what is the largest house

[irishpipes]

Originally Posted by Coramoor

I'm not sure what the fetish is with having the largest Fraternity/Sorority house is. It can be huge, but still look really cheap and probably not have a long lige. A stronger consideration should be the nicest looking/designed fraternity/sorority house.

Yep.

[Firehouse]

Ha. I see an FSUPhi beat me to it. We have a long standing good-natured rivalry, and both of us just built new houses. The reason the cost for houses of this size may seem low (Pike cost $4.5 million; Phi Delt $4 million ++) is because there was little or no land costs for the fraternities, and the University built the infrastructure and provided 100 parking places per house. The chapters had to pay very litte of the cost; we could put all our money into bricks & mortar.

Pike, Phi Delt and Lambda Chi just finished building new houses. Sig Ep and ATO will break ground soon. All five will be more or less the same size. Phi Delt built three unconnected buildings. If they house 66 men then they have the largest house capacity. Website: http://www.fsuphidelt.org/index.asp LXA built two unconnected houses. Website: http://www.lxafsu.com/
Pike built one enormous 40,000 square foot house all under one roof. It houses 60 men. Website: http://www.fsupikes.com/
the Pike house is the largest fraternity house in the nation under one roof. It's possible that Phi Delt has the largest fraternity house in the nation under three roofs.
Rush was great this fall. All three of us pledged between 45-60 men each.

Couple of other points brought up previously in this thread:
1. About Pike being the largest fraternity in the nation...
It's been published before, but: SAE has more total initiates; Sig Ep has the most undergraduates in a given year; TKE has the most chapters; Phi Kappa Psi has the alrgest endowment; Pike has the largest average chapter size among all fraternities, and has had that for twenty years or more.
All of this information is inconsequential because it discounts the strength of great fraternities like, well, Phi Delt, Beta Theta Pi, Sigma Chi and many others.

2. Sig Ep house at Mississippi State is the largest fraternity house in mississippi. Since 1960 the Pikes house there had that distinction. When the Sig Eps built their new house the deliberately built it one square foot larger.

[Elephant Walk]

Two of the Biggest LXA Houses I have seen and been in is Arkansas and UnOk.

That's the biggest you've seen?

Their's is certainly nice, I like it alot, but it's not all that big.

At Arkansas, our best architecture is our fraternity and sorority houses and Ole Main. Otherwise, the rest of the buildings are aesthetic (sp?) nightmares. You should see the Sigma Chi or Kappa Sig houses here, they are absolutely huge and beautiful.

[macallan25]

i couldn't really tell what Pike looked like.......but I don't like LXA or Phi Delt at all.......Phi Delt looks like a school/office building...and LXA looks like an apartment complex. There is no character or uniqueness to them at all. They remind me of a spec home....only massive in size.

[Firehouse]

I'm sorry the photos don't do the houses justice. The Phi Delt house is extremey impressive. The LXA house design is a little more subdued but very well laid-out and the members love it. The Pike house is, a-hem, fabulous.
True, none of the houses have the character of old southern homes, but all the houses here are bult to compete with the huge apartment rental market. With FSU, FAMU and the junior college, Tallahassee is home to about 70,000 college students.

[kstar]

Originally Posted by irishpipes

Then I would highly doubt that it is the largest. AOII is building a 30,000 square foot house at Arkansas, and I haven't heard anything about it being the "new" largest sorority house. At OU, the Alpha Phi house doesn't even appear to be the largest. Is it really larger than the DG house there? I know that looks an be deceiving, but a couple of houses there look larger than the Alpha Phi house.

The old Phi Mu/Alpha Phi house at OU is actually over 30,000 sq. ft. and it is twice the size of the DG house at OU (which isn't even in the top 5 houses in terms of size.) It is deceptively large, 3 stories, and can house over 100 women. All in BEDROOMS- no sleeping porches.

Phi Mu has now bought the old ZTA house, from when they left. The Alpha Phi house stands empty, but there was a rumor that they would be coming back to OU since Zeta left.

[irishpipes]

Originally Posted by kstar

The old Phi Mu/Alpha Phi house at OU is actually over 30,000 sq. ft. and it is twice the size of the DG house at OU (which isn't even in the top 5 houses in terms of size.) It is deceptively large, 3 stories, and can house over 100 women. All in BEDROOMS- no sleeping porches.

Phi Mu has now bought the old ZTA house, from when they left. The Alpha Phi house stands empty, but there was a rumor that they would be coming back to OU since Zeta left.

The Alpha Phi on this thread posted that the OU Alpha Phi house is 29,000 square feet. Maybe there have been additions. Who knows. Twice the size of DG? What is the size of the DG house? I just used DG as an example because it is another fairly new house at OU, and it appears very large, although I have no idea what the square footage is.

Also, Alpha Phi has recolonized at OU this Fall. I understand they accepted around 100 women, are renovating the house, and will be moving back in for Fall 2007.

[kstar]

Originally Posted by irishpipes

The Alpha Phi on this thread posted that the OU Alpha Phi house is 29,000 square feet. Maybe there have been additions. Who knows. Twice the size of DG? What is the size of the DG house? I just used DG as an example because it is another fairly new house at OU, and it appears very large, although I have no idea what the square footage is.

Also, Alpha Phi has recolonized at OU this Fall. I understand they accepted around 100 women, are renovating the house, and will be moving back in for Fall 2007.

I don't know the exact size of the DG house, but the footprint is about half the size of the A Phi house. I'm pretty sure that the DG house is smaller than Theta and even the Alpha Gam house. I know that DG house uses sleeping porches to maximize the number of girls it can house.

Being a grad student, I haven't a clue about the current climate in south greek, aside from the kid that got hit because there are no sidewalks.

[PeppyGPhiB]

Just to give the west coast some love, I direct you to the U-Dub Chi Omega house, which claims to be "the second largest fraternal structure west of the Mississippi"

http://students.washington.edu/chiomega/ourhouse.html

And, it even looks pretty from the outside (in my opinion)

[OleMissGlitter]

Originally Posted by PeppyGPhiB

Just to give the west coast some love, I direct you to the U-Dub Chi Omega house, which claims to be "the second largest fraternal structure west of the Mississippi"

http://students.washington.edu/chiomega/ourhouse.html

And, it even looks pretty from the outside (in my opinion)

That house is amazing!

[PeppyGPhiB]

Originally Posted by OleMissGlitter

That house is amazing!

Isn't it? I'm in love with several of the houses at UW, of course I've only seen them from the outside since I didn't go to school there.

[norcalluvbug]

however, the largest physical sorority house that is west of the mississippi river is on the university of colorado campus. or actually i guess you would consider it off campus, but it is in boulder on the hill.

[sooneralumni]

Originally Posted by kstar

I don't know the exact size of the DG house, but the footprint is about half the size of the A Phi house. I'm pretty sure that the DG house is smaller than Theta and even the Alpha Gam house. I know that DG house uses sleeping porches to maximize the number of girls it can house.

Being a grad student, I haven't a clue about the current climate in south greek, aside from the kid that got hit because there are no sidewalks.

_________________________________

Well, I have a set of the blueprints right now on my dining room table for the A-Phi house at OU and it's 29,000 s.f., we are spending $1.4 million completely renovating it and yes, it will be full next fall with most of our 100+ new members! We are so excited to be back on campus and the house will have a Starbucks type study lounge, spa bathrooms, gorgeous hardwoods, brick outdoor dining room, all new decor and furniture, etc. All bedrooms will house 2 girls (a few 3 girl rooms) with custom furniture.

I don't think anyone will ever know for sure WHAT house is the biggest in the nation as most houses probably don't even have current blueprints on them. So everyone can say theirs is the biggest and no one will be the wiser!

Looks are deceiving though...our 3rd floor is with dormers and our newer wing stretches out in the back, so just driving by, it probably doesn't look bigger then some of the others. I am just so thrilled our Chapter has recolonized with some awesome girls, our house will be shiny and new again, and we are back for good!

Phi alumn - '97 graduated

[Mooch279]

I'm not sure of the numbers but looking at the picture the Lambda Chi house at Indiana Univ. is a big freaking house. http://www.indiana.edu/~lxa/

[madmax]

Originally Posted by Firehouse

Pike, Phi Delt and Lambda Chi just finished building new houses. .

What happened to their original houses?