Between the months of January and March every year, two patches of grass in Duke’s athletic quarter fill up with tents occupied by undergraduate students camping out for tickets to the men’s basketball game against hated rival North Carolina at Cameron Indoor Stadium.
The process is, to put it bluntly, grueling. Interrupted nights of sleep, a series of team trivia tests and scheduling headaches to make sure enough people are in K-Ville at any given time to pass dreaded “tent checks” are just some of the challenges. But for all the difficulties it causes, tenting is one of Duke’s most cherished traditions and a bucket-list item for many undergraduates.
This is evident in many tents’ designs, which embrace the ritual’s absurdity to display exuberant decorations in support of their team and favorite players. This ranges everywhere from signs and spray paint to laser-cut wood, photoshopped flags and beyond.
So with this year’s tenting season officially behind us as of Sunday, let’s take a walk through 2024’s iteration of K-Ville to see some of the signs, decorations, names and other quirks that turned this makeshift tent city into one of campus’ most vibrant communities.
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Amid the jungle of tarps, foldable chairs and steady stream of undergrads funneling in and out of K-Ville at any given moment, one tent immediately catches the eye. Why? Because it’s bright pink.
“We had an iterative design process during winter break where we kind of just spam-chatted a lot of tent ideas, tent name ideas,” said Pratt junior Eliana Durkee, a three-year K-Ville resident and the tent’s captain. “What we've struggled with in the past is like we had a fun name, but we had no decorations that go with it. And so we wanted to pick a name we can decorate for, we can dress up for.”
The name they unanimously settled on was “Mojo Dojo Casa Tent,” a play on “Mojo Dojo Casa House” from the 2023 blockbuster “Barbie.” That name beat out “Genghis Sean” and the “Scheyera’s Tour.”
“What makes a good name is if it has good potential for costumes and decor, but it's also funny,” said Pratt junior Emma Fleischman.
The process of naming and designing the tent, purchasing costumes, studying for placement tests, scheduling shifts and managing social media all belonged to separate “committees” within the group. A crucial consideration in naming and assembling the “Mojo Dojo Casa Tent” was finding a theme that worked for everyone and would enable them all to look cohesive on gameday. Whereas years past would have each member dress independently, one key change for this year is that every member will don a pair of sunglasses and a cowboy hat in addition to whatever other accessories they individually procure.
“We can still preserve our individual styles because I feel like we're not the most conforming group,” Fleischman said. “We have a wide variety of shapes and sizes and personalities, and we don't want to wear the same thing.”
The tent itself is ornate. One centerpiece photo features two versions of Ryan Gosling as Ken, two horses, fire and a massive cutout of freshman guard Jared McCain’s face adorned on the front-facing wall outside. That sits next to a hand-crafted wooden door reading “McCain-dom Saloon,” which tent members constructed with wood from Home Depot and engraved using Adobe Illustrator and a laser cutter. Small 3-D printed horses are strung up like Christmas lights across the tent with duct tape.
McCain visited the tent the week before takedown and snapped a photo.
A short walk away, another compound sits kitty-corner to Cameron Indoor Stadium — one of a distinctly ancient sort. Well, if you consider a dinosaur piñata and inflatable palm trees ancient.
“Our tent actually has an official name and an unofficial name,” clarified Pratt senior Christopher Lloyd. “The official name is Jurassic Mark, which was actually invented by a line monitor who is a dear friend of some of us. And then the unofficial name is Jurassic Mark and the Velociproctors.” The name pays homage to sophomore players Mark Mitchell and Tyrese Proctor.
“Jurassic Mark” — with or without the addition— is one of K-Ville’s most exuberantly decorated tents, featuring a sweeping banner that reads “when dinosaurs ruled the earth,” extensive spray paint on the rust-colored tarp, a pair of blue Adirondack chairs, an astroturf mat and a few lawn flamingos. This “tent full of Mech-E’s” and “very handy people,” Lloyd said, even made an acrylic sign of the “Jurassic Park” logo with the tent’s name, surrounded by blue LEDs. Normally it is displayed prominently, but the group brought it inside to keep it from getting wet amid weekend storms.
