UC Berkeley’s Enclave Apartments features a unique Moorish Castle design

Located at the corner of Telegraph and Haste Avenues, just three blocks from campus, UC Berkeley’s new Enclave Apartments is nearing completion.

The building, which will feature 55 dorm rooms and have an overall capacity of 254 students, has what the university is calling a “Moorish Castle” design. The original project team was inspired by Italian hill towns, Tibetan forts, and the rock-cut architecture of Petra in Jordan, according to Berkeleyside.com. The top half of the seven-story building has a very Mediterranean-inspired design; it isn’t until you take a peak at the lower three levels where that Petra inspiration really begins to take shape.

The bottom three floors feature a rock facade that looks like it would be more at home in a Disney theme park than near a college campus. The building’s entrance will be made of concrete meant to look like rock with the Moorish castle sprouting from the top about three floors up.

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The all-gender facility will feature single gender, single and double rooms in shared apartments with two bathrooms. Other features include a shared kitchen with a living/dining area, an outside courtyard, two elevators, WiFi, a trash chute on each floor, and on-site laundry. Additionally, businesses will be housed on the ground floor.

The building is expected to be completed in the fall of 2020.