Inverted Fountain UCLA
The well-known fountain with a long history
The Inverted Fountain UCLA is the famous fountain that has inspired several orientation traditions and superstitions. It is called the Inverted Fountain because rather than spraying upwards as a spring, the fountain’s spring descends into a crater below. To read more about the Inverted Fountain UCLA, click the button below.
According to the UCLA Newsroom, former Chancellor Franklin D. Murphy tasked the architectural landscape team, with principal designer Howard Troller, to create a fountain that did not spray water upwards in Franz Hall Court. UCLA Alumni added that the nontraditional fountain design was set in place to avoid the wind tunnel in the court that would potentially spray water at the Bruin community walking past, so Troller designed an inverted fountain.
Both the UCLA Newsroom and UCLA Alumni webpages, linked above, describe how Howard Troller decided to design the fountain based on a childhood recollection of Yellowstone’s natural springs in the ground. The Inverted Fountain UCLA was officially completed on March 18, 1968, with Troller’s selection of rocks taken from Claremont, California, the UCLA Newsroom notes.
The Inverted Fountain has an off-centered 12-foot wide and five-foot deep crater that recirculates approximately 10,000 gallons per minute, according to The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF). To read more from the TCLF on this unusual fountain, click the button below.
After the fountain was created, the Inverted Fountain UCLA started to become a common place for students to frequent. Over the decades, a particular orientation tradition has been upheld at the fountain; according to the UCLA Alumni slang webpage, becoming “Bruintized” is the process where students become a True Bruin during True Bruin Orientations. New students are often guided by orientation leaders to take an oath and touch the waters of the fountain. Once this is complete, it is said that students should not touch the fountain water until graduation, or risk the possibility of needing to take an additional quarter at UCLA before graduating.
To visit the Inverted Fountain UCLA, the UCLA Map is a helpful resource to locate the fountain. Nearest to Parking Structure 2, the fountain can be found at the southeast area of campus between the Ostin Music Center, Knudsen Hall and Pritzker Hall. The address is 595 Charles E. Young Drive, East Los Angeles, CA 90024.