Joe Tsai ’82 signs his name to the wooden “jump circle” removed from the old basketball court that will be displayed in Tsai Field House.
A Hub of Campus Life
Lawrenceville celebrated the long-awaited completion of Tsai Field House, its united dining and athletics facility, with its chief benefactors, Joe Tsai ’82 and Clara Wu Tsai.
Tsai Field House, the culmination of a multiyear endeavor to fortify the heart and soul of the Lawrenceville community through a unified dining and athletic facility, was celebrated and dedicated on May 17 in a ceremony set in its distinctive Harkness courtyard. The new hub for campus life, Tsai Field House creates opportunities for various aspects of wellness and extends the School’s commitment to environmental sustainability with LEED Silver certification by the U.S. Green Building Council.
Expressing gratitude to Joe Tsai ’82 and Clara Wu Tsai, the principal supporters of the project, Head of School Stephen S. Murray H’54 ’55 ’63 ’65 ’16 P’16 ’21 said they were in total alignment with the needs of the School from the start.
“Joe understood from the outset what we were trying to accomplish by combining dining, athletics, health and wellbeing, and community recreation,” Murray said. “Celebrating and reinforcing community with a key priority of the Emerge Transformed campaign, and he was on board from the beginning.
My favorite part of the day at Lawrenceville was during dinner time. When you play sports and when you have meals together, (these) are the things I remember about life at Lawrenceville.
Jonathan G. Weiss ’75, chair of the Board of Trustees, said the Tsais and others who joined them in making significant gifts to the project have “created a field house and dining complex that I’m confident creates a new playing field among independent schools.”
The purpose in creating an athletics and wellness facility and dining hall to become a hub of campus life was very much drawn from Tsai’s experience in coming to Lawrenceville from Taiwan in 1977 at just 13 years old. He poignantly noted that some of the most transformative moments of his experience occurred on the sports fields and in the dining hall.
“As a First Former who came from a very different culture and spoke very little English, I didn’t want to stand out, so my desire was to assimilate to the school life and into the community,” he recalled, adding that he viewed sports as his entrée into the community, a way to make friends and earn the respect of his peers.
“My favorite part of the day at Lawrenceville was during dinner time,” he said. “When you play sports and when you have meals together, (these) are the things I remember about life at Lawrenceville.” The first phase of the Tsai Field House project was completed in 2022, providing students with a new pool, ice rink, and light-filled dining room with its signature curvilinear roof.
Attendees at the dedication of Tsai Field House gathered in its distinctive Harkness Courtyard on May 17, 2024.
The second phase ties the complex together with a new entrance to a spacious lobby facing the historic heart of campus. The lobby arcs around a curving courtyard, its form inspired by the oval-shaped Harkness tables used in classrooms, suggesting a spirit of inclusion. A wooden canopy ringing the courtyard draws students into two ends of the lobby from the residential and academic sides of campus.
Phase II includes renovated squash courts, a basketball court, a wrestling room, a community fitness center, locker rooms, athletic training facilities, two new multipurpose spaces, and a snack area. The bridge from the new construction opens onto a mezzanine with a sweeping view of the historic vaulted field house, with an all-new indoor track and multipurpose athletics arena below.