west launceston primary school
Completed 2011.
The West Launceston Primary Early Learning facility is an educational facility that houses 3 early learning spaces, a publicly accessible multi purpose hall and provisions for family resources and health.
Two guiding principles for the project are based on children’s special perception of the constructed environment. The first principle has to do with scale and seeks to combine general large-scale volumes of the public facility with the more intimate and domestic scales that suit young children. The second principle relates the to the children’s creative world where architecture can contribute to the learning experience. The building amplifies the sensorial relationship between children their built environment through varying spatial volumes, light sources, materiality, textures and colour.
The basic unit of the school is the classroom. The scheme pays particular attention to the configuration of this classroom space, establishing a correlation between this essential use and a shape that can be identified as an architectonic element that has spatial, structural and constructive unity. With a rectilinear ground plan, the gable shaped roof of these spaces takes advantage of height and additional roof lighting in the classrooms. The gable shape of the classrooms is continuous and covers the other spaces, which include the multipurpose hall and the general learning areas.
A monolithic form, basic cladding system and the constructive logic of the project is appropriate to budget restraints and a shortened construction period.
Sited in a valley, the buildings external cladding pattern echoes the striated rock formations of the nearby Cataract Gorge. The pattern wraps across the roof and forms a continuous fifth elevation, which is clearly visible from the elevated residential properties situated on the neighbouring hills. The building appears as a singular gabled mass with cave like cutouts. These cutouts function as covered walkways, sheltered play spaces, and assist in restricting heat load on glazed openings during the summer months.
Careful orientation, insulation beyond BCA requirements, double-glazing, correct solar shading devices, natural ventilation and under floor hydronic heating contribute to comfortable learning environments and a well performing building envelope.