A School
The project unfolds a wooden net across the space, letting light shine brightly through.
The various buildings of the ITCF forms a heterogeneous and dense environment. The intervention has to be clear and evident to find its place and to reorder a bit this situation.
It realises as a parallelepiped and compact object made of two large U shaped structures. The first one is built with double walls and forms the massive and solid base of the building. Its two levels contain the logistic and pedagogic spaces of the school.
The second forms the canopy of the building, light and luminous. It spans over the spatial and programmatic centrepiece of the project; the machines hall. This structure unfolds a wooden net reaching more than twelve meters at once to fold as a bow-window.
The two-level west side grants access to the central workshop, allowing delivery of raw material to the processing center and the evacuation of manufactured elements. The upper floor accommodates a class, the canteen and the lockers. The latter can be reached from a separate entrance through an ample stair. The loggia system offers recesses in order to create an entrance area sheltered from the bad weather at ground level and an accessible terrace at the upper level. At the same time, by its materiality, it filters south-west light entering the class and the canteen. The east side is a close «box» accommodating technical rooms and equipment. These are reachable from outside through a lateral corridor along the neighbour’s wall. Two service entrances lead to the central workshop from there.
The two structures built with prefabricated concrete (with pre-insulated double walls and concrete slabs) offers the necessary thermal inertia. The lateral facades are built with dark wood. For the west side, the loggia a screen wall. For the east side, the wooden surface is punctually opened for air intake and techniques.
The central room is a void devoided to hold the processing center. It is the heart of the project. It unfolds a wooden net across the space, letting light shine brightly through. On the roof, a clerestory grid acts as sunshield. In this way, the workshop is perceptible from the street.