Yale’s new residential colleges, by Robert Stern Architects. (Peter Aaron/OTTO)

Winners of the eighth annual Charles Bulfinch awards include the new residential colleges at Yale designed by Robert Stern Architects. That is the most significant project of classical architecture in America in recent years, and possibly for years to come. Those of us who love to immerse ourselves in classical architecture are lucky it is in New England, or it would not have been eligible, let alone so easy to visit.

People who view the Benjamin Franklin and Pauli Murray colleges, which placed first in the “institutional” category, will better understand the allure of new classical architecture – that is, assuming visitors to the new college do not confuse them with, shall we say, “pre-existing” classical architecture. So one of the vital purposes of the Bulfinches is to let people know that certain winning structures are recently built.

“It is not good because it is old, it is old because it is good.” Someday that will be true of these two new Yale Colleges.

My apologies for lingering on just a single Bulfinch laureate. To see the rest – and they are very, very good – click on the announcement of the winners in the Boston Design Guide. Sandy Giardi’s summary comments (with pix, of course) are interesting. So you don’t have to lift your finger to click on the BDG link in order to see the winning projects, here is a list, with pix:

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LeBlanc Jones Landscape Architects, Inc. – “John L. Gardner Estate” – Landscape Architecture

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Dell Mitchell Architects – “Brick House” – Residential Restoration, Renovation or Addition

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Carpenter & MacNeille – “Oakledge” – Residential New Construction over 5,000 square feet

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Campbell/Smith Architects – “Norton St. Home” – Residential New Construction under 5,000 square feet

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Robert A.M. Stern Architects LLP – “Benjamin Franklin College and Pauli Murray College, Yale University” – Institutional

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Carpenter & MacNeille Woodworking – “Nantucket Bunk Room” – Craftsmanship/Artisanship

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G. P. Schafer Architect – “Alterations for House by the Sea” – Interior Design

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Ronald Lee Fleming – Patron

The award for Patronage is chosen annually by the board of the ICAA New England Chapter from recommendations, also by the board, of individuals who have devoted themselves to the mission of appreciating and reviving classical architecture and its allied arts in New England. Ronald Lee Fleming, of Newport, is a noted urban planner and philanthropist whose “cottage” on Bellevue Avenue features a “backyard” filled with delightful follies – nominally useless features of mostly classical architecture, useful, however, for enlivening the spirit – among which the board and other guests have been pleased to stroll in the past.

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This year’s jury for the other awards was composed of Marc Appleton, Thomas Pheasant and Greg Tankersley. The laureates will be celebrated on Saturday, April 28, at a gala in the Harvard Club of Boston, at 374 Commonwealth Ave., Boston. Reception begins at 6 p.m. For information on reservations for the gala and two lectures to be delivered in association with the awards program, please visit the Bulfinch Page of the chapter website.