The Lovett School has broken ground for Rita Anne Rollins Hall, a new state-of-the-art campus hub for worship, dining, the arts, and student support.
The ceremony, held on Lovett’s 100-acre campus on West Paces Ferry Road, helps usher in the school’s yearlong Centennial Celebration, according to a press release.
The hub honors Rita Anne Rollins (Class of ’72), the oldest child of Randall and Peggy Rollins. The family’s $30 million gift, announced in November 2025, is the largest single gift in the school’s history and among the largest ever made to an independent K-12 school in the United States.
Rising on the site of the former Community Center, which opened in 1960, Rollins Hall will feature a light-filled chapel, expanded and reimagined dining spaces, an expansive campus green to connect the Lower, Middle, and Upper Schools, state-of-the-art performing arts spaces, and intentionally designed classrooms, studios, and makerspaces to meet expanded curricular offerings for students.
Rollins Hall will open its doors in Fall 2028.
“This is a proud day and historic moment for The Lovett School,” Head of School Meredyth Cole, said in the release. “Lovett started as a dream by our founder, Eva Edwards Lovett, one hundred years ago, who envisioned a school that prioritized a child’s holistic development over rote learning, or as she put it, an extension of the home, supporting ‘full and continuous physical, mental, and social development.’ This building will quite literally make her dream a reality.
The centennial year honors the school’s 1926 founding by Eva Edwards Lovett and will feature a community-wide storytelling series, an interactive artifacts display, an original documentary film, and the Centennial Gala on Oct. 24, 2026. More information, including the full programming schedule, is available at Lovett100.org.
