New Build Projects

Synopsis

Fitzalan High School
Victoria Slater, Associate Architect, Austin-Smith:Lord & Julie Holmes, Operational Manger – Capital Delivery, Cardiff Council

Case Study on the new build Fitzalan High School project in Cardiff – The brief calls for the provision of a replacement new 11-18 10FE high school including 350 post 16 places to address “D” condition categorisation and “D” categorised sufficiency issues in the local area. This £64m project represents a significant new facility for the pupils, staff and local community. Handing over soon to the LEA, the new school is built in the same area facing the catchment area that it serves. The scheme involved a significant enabling works package to re-provide and enhance leisure facilities for CAVC and other education and community sports stakeholders and helps to create a wider leisure and education masterplan in Leckwith.

A key brief objective was that the design of the new school should provide flexible and adaptable spaces to teach and learn the New Progressive Curriculum. The design delivers these principles and supports the changing role of the teacher as a facilitator of learning. The building is arranged broadly through sectional adjacencies into the new Area of Learning clusters with each cluster supported by a range of space types and sizes, supportive of project based and thematic learning. Three halls are positioned at the heart of the school, arranged in a dramatic sequence of spaces cutting diagonally through the building section, with main hall at ground spilling onto the dining space which is connected through learning steps to a Sixth Form Hall on first Floor, allowing options for accommodating large school events and engaging with Creative Partners and the wider community.

The whole school is accommodated within a single 3-storey ‘superblock’ arrangement, with a simple, efficient form set on a modular design grid providing an excellent framework in which we have created a wide range of exciting, flexible and adaptable learning spaces within.

Mynydd Isa Campus Development
Christian Stanbury, WEPCo & James Jones, Sheppard Robson