'De Letterdoos' Primary School Oostakker
Wim Cuyvers
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Status:
Realized
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Education type:
Municipal Education
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Education level:
Primary Education (pre-school + primary)
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Address:
Gentstraat 212, 9041 Oostakker
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Client:
City of Ghent
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Programme:
classrooms, exercise hall, covered playground and school grounds
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Number of classrooms:
8 classrooms
Rationalising and restructuring the school site
The municipal primary school is on the corner of the main street of Oostakker and a quiet residential street. The school complex dates back to the start of the last century. The headmaster’s house, which will be used as a nursery, and a long building with a multifunctional hall, are located at the front, on the main street. At the back of the site, there is a large school building with a central stairwell and four classrooms. Over the years, several low wings were added until the entire site was built up. In the new project, the sites were first partly cleared in order to reveal the original structure of the school once again.
A new wing is placed at right angles to the side street. This part of the building takes over the rigid dimensions of the façade of the existing school building, but has a characteristic façade with a profiled texture of red and blue brick, which softens the appearance of the whole building. The dimensions and height of the classrooms were simply taken over from the 19th-century school building. The high ceilings and tall windows allow daylight to penetrate deep into the classrooms. Large wooden windows ensure that the classrooms are bright and provide a sense of openness between the classrooms and the corridor. This results in an interesting contrast with the robust exterior of the building.
The new wing mirrors the former corridor. The garden, which was previously only a narrow corridor of light, is enlarged in this way and the playground is situated between the existing wing on the street and the new wing. At the same time, this results in the creation of an enclosed green area for the children, where some playground furniture is placed. From the classrooms, a view on the gardens is created. You can look outside through the corridor from the large windows next to the doors of the classrooms. In this way, two clearly separated areas, the green garden and the paved playground, are visually linked through the space of the classroom.
The most striking element of the renewed school site is a gigantic canopy with the word ‘school’ in large letters. This is between the playground and the street and forms a sort of transitional area between the outside and inside of the school. The entrance gate is under the centre of the canopy. This creates a sheltered area which can be used, on the one hand, by parents waiting in the street, but equally serves as a covered playground for the children.
In this way, the different characteristic elements making up a school – the corridor and the classroom, the outside and inside, the street and the playground – are separated and reintegrated in a new project. The interventions recreate order on the school site and also express both its spatial and social function.