5 minute read
Deviating from the ‘same old same old’
Deviating from the
‘same old, same old’
To the practiced eye, the detailed usage of steel roofing and cladding, combined with exposed concrete and glass, speaks of architectural wizardry. A new contemporary Hogwarts campus? No, it’s Curro Durbanville, the latest iteration in the role out of JSE-listed independent education provider, Curro Holdings.
BPAS Architects and 3sixty Photography Gareth Griffiths
Curro Durbanville proudly announced the expansion of its original grounds by building and occupying a brand new, contemporary campus for the high school that is 9 800m² in size, including the auditorium. The new campus showcases the very latest in education space design, which has been crafted with a learnercentric approach where their needs and aspirations have been taken into account throughout the design process.
Located in Groot Phesantekraal, about 5km from the current campus, this greenfields building boasts the capacity to house 1 000 learners with room for further expansion.
The new campus eschews the conventional arrangement of space within a school where usually the classroom is private, the hall and passages semiprivate, and the playground the school’s public space.
Inspiration for the project was acquired from the best schools in Europe, Brazil and India, and it also took key indicators from our Southern African continent. The high school, for instance, includes features that reduce the school’s energy footprint, such as a rainwater harvesting system.
The new campus eschews the conventional arrangement of space within a school where usually the classroom is private. Here it is different.
TO BUILD spoke to the architects, BPAS Architecture about just what makes this new campus unique and the features that make it stand out from the rest.
“It was important that the design process was not isolated to a single author but crafted with a learner-centric approach through collaborative and investigative processes. Further inspiration was drawn from the surrounding context; the design emits an exciting take on form, texture, and scale,” says Landseer Collen, the Director and architect at BPAS Architects in Tyger Valley, Cape Town.
A series of layout configurations were assessed for the overall campus. During this process, determining factors such as site conditions and constraints, accommodation requirements (programme), the orientation of sports fields together with potential shade-cast of structures, connectivity between respective facilities, as well as the internal road link between the predetermined access points were taken into consideration to find the most suitable layout.
“The U-shaped building footprint frames the southern corner of the site, which formulates a forecourt defined by the auditorium and hall on either side. It ‘embraces’ the learners and visitors as they enter, while also acting as a protective buffer from the elements. A direct visual connection to the main entrance makes wayfinding easier for users,”explains Collen.
“The building height was kept moderately low by spreading the accommodation over wider floor plates, thereby relating to the surrounding context of the existing and planned urban skyline. The architecture is non-stylistic, it responds to site conditions such as climate, contours, accessibility, and connectivity, resulting in a site-specific design.”
The conventional ‘school typology’ consisting of classrooms that are framed by four walls was challenged by the concept of constant interaction between spaces. The classes become permeable and adaptive with furniture, such as combinable tables, designed specifically for the hybrid and flexible use of each space. This dynamic space is emphasised by the juxtaposition of the slanted columns. These columns symbolise the encouragement of diversity, uniqueness, and unconventionality in a collective and safe environment.
The classrooms and laboratories are placed around an atrium and internal courtyard space respectively, allowing for daylight to filter into these spaces. Organically shaped walkways that host collaboration spaces, together with slanted columns and colourful interior elements create visual interest and a sense of playfulness and difference.
Ventilation strategies
According to Theo Gutter, project architect at BPAS Architects, openable windows and louvres on facades added to natural ventilation. The atrium roof functions as a heat chimney, with constant cool air drawn in at lower levels from shaded areas on the façade. All naturally ventilated areas make use of cross ventilation across enclosed passages.
To the eye of the visitor, the usage of exposed concrete in the walls and the roof is also evident in thinking of ‘thermal mass’ which clearly, coupled with the natural ventilation will enhance passive climate control inside the learning areas.
Central to the learning area is the atrium: “This required more finesse, with an inverted truss design, being used with minimal end supports to create a perimeter skylight, with a ‘floating ceiling’ in the centre. The skylight had technical detail resolution to interface between concrete, aluminium, frameless glass and roof sheeting,” explains Gutter.
Roofing and cladding
Conventional steel trusses were used in the auditorium, hall and dance & drama studios to create free span structures for the respective spaces. An outstanding feature on the 'tails' of the U-shaped building for auditorium and hall is the use of SAFLOK 700 sheeting which was used on roofs and wall cladding as an added rainscreen. The pre-painted steel substrate used by Safintra Roofing in the forming of the Saflok 700 sheeting was supplied by Safal Steel South Africa, as Colorplus® AZ200 TCT 0.53 in colour Raincloud.
