Archinect - News

NYC public school students are pushing the city for greener school buildings

2024-01-09T13:48:00-05:00

New York City teens have launched an initiative, born out of a 2019 citywide climate walkout, to urge Mayor Adams to "speed up plans to retrofit school buildings to make them safer, healthier, and more climate-friendly."

The student-led environmental coalition named, TREEage is "asking peers across the city to post videos to social media about why their schools urgently need green energy upgrades. The group is also asking students to grade how green their school is from A to F," reports Jessica Gould of the Gothamist.

Over the years, they have gained significant concessions from the Adams administration, including a pledge to make all new public school building constructions all-electric by 2030.

Their advocacy for the city’s Green New Deal is bolstered by an understanding of the correlation between healthier environments and better learning outcomes.

TREEage is now preparing a social media campaign that will kick off next month using the hashtags #MayorAdamsFixMySchoo and #Gree...

Closed school buildings offer a silver lining through adaptive reuse nationwide

2023-10-12T11:56:00-04:00

Amid the backdrop of a national trend of tumbling enrollments, brutal pandemic-era learning losses and an ongoing flight of young families from urban centers, the dilemma of how to repurpose empty schools is that many cities face. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, about 2,200 public schools closed from 2019 to 2022. Chicago’s experiences offer some insights into what can happen to these spaces, and the communities around them, after the students get sent home.

Lamar Johnson Collaborative Associate Principal Max Komnenich tells Bloomberg the other side to the growing problem of school closings can offer a “beacon for reinvestment” given the proper incentives.

His firm’s Aspire Center conversion took advantage of a $12.5 million TIF that’s included in the larger Community Development Grant program overseen by the Chicago Department of Planning and Development. Projects geared towards workforce development are another popular solution besides the obvious need for residential conversions. According to the website Yardi Matrix, 2.9% of all newly converted housing units were created from former school buildings nationwide in the last year alone.

MVRDV and Van Boven Architecten complete high school alma mater renovation in the Netherlands

2023-09-29T14:56:00-04:00

MVRDV has announced the completion of their Van Boven Architecten co-designed Gymnasium Beekvliet renovation project in the Netherlands.

The alma mater of both Winy Maas and Theobert van Boven was once the nation’s leading catholic seminary and was later used as an internment camp for political prisoners of the occupying Nazi regime during Worl War II before being modernized into a new grammar school in the early 1970s.

“I went to school at Beekvliet myself, as did one of my children, and my wife is also a teacher there. These connections strongly motivate me to design a unique and special building that does justice to the school’s rich history,” van Boven said in a preview last year.

Image: © Daria Scagliola/MVRDV

Located in the village of Sint-Michielsgestel near Eindhoven, the school now features a unifying new auditorium addition at the center of the school that’s meant to improve circulation. An existing classroom building and plaza area were also renovated. Ian Kirkpatrick, a C...

Winy Maas transforms his former high school with colorful swooping addition

2022-02-03T13:41:00-05:00

MVRDV founding partner Winy Maas and Theobert van Boven of Van Boven Architecten are leading the transformation of their old high school Gymnasium Beekvliet in the Dutch village of Sint-Michielsgestel.

The main element of this design by the two alumni is a colorful, flowing addition that reaches out into the school’s plaza and improves circulation, creating a new focal point at the heart of the building. In addition, the space exhibits artwork by artist Ian Kirkpatrick throughout.

The initial mission of the project was to renovate the existing school building. The brief also called for a new auditorium, more space for regular school activities, and additional art and culture facilities to provide students with a challenging and stimulating learning environment while offering them more spaces to gather. To meet this demand, the design extends the existing roof structure and lowers it to ground level, closing the building’s circulation routes and forming a distinct entrance.

The sw...

Urban Projects Bureau supports STEAM education with newly completed school building

2020-04-06T19:17:00-04:00

The Urban Projects Bureau (UPB) has recently completed its second building at Graveney School in Tooting, London. The Observatory Block came from a long-term collaboration between the school and UPB. The UPB team recieved funding for a new 8-classroom teaching block in 2017, which after additional crowd-funding, later became the 10-classroom Observatory Block enjoyed by the school today.

The new building supports the school's STEAM program and encourages and facilitates learning surrounding space, time, and the universe. As such, the architecture's design guides users' gaze toward the sky. External walkways, terraces, and teaching spaces are held at each of the structure's three levels and habitable roof terraces allow for star-watching and other activities.

A cylindrical staircase leads building-goers from the lower level up to the roof. On the elevated journey upward, a chandelier hangs in the center of the spiral stair. Students can program the chandelier to represent various con...

10 academic architecture projects in Boston we liked this month by architects based in Boston

2020-03-24T18:53:00-04:00

Hardly any other American city is as closely associated with higher education as Boston, with some of its universities making frequent appearances in Archinect's academia-related news coverage.

As part of our month-long editorial Spotlight on Boston, why not take a look at ten standout architecture projects for institutions of higher learning and K12 schools in the greater Boston area? All selections were picked from projects uploaded to Firm profiles of practices based in the city.

Searching for architectural jobs in the region? Check out these firms that are currently hiring in the city and catch up also with our latest curated job picks specifically for Boston.

If you missed our recent regional project roundups, head over to Miami, Austin, Los Angeles, and, most recently, residential projects in Boston.

↑ New England Conservatory Student Life and Performance Center in Boston by Ann Beha Architects (Design Architect) with Gensler (Associate Architect); Photo: Peter Vanderwarker

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OMA / Ellen van Loon fuses science and sports in new Brighton College school building

2020-01-16T09:29:00-05:00

When OMA won the 2013 competition to design Brighton College's new School of Science and Sport in England, the Dutch firm had to create a scheme where two contrasting academic disciplines were interwoven into the same building, and in a way that encourages interaction among students. The building was officially inaugurated on January 9.

Photograph by Laurian Ghinitoiu, Courtesy of OMA.

“We wanted to give Brighton College a building that continues to deliver more than strictly required, expanding the traditional definition of educational architecture,” OMA Partner Ellen van Loon said.

Reflective of the fact that learning takes place outside as much as it does inside a classroom, the new building merges the department of Science and the department of Sports into one linear volume. Athletic spaces are level with the adjacent outdoor playing field, while Science classrooms, labs, and a greenhouse span over the athletic spaces.

Photograph by Laurian...

Step inside The Bartlett's new central London HQ, designed by Hawkins\Brown

2016-12-16T20:09:00-05:00

After calling the Wates House their home since the 1970s, the UCL Bartlett School of Architecture celebrated the official opening of its newly refurbished headquarters today on 22 Gordon Street in Bloomsbury. Collaborating with the Bartlett and UCL Estates, architect Hawkins\Brown doubled the size of the existing building to 8,500 square meters.

Preserving some of the original fabric of the old Wates House and using the existing structural concrete frame, the new “flexible and robust” building now includes a public gallery and provides more open working space for the school's 1,000 students and staff.

Hawkins\Brown added a fifth and sixth floor, and a main spiraling stairway within a full-height atrium. The renovation also includes double-height glazing at ground level and a new prominent entrance to create a more inviting building in its city-center location.

“A large number of the Hawkins\Brown team are alumni of the Bartlett and have fond memories of the old Wates House,” Hawkins\B...