The Northeastern University London campus has effectively doubled in size after the university acquired four floors of One Portsoken, a high-rise building bordering London’s financial district.
Northeastern has opened nine new classrooms along with numerous study spaces and offices on the fifth floor of One Portsoken, or Portsoken, according to an article published by Northeastern’s media relations-run outlet Northeastern Global News, or NGN. The floor adds 27,513 square feet of space to the London campus.
The university has plans to open three more floors — totaling 98,000 square feet across all four floors — by fall 2025, NGN’s article reads.
The only non-North American campus owned by Northeastern was previously located exclusively on two and a half floors of a four-floor building called Devon House, which the New College of Humanities moved into in 2021 after it was acquired by the university in 2018. One Portsoken is located about three-quarters of a mile inland from Devon House.
“When I am at Devon House, I see more people waiting between classes, and they’re up to chat; it’s more bustling,” said Charlotte Gliddon, a second-year student studying politics and international relations in the double degree program at Northeastern London. “Portsoken is definitely the slightly calmer, younger campus.”
Alexandra Hill, a first-year London Scholar majoring in mechanical engineering, said she hasn’t noticed a disconnect between the buildings, describing them as giving off a similar, modern aesthetic.
Hill, who is from the United States and will only spend her first year in London, said she went to the university with the expectation that she’d be overwhelmed with the culture shock and homesickness. But she added that “location doesn’t matter as much if you’re engaged with your studies.” Hill has found herself involved in campus life through the London Husky Hunt and events thrown by the student union.
“Devon House is more of a social hub now, which has been very positive,” said Petar Petrov, a third-year NU London economics major and the NU London Student Union president. “Generally speaking, the space in Portsoken has become more academically oriented. Students in general, I think, we really like that. Now they have a way to split their work between Devon House and Portsoken.”
Now, Portsoken serves as a convenient meeting and classroom space. “I find that Portsoken is a really good space for classrooms in general. They’re really good sizes,” Gliddon said. “We’ve got huddle rooms there, which is really useful. Not only to practice presentations, et cetera, but you can also do tutor meetings, group work meetings, which is very, very useful.”
Chapter Spitalfields, a student housing building where much of the campus resides, is another half mile north from Portsoken.
“It’s really nice that it’s in a line because you see people kind of walking with their friends and then one will go to Portsoken and one will continue on to Devon House,” Gliddon said.
“It has freed up a lot of study space in Devon House, which was much needed because Devon House is quite a small building and the number of students was increasing dramatically with both the three-year students and the Global and London scholars,” said Euan Wilkins Campbell, a third-year UK LLB Honors Law student on the London campus.
In fall 2023, NGN reported that NU London welcomed 1,050 new students. Although Northeastern doesn’t report the total number of students on its global campuses, the incoming 2023 NU London class saw a significant increase from its 2018-2019 population, which consisted of 197 undergraduate and 13 postgraduate students.
Campbell said he wants to see NU London continuing to expand while prioritizing student socialization.
“If we keep expanding but they’re not putting that dedicated space to the student socialization aspect of it, it then just becomes a bit of a mess in my opinion, where, once again, you’d be socializing right where you study,” he said.
“As the university expands, there needs to be awareness of the university being in the UK and appreciating what comes with the British university and the traditions of it,” Campbell said.
