Description

This school aspires to become a symbolic centre for its community in terms of its architectural expression and its open plan forms. From its sun-shaded internal colonnades to its iconic entrance tower building on the outside, it is a mini city complete with its own medical centre and restaurant. In short it is far more than a school. Commissioned by the education department for the Municipality Number 17, the site is in the south of Santiago de Cali in the green belt which forms an environmental lung between high rise social housing blocks and dense inner city industrial areas. The plan comprises two main linear blocks which are hinged on their eastern corner and rotated at 45 degrees to each other creating a triangular inner courtyard which has buildings on two sides and a semi-open, partly landscaped third side. The hinge and its two wings of built form create a hard geometrical outside edge to the surrounding streets. The complex architectural geometries of the whole resolve themselves at the corner. The hinge is also the main entrance from the street corner, however it is a semi-permeable edge with clear thresholds and deliberate breaks in the built form. They create welcoming entrances, views and vistas into the courtyard beyond.

On entering inside from the street corner the composition unfolds as a colonnade of two-storey standard size classrooms to the left and a more free form range of communal spaces including a 300 seat theatre on the left, with design workshops and other flexible spaces. The third side of the colonnade opens up to the landscape beyond with views towards children’s play spaces and sports fields. The solid south and east façades with the single open edge towards the west creates a cool shaded space. The organisation is a direct response to the climatic conditions, high humidity and extreme solar radiation. The built form with its solid concrete and masonry construction and enhanced natural cross ventilation works extremely well in this respect.

The architecture not only provides a strong environmental theme in this hot climate, but also refers to the idea of monastic cells and cloisters. The architects have deliberately drawn on this metaphor which they describe as a ‘continuity – discontinuity’ spatial ideal. The architecture establishes a clear distinction between the classroom, which is essentially a non-social space and generally an internalised world for personal reflection and individual study, and the colonnade, an altogether more social interactive school space. The clarity of this view may be slightly uncompromising, however it is a very effec­tive way of organising the architecture.

This is a stylish building but also one which is practical; for example there is a robustness about the architecture with the use of durable hard wearing materials which are standing the test of time. Its scales are resonant with the scales of its users, with large and smaller scale architectural moments throughout. Perhaps most important is the overall spirit it transmits to the users, a sense of playfulness and austerity at the same time. There is in effect a time and a place for both moods within this pleasing composition. This is an example of best practice.

---

Originally published in: Mark Dudek, Schools and Kindergartens: A Design Manual, Birkhäuser, 2015.