Like it or not, Phillips Hall is the closest thing UNC has to Hogwarts

Let’s talk about Phillips Hall, also known as “Southern Hogwarts.” Love it or hate it, if you had a class there, or have been inside the building, you’ll never forget it. It’s a masterpiece.

Home of the math and physics departments, it claims many souls. Dementors may or may not lurk around the corner, ready to plant one on you, but that will never diminish from its appeal. If anything, you get a taste of the Wizarding World, so you embrace it.

You’ll be confused

Imagine this: you walk up stairs centered on a massive brick building covered in windows, its architecture beautiful and unlike any other on campus. The bricks surround you and protect you. Some may say they entrap you, but that’s just Phillips showing you some love.

You enter the main door and are welcomed by a hallway passing right and left. Which path will you take? If you head left, you embark down a straight corridor. Going right will send you on a journey through a winding path reminiscent of your first day on campus.

“I DON’T KNOW WHERE I’M GOING! I NEED A MAP!” says Ebony, a freshman.

No matter how many times you enter this building, you will get lost. There’s only one explanation for this: Lord Voldemort set a curse upon it before his demise.

The construction

Myrtle? You there?

The original building is beautiful outside, with its Hogwartsian structure, and quite antiseptic inside, in part due to the scientific nature of its contents. The updated classrooms there utilize recent technologies, but the new wing attached to the building feels like a blast from the past. If you didn’t know the truth about the building, you’d think the old wing was the new one.

White walls and white tiled floors end abruptly as the new wing begins and you find yourself walking on gray tiles amid walls of a not-so-lovely sea green. But, at least the new colors get you out of the sterile environment.

The pipe-covered ceiling on the first floor would have Moaning Myrtle feeling right at home. She’d have plenty of space to roam.

Mystery surrounds it

The Dark Lord definitely left his mark – Phillips feels like the perfect setting for a horror movie. With a section of the basement no one can enter, another basement hallway with 24-hour surveillance and a single stairwell that leads to the roof, it seems like they’re hiding something. The Sorcerer’s Stone, perhaps?

No matter how many times you enter this cursed collection of hallways and sketchy doors, you will love the fact that you’re in Phillips Hall. With physics and math courses happening all the time, you soak in the solidarity of joy, tears, triumph and loss. Maybe there aren’t many who find joy here, but they definitely find friends.

It feels a little unsafe

Remember the bridge at Hogwarts and how safe it looked? Well, that’s not something Phillips can offer. Instead, you get a metal death trap between the two wings – one that feels a bit less safe with each passage.

“I always feel like the doors are going to lock behind me and I’ll be stuck three stories high on this metal contraption that might require a tetanus shot.” said Gabby, a sophomore.

Cross if you dare.

The temperature

If you can make it off the bridge, you may find yourself in a room without air conditioning. This is where we diverge from the idea of Hogwarts. There’s no way you would ever attempt to wear a robe in this building.

Phillips LOVES heat. When the temperature is 100 degrees outside, Phillips is in heaven. No need to fret, though. If you don’t enjoy the heat as much, you can always open a window…if Phillips allows. Sometimes it wants to keep you inside, like if you don’t have your Hogsmeade permission slip.

It’s home sweet home

Phillips is like a second home – like Hogwarts, but not Hogwarts. The stairwells don’t really move, it just seems like it. You may get lost, but you enjoy the journey. You may sweat like nobody’s business and feel unsafe on the bridge, but you love going back.

Phillips Hall is the source of many friendships and memories and everyone knows its quirks. Disagree if you will, but Phillips Hall is the best thing about UNC and the closest thing we have to the Wizarding World.