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The planning of learning spaces and the unification of each grade around a shared nexus of academic support, creativity hub, and collaborative workspaces offer definitive wayfinding and day-to-day functional adaptability.
Marty Pollio
Superintendent, Jefferson County Public Schools
By carefully developing a beautiful rural property, we minimized construction costs and optimized the connections between the building and the site.
The planning of learning spaces and the unification of each grade around a shared nexus of academic support, creativity hub, and collaborative workspaces offer definitive wayfinding and day-to-day functional adaptability.
Familiar educational architecture materials are subtly tweaked to deliver the unexpected, yet affordable aesthetic, while the use of insulated concrete formwork and geothermal heating and cooling make this facility exceptionally efficient.
The weathered beauty of vertical, wood-plank-clad barns was rendered in overlapping rows of four unique bricks. The simple, running bond pattern affords interplay between the colors that creates exceptional visual variety from a distance, but reveals diversity of texture and sheen up close.
The ideal east-west orientation of three pavilions creates a street-facing facade with the intentional imperfection of buildings stepping back from one another to reveal courtyards and offer greater depth of view from multiple vantage points.
A two-story massing capitalized on an existing, plateaued clearing to minimize site disturbance and protect the remarkable rural context.
The traditional education materials of brick veneer, standing seam roofing, polished concrete floors, painted concrete masonry, and acoustic panel ceilings are deployed liberally to respect institutional standards, yet married with the resounding value of ICF exterior bearing walls and geothermal mechanical systems.
Three pavilions cleanly define the three grade levels, administrative offices, special teaching areas, and the gym/cafeteria support spaces. Within each grade, three team clusters surround a central, shared gathering space with breakout rooms of various sizes.
Colin Drake
FAIA, LEED AP, Principal, JRA Architects
