Learning curve.Design of a new school in the Hague for the children of expatriates makes the most of its garden site and provides a benevolent ambience for the pupils. Dirk Jan Postel's building for the new British School in the Netherlands curves in Classical manner around the northern edge of a large garden in the Hague's green belt. This graceful response to the site - achieved within the limits of an extremely tight budget - derives from the democratic concerns of the architects. Each of the 34 classrooms has a view of the garden and in spite of its large size the building feels benevolent and does not intimidate the children. There are echoes here of Hampshire County Hampshire County is the name of two counties in the United States:
The school is on two levels and consists of two distinct parts - curve and rectangle. Each element contains a nice architectural paradox that is very well described on plan. The northern face of the rectangle is marked by long bands of windows with emphatic mullions. At each end, and in the middle, the pattern is punctuated by thin double-height panels of glass. But within this abstract rationalist ra·tion·al·ism n. 1. Reliance on reason as the best guide for belief and action. 2. Philosophy The theory that the exercise of reason, rather than experience, authority, or spiritual revelation, provides the primary form is a complex jigsaw of different pieces - an assembly hall, offices, staffrooms and studies, washrooms, lavatories and a library. Conversely, on the south side straightforward repetition has been rendered expressive. The 34 identical classrooms are contained within the immensely elongated e·lon·gate tr. & intr.v. e·lon·gat·ed, e·lon·gat·ing, e·lon·gates To make or grow longer. adj. or elongated 1. Made longer; extended. 2. Having more length than width; slender. crescent built of concrete and clad in wood around the sides and rear. Its main face, articulated in wood and glass, gives onto the garden through a louvred veil. The crescent meets the rear part of the building at a slight tangent tangent, in mathematics. 1 In geometry, the tangent to a circle or sphere is a straight line that intersects the circle or sphere in one and only one point. leaving a double-height chasm of variable width in-between. This is the central circulation spine, a visually stimulating corridor lined with warm plywood panels and overlooked by bridges and a gallery that, supported on rainbow-coloured columns, follows the curve of the crescent. Such animation is enhanced by light diffused by skylights and filtering through from the classrooms and corridors to the garden. Climate control has been built into the design of the school. Energy efficiency is based on Arups' computer simulations of night-time cooling, the thermal absorption of concrete and so on. The south face acts as a passive solar
Passive solar technologies convert sunlight into usable heat, cause air-movement for ventilation or cooling, or store heat for future use, without heat collector, a special zone between building and garden. In winter the sun is allowed to penetrate deep into the classrooms; in summer, the great assembly of horizontal louvres deflects light and heat. In the classrooms there are ceiling strips rather than ceilings to take advantage of the thermal capacity thermal capacity: see heat capacity. of raw concrete. Cooling takes place by means of a sophisticated circulation system and the chimney effect of skylights, opened centrally, over the central corridor. Just like the Hampshire schools, this building is the product of a supple supple Physical exam adjective Referring to free movement of a body part architectural intelligence able to respond lyrically to the site and to translate the requirements of teachers and children into a properly functioning building - all within the limits of a small budget. With 34 classes, this is a large school and it seems significant that each child is known individually and has no trouble in finding their own space. Architect Kraaijvanger-Urbis Project architects Dirk Jan Postel, Luuk de Boer De Boer or de Boer can refer to: In football:
n. pl. kroon·i See Table at currency. [Estonian, from German Krone, from Middle High German kr , Bernard Jan Kahman, Peter Steegers, Reinier Van Huijcksloot, Nol van den Boer, Patrick Keizer, Laura Stevens. Engineers Ove Arup Sir Ove Nyquist Arup CBE, MICE, MIStructE, (born at Newcastle upon Tyne in 1895 and died in 1988) was a leading Anglo-Danish engineer, the founder of the internationally important firm of Arup and generally considered the foremost engineer of his time. & Partners, with Pieters Bouwtechniek (structural), Linssen (M&E) Acoustics Peutz Contractor Van Der Linden Photographs Jan Derwig, Peter de Ruig |
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