16 EDUCATION
The bright colour of the central library, with its protruding brise soleil, helps to give the building a civic presence
Ruth Slavid reports on... Lornshill School
SCHOOLS OFTEN PLAY AN IMPORTANT PART IN THEIR COMMUNITIES BUT THERE CAN BE FEW INSTANCES WHERE CIVIC PRESENCE IS CONSIDERED AS IMPORTANT AS AT LORNSHILL ACADEMY, IN LORNSHILL, CLACKMANNANSHIRE.
This is not because of any grandiose ambitions on behalf of the authorities but because of its position. Perched on a ridge above the town, the school is immensely visible. This was a choice imposed on the architect, 3DReid, by circumstances, but one of which it has taken maximum advantage.
T
his is one of three schools that the local education authority appointed 3D Reid to design, and the only one that is on an existing site. (This is an academy in the Scottish sense of a secondary school, and bears no resemblance to the English privately funded Academies programme). The options for construction next to the existing building were either on the school’s playing field, or on the crest of the ridge. Since the playing field was used by the community as well as by the school, and the local authority did not
want to lose the facility for the duration of the construction programme, the ridge became the chosen site.
As well as requiring a civic presence, this position made other demands on the design. It dictated the orientation, which fortunately is east west, so that the main elevations face north and south – ideal from an environmental point of view. It determined that this would be a linear design. And it determined that there would be two very different facades – an
open, south-facing façade overlooking the town, and a much more closed north-facing façade, up against the site boundary.
The two-storey school has a central space which forms the hub, with circulation moving out from this. The hub consists of a double- height dining space and assembly hall on the ground hall, with the library above. ‘We used the library and the central social space to give the whole building an external presence,’ said Alan Moore, associate director at 3DReid.
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