The group also made use of the lamppost on their property to secure the aforementioned dinosaur piñata, and constructed a makeshift fence with some chicken wire by the tent’s entrance. Originally, the group roped caution tape around the lamppost as well, but Duke Athletics staff asked them to take that down.
“They didn't care about the fence because that's obviously not going to move,” Lloyd said. “Apparently a lamppost collapsed last year and they didn't want it to happen again. And so someone from athletics just asked us to kindly move some of our caution tape and we did, and I think it still looks wonderful … I think we ended up with a very beautiful design.”
Although “Jurassic Mark” did not win K-Ville’s annual tent decorating contest, one of many metrics that help determine the order in which groups enter Saturday’s game, Lloyd and the rest of his tent is just happy to have made their senior year one to remember.
“I was tenting last year, and obviously we were less nostalgic about it last year, because we still had some time left,” he said. “We've done a lot more walk-up lines, just looking toward the end. I would say that everyone's enjoyed it a lot. We've had a great time the past two years.”
The residents of “Jurassic Mark” will be wearing dinosaur masks to the game, though the rest of the getup has yet to be decided.
“Jurassic Mark” buddies up to “The Loch Ness Foster,” a Scottish-themed tent honoring freshman guard Caleb Foster. Trinity sophomores Arielle Zabusky and Jack Roberts said they picked the tent name for its “intimidation” factor and the “creative freedom” it allotted them for design features.
The tent resembles a cave, with a tarp hanging low on the entrance that forces one to duck to go inside. Yellow caution tape surrounds the tent alongside various warning signs that inform passersby to not trespass, or to swim, with the mythical creature. A large Scottish flag is hoisted on a narrow pole stuck in the ground, while the tarp is colored with bright yellow spray paint crossing out North Carolina logos and telling people to “Beware of the Loch Ness Foster!”
The showstopper, however, is a laser-cut wooden sign planted by the entrance which features an outline of Foster in front of a plesiosaur-like creature. Just off-center is a smattering of black ink — an autograph from Foster himself.
“They were giving us pizza,” Roberts said, “and we took it to him to sign. And he was very happy to sign it. The whole tent was pumped to see it getting some love.”
Nobody but two people in this tent had participated in the K-Ville ritual before 2024. One member, Trinity junior Mauro Mastrapasqua, joined the then-group of 11 by complete happenstance courtesy of the “tent finder,” a spreadsheet which displays tents that are looking for extra members to fulfill their 12-person requirement.
“Good to have Mauro on the team,” Roberts said.
Evidently, things worked out just fine.
The creativity of K-Ville is abundant as one walks through it. Just be careful not to trample mini white picket fences delineating tent boundaries, crush small garden gnomes or trip on the dozens of sopping-wet shoes left outside from late-night tent checks.
Looking for a nod to “The Devil Wears Prada?” Look no further than “The Devil Wears Proctor” and its autographed poster superimposing Proctor’s face on Meryl Streep’s. What about the “Scheyer Department?” Or “O’Sean’s 13,” a reference to the “Ocean’s 11” movie franchise featuring poker chips taped to the side of a tarp and a wooden prop reminiscent of Nevada’s famous “Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas” sign? They’re all there.
And what if you want a place to relax during the many hours spent outside between January and March? One group had a leather couch on its compound, while another student used a quiet getaway littered with trees to string up a hammock.
Beyond “Mojo Dojo Casa Tent,” “Jurassic Mark” or “The Loch Ness Foster,” K-Ville during tenting season is a way for Duke students to express themselves and their fandom with all the puns, references and creativity their hearts desire. It’s not just for a chance to see Saturday’s spectacle from a row or two closer, but an opportunity to build friendships and memories.
After all, for its absurdity, fatigue and frigidity, these committed undergraduates are living outside for a month. They might as well have some fun with it.
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Alyssa Ting is a Trinity junior and a photography editor of The Chronicle's 119th volume.
Andrew Long is a Trinity junior and sports editor of The Chronicle's 119th volume.