New Dufferin Alternative

Alternative High School

Software: Revit, AutoCAD, Illustrator, Enscape, Photoshop

The New Dufferin Alternative School acts in the same way as the adjacent Dufferin Grove park to continue its tradition of social discourse; traversing axial pathways define meaningful community spaces through their interstices, using circulation as both a programmatic boundary and a means of connection. The school uses the park as its precedent, forming an environment which physically manifests the convergence of varying people and perspectives.

Redefining the Urban Grid

The emphasis on overall form found within Scarpa’s Museo Canova is reinforced by his selection of materials, using seamless plaster to create continuous interfaces which visually extend beyond the building’s threshold. The New Alternative High School will similarly adopt such practices, using materiality to fortify intention, especially within the school’s distinctive axial pathways and areas of curricular programming. Circulation will be defined by linear, continuous materiality, in an effort to “minimize the expression of the joints and joins between the single parts in favour of the overall form” (Zumthor, 13). Contrasting this, curricular and social areas within the building, such as student commons, will use clearly divisible material units, creating solid overall masses formed through aggregation (Figure 6).

Science Department Plan

Polyvalent Learning Spaces

Alternative and traditional curriculums converge through polyvalent learning spaces, designed to accommodate different educational approaches. These include breakout lab spaces, adaptive arts spaces, and fabrication areas for students.

A Dedicated Public Forum

The school’s community space is a public forum, engaging with Dufferin Grove’s history of social activism. Visual connections with the above student learning commons allows for alternative education opportunities.