Our design for Carr Manor has created an uplifting experience for students, staff, visitors and the community.  We have created a building that will be iconic: a piece of sculpture sitting in the magnificent grounds.  Our focus has been to let the beauty of the landscape spill into the body of the school, and we have achieved this by the creation of an amphitheatre.  This will be a dramatic space enabling concerts, displays, and celebrations to take place right at the heart of the school.

The plaza is a dramatic space, partly covered, defined by two straight edges and one sweeping three-storey curved façade, of which the ground floor area is uncovered. The curved wall is punctured by entrances to the two three-storey learning clusters and gateways to the play areas beyond.  This will be an attractive place where students will want to congregate before, during and after school and where events can take place during the day as well as in the evening.

Each learning cluster has its own entrance on the ground floor with its own splayed lobby space  which offer ample opportunity for displays for each of the faculties, allowing a clearly-defined identity and pride in their work.  At the end of the corridor space in the learning clusters is glazing with views to the playing fields beyond.  Toilets have been positioned close to the entrance to reduce circulation times, and to retain their availability while classroom corridors are locked for community events in the plaza.

The larger spaces of the Activity Hub are situated beyond the administration suite and library.  The assembly hall can expand by using the drama studio as its stage or backstage, and can spill out into the covered external courtyard of the plaza.  The changing room spine creates an acoustic buffer between the assembly hall and sports hall, and also provides for theatrical changing areas.  Its proximity means that the assembly hall can easily be used for PE and other activities.  Music is stacked above changing to make full use of the acoustic buffer.  At the front of the Activity Hub lies inclusion and the sixth form (doubling up as a community room).  The sixth form areas inhabit a clearly defined area yet benefit from some passive supervision from the main staff room.

To the left of the plaza is dining, which can spill out into the covered external courtyard.  The servery can also make use of this external space to alleviate queueing.  Part of the dining area will be a light, airy, two-storey space, which will create a more relaxed, pleasant dining experience.

Visual Impact

 The main concept behind Carr Manor is to provide a building which celebrates the achievements of the students, staff and community alike and provides a landmark building expressing a clear architectural vision. 

Functionality

The heart and focus of the building is the external courtyard, which is bounded by building frontages or visually transparent screens.  The functional school spaces radiate out from the perimeter geometry of the courtyard, which has been re-arranged to bring a clearer architectural language to the plan form, and to assist in the integration of the various building forms and the architectural and structural detailing.

Approach and Entrance

The architectural language of the main visitor and staff building is a strong statement, which is the focus to the end of a formal tree-lined piazza. This approach to the building has been rationalised and simplified to provide a clearer route from the site entrance. In turn the car park has also been re-arranged to reflect the radiating form of the building structure, thus integrating landscape and building.

Arena

The partially covered central Arena, together with the functional buildings of the school has been reconfigured to better relate in a structured architectural planning form, rather than an organic plan form, thus linