"Murray Edwards provides excellence in the education of outstanding young women from all backgrounds. The College is open and friendly, maintaining the traditions of a Cambridge college but at the forefront of innovation. Architecturally light and modern the College is set within colourful informal gardens and enjoys an art collection of international repute." New Hall was founded in 1954 as the "third foundation" for women students at Cambridge University at a time when Cambridge had the lowest proportion of women undergraduates of any university in the UK. Up to that time there were only two colleges that could accept women, Girton and Newnham, both founded in the late nineteenth century. Hughes Hall (although not a college of the University) was also allowed to admit up to 70 women students in all.