearranged, so the upcoming Fête is bound to be even grander!

From voting for the theme to picking the live performers through a Battle of the Bands, the planning process involves the entire Eliot community, because everyone’s voice matters. This is the biggest and most elaborate spring formal on campus, and the tickets are also the most sought-after. Every Eliotite gets two tickets: one for themselves and one for a plus-one. The plus-one ticket can be upsold to over a hundred dollars, and sometimes non-Eliotites try to sneak in 24 or 48 hours beforehand. Hence, the creation of the Senior Guard, where seniors sign up to stand guard and ID anyone coming through the Eliot gates with water guns to keep Fête Eliot-only.

Fête and its preparations last a full week. You start with chocolate strawberry dipping, then a bow-tie workshop (President Eliot callback + important life skill!), followed by line-dancing, and then the grand formal! This is many Eliotites’ a “you had to be there “ moment because no words can describe how spirited Fête is. “Literally, last song in the night was ‘Shout’ and everyone just had such a great night, and at this point, it’s just people of Eliot House that are left on the dance floor,” Patel said. “And it’s everyone just, throwing it back to ‘Shout,’ man. It was so fun. My whole blocking group, every time we talk about anything, it’s always this moment of how much fun we had dancing to ‘Shout.’” You know Eliot gets down, so keep your eyes peeled for that plus-one ticket because FOMO hits hard. It is coming up, so does anyone need a plus-one? No returns or exchanges needed…

Want E-liot More? Hear the HoCo Co-Chairs Out!

You know, it’s ok to be obsessive. Who doesn’t love being the main character in The Great Gatsby? Let’s get your burning questions answered by Ahuja and Patel!

If you had to describe Eliot House in 3 words, what would they be?

DPP: Classy. Close-knit. Cheerful.

Who is the “main character” archetype of Eliot house?

DSA: The Ralph Lauren Bear.

DPP: We have a mastodon in this Ralph Lauren outfit with the khakis and Eliot sweater, and we give it to all first years in their house welcome bag.

Finish the sentence: You know you’re in Eliot when…

DSA: You don’t want to leave.

And that’s how Eliot swings! Even just having Eliot bit more hope and letting it dom-inate your thoughts as you pray to the River Gods is one step closer to being a part of this wonderful community! As per true Eliotite fashion, Floreat Domus de Eliot!

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