Cloister Inn Is Shutting Down for 2-3 Years for Renovations

The hot tub’s going cold — at least for now.

Cloister Inn, home to the only hot tub on the Street, is suspending operations for the next two to three years for major renovations. President Charlotte Cox ’26 and chairman of the Board of Governors Mike Jackman ’92 broke this news to members and alumni of the eating club in emails sent out June 13.

Since the pandemic, Cloister has struggled to attract students, drawing fewer than 50 members each year — by far the smallest club on the Street.

In November 2023, the board solicited proposals for interested sophomores to “take over” Cloister Inn, offering funds for events and officer positions if said groups could boost membership. Yet this takeover failed to materialize, and the decline continued.

Jackman, who began his term as chairman this year, wants bigger ideas. Cloister needs to reinvent itself to “meet the demands of the next century of Princeton students,” he wrote in his email to alumni.

“We can’t recruit our way out of our current membership deficit,” Jackman told PAW. He put the board’s concern simply: Over the past two years, more than 200 students have tried to join a club and walked away unaffiliated, as Cloister sits under capacity.

“There’s a lot of kids saying ‘Hey, we’re looking for a club, but we’re not willing to join Cloister,’” Jackman said. “How do you change that?”

Addressing Cloister’s 1924 clubhouse — which last saw renovation in the late 1980s — is the board’s first step. While plans remain in their infancy, they seek to modernize four key areas: dining, studying, infrastructure, and “playtime.”

Discussions between alumni and current students on how to “re-imagine Cloister” began at Reunions. A finalized vision and fundraising plan should emerge within the next six months, Jackman said. General manager David Goldsmith will stay on. Cloister seeks to find employment for other staff members at other eating clubs.

Though planning for the renovations will take some time, Jackman said the choice to suspend operations now gives Cloister members the chance to start the year in a new club. Jackman is in talks with Quadrangle Club and Colonial Club — themselves under capacity — to examine how current Cloister students could sign in for the next semester. He expects some students to bicker selective clubs in the fall or join the waitlists for Charter Club or Terrace Club.

Jackman said the club is committed to ensuring current members stay on the Street. He cited data from the University’s study last year on student satisfaction with housing and dining options on campus. Last June’s final report from Huron Consulting Group to the University showed students in eating clubs to be more satisfied with their Princeton experience than unaffiliated peers, as students and as alumni.

The Interclub Council echoed Jackman’s comments in a statement: “Senior exit surveys consistently show that undergraduates who join a club — any club — have a better overall Princeton experience.”

For Lexi Wong ’25, that story rings true: After an unsuccessful bicker, she joined Cloister on a friend’s recommendation. Wong loved its intimacy, and the next semester, she was elected its president.

Even then, Cloister members were discussing how to fix the decline. “It was definitely something, like, almost entrepreneurial about my class in Cloister,” Wong said. “They wanted to revive Cloister and really help it.”

Lake Liao ’27 joined Cloister this past spring. He wanted to join an eating club to participate in a classic Princeton experience, but he wasn’t settled on the idea and didn’t want to bicker.

“I’d thought that the sort of closeness that people talked about, in terms of what the eating clubs facilitate, was a bit of a story,” Liao said.

He chose Cloister for its welcoming vibe. Liao soon found himself studying in the library, making friends at Thursday “burgers and beers” nights, and hanging around the clubhouse.

The move to suspend operations came as a blow to Liao’s plans for junior year. He now intends to purchase a meal plan instead of joining another club. Liao has loved his time in Cloister but doesn’t know if it’s interchangeable: “I feel like it’s not totally necessary, or the right impulse, to jump ship.”