Queen's lower campus has the largest remaining green space on Queen's main campus. It runs from University Avenue to Arch Street south of Kingston Hall, Theological Hall, and Summerhill. It consists of a full-sized playing field, Nixon Field (formerly known as Kingston Field); two public tennis courts; an area of small, grassy hills; and Founders' Row, the tree-lined road that curves from Stuart Street up to Theological Hall.
Near Summerhill, there is a stone and wrought-iron gate leading into the area, donated by the Arts class of 1910. Until the late 1960s, this gate was located near the west end of Kingston Hall.
Just west of the tennis courts is a large steel sculpture shaped like a picture frame. Called "Ground Outline," it was created by the Peterborough artist Peter Kolisnyk in 1978 and purchased by Queen's in 1981.
Lower campus was the centre of a bitter dispute in the 1960s, when Queen's Trustees decided to place a new physics building on Kingston Field. Harsh condemnations of the decision by alumni, students, staff, and faculty -including Professor A. Lower - forced the trustees to reconsider and place the building, Stirling Hall, on Queen's Crescent (now Bader Lane).