Celebrating 50 years since the University of Nottingham received its Charter in 1948, this is a scholarly critique of the architecture which symbolizes a modern civic university. From its genesis in an arguably Reptonian landscape, the University of Nottingham has grown to include a diverse building stock which reflects not only the aspirations of an ambitious university but also the pluralist state of 20th-century British architecture. This is a critical appraisal of the University's key buildings in a political and art-historical context.