St Helen’s Junior School

Following our appointment to produce a masterplan, the first significant projects we then undertook for St Helen’s were the main school entrance and its new Junior School.

The school’s brief was concise and thorough.

‘The new Junior School offers us the opportunity to take a very big step into the twenty-first century and to promote a more open and spacious environment which will provide the model for the future development of the School as a whole.’

Quite a challenge.

Putting the development plan in place first ensured that specific projects could be considered in a rational and practical order. It also meant we were able to consider various options for the site of the new junior school and arrive at the most appropriate – locating the new building at the heart of the site and freeing up previous accommodation for alternative uses.

The design is part single and part two storey with the landscape taken up and over the roof of the single storey elements. This achieves a balance of building volume and form which minimises the adverse visual impact on the open landscape in this area of the site. The extended fingers create open rather than closed courtyards connecting the building into the broader landscape and defining the Junior domain. The form is intentionally simple and straightforward to read. The single storey elements contain the shared and specialist areas with the main classroom bases located in the central two storey element.

Landscape was a key element to the design, ensuring the built form was seamlessly integrated into the parkland setting that is St Helen’s grounds.