Eliot Hall was one of the three blocks of students hostels (the other two were Lugard and May Wings) designed in the early 1910s by the Architect Messrs Denison, Ram and Gibbs in the same style as the Main Building of the University - the Neo-Classical Edwardian (after King Edaward VII who reigned from 1901 - 1910) manner of red brick and white inlays which characterized many British College architecture of the period. The three buildings were named Old Halls in 1966 after a landslide and a storm and the earliest of the three - Lugard Wing - was demolished in 1991 to give way to new development in the campus; and Chong Yuet Ming Chemistry and Physics buildings were built on the Lugard Hall site.

Eliot Hall now houses Journalism and Media Studies Centre and the Foundation Chamber. May Hall, has been converted into University offices and Centre of Buddhist Studies. These two halls have witnessed from the first generation student hostel life in campus. Its architectural forms - the classical ideals of symmetry and proportion - not only conform to the best tradition of its time but also adapt ingeniously - with balconies, arcades and cascading terraces - to the local climatic and topographical conditions.