A-Z of universities: Royal Holloway

ROYAL HOLLOWAY, University of London

Age: 149, if you count from the founding of Bedford College, or 112 from when Royal Holloway College was opened by Queen Victoria.

History: Both Royal Holloway and Bedford were women's colleges affiliating to London University in 1900. They became mixed by the 1970s, merging in 1985 when Bedford gave up its glorious campus in Regent's Park. And Bedford lost its name later because Royal Holloway and Bedford New College was too much of a mouthful even for higher education.

Address: Divine bucolic 120-acre campus in Surrey between the village of Englefield Green and the town of Egham.

Ambience: Fun and friendly. Small, not claustrophobic; close to London but still green. Famous for Grade 1 Founder's Building, ornate redbrick structure, Thomas Holloway's dream palace, modelled on the Chateau de Chambord in the Loire Valley. (Thomas Holloway was a Victorian entrepreneur who became wealthy through marketing pills.) The 500 student bedrooms in Founder's are the most sought after on campus.

Vital Statistics: Upmarket reputation, particularly in the arts. Recruits heavily from the Home Counties. Has 6,000 students, including postgraduates, lots from overseas. One in five entrants over the age of 21. Merger with Bedford meant expansion via a pounds 24m building programme.

Added value: Good for sport. Plenty of student jobs on campus. College Picture Gallery contains more than 70 paintings from the high Victorian period (Landseer, Millais etc) collected by Thomas Holloway. You can see them by arrangement. Plan to flog them off was defeated. Instead a Turner seascape and two other pictures were sold for pounds 11m to provide for upkeep of Founder's Building.

Easy to get into? Economics ABB at A-level; English ABC; physics BBC; biological science BCC.

Glittering alumni: George Eliot; David Bellamy; opera singers Felicity Lott and Susan Bullock; Diana Warwick, CVCP chief executive; Richmal Crompton, author of Just William books; Baroness Fookes, ex-deputy speaker of the House of Commons; Roger Wright, BBC head of classical music; Pippa Greenwood, BBC gardener; John Moloney, comedian; Nicholas Greenstock, England rugby player; journalists Emma Freud and Francis Wheen.

Transport links: London is 19 miles away. Hop on a college bus to Egham station and you're in Waterloo in 40 minutes.

Who's the Boss? Unflappable mathematician Norman Gowar, who is game for boogying the night away at Christmas parties.

Teaching rating: Rated 23 out of maximum of 24 in drama, theatre and media arts; 21 for French, Italian and social policy.

Research: Came 19th out of 101 in the research assessment exercise. Awarded tip-top 5* in music as well as drama, theatre and media arts. Achieved a 5 (top grade) in classics, French, history, Italian, psychology and geography.

Financial health: In the black.

Nightlife: To make up for the deadness of Egham, students' union runs big entertainment nights three nights a week. And it attracts big-name bands - Lightning Seeds, Bamboo, Dannii Minogue, Ocean Colour Scene, ChumbaWumba, Gina Gee and Space.

Cheap to live in? Weekly rent in catered hall ranges from pounds 44 for a shared room to pounds 70 for a single, en suite room. Rent outside from pounds 58 to pounds 80 a week.

Buzzphrase: Whatcha gorgeous! (student greeting).

Next week: St Andrews.