[by Olin Ericksen, Charlottesville Daily Progress]

Sitting cross-legged in the sunlight, University of Virginia student Ariel Cornett looked up from studying to admire her setting.

The Rotunda, columned pavilions, a lush rectangular lawn flanked by hidden ornate gardens — close to how Thomas Jefferson imagined them nearly 200 years ago — surround her.

“It’s beautiful,” she said. “It inspires you.”

Now an updated exhibit opening today at the newly renovated UVa Art Museum offers Cornett and others a chance to see how it got that way.

“Thomas Jefferson’s Academical Village: The Creation of an Architectural Masterpiece” delves deep into the UVa founder’s crown jewel in design and building.

The same hands that helped to craft the Declaration of Independence and signed laws as a U.S. president also drew the collection of buildings and landscaping still considered the architectural cornerstones of UVa today.

“Architecture was one of his great passions,” said Richard Guy Wilson, UVa Commonwealth Professor of Architectural History and curator for the exhibit.

“He said somewhere that ‘one of my great delights is putting up and pulling down.’”

Jefferson is known for other architectural achievements, such as his Albemarle County hillside estate of Monticello. Monticello and the Academical Village are designated as World Heritage Sites.

[for complete article, follow link in headline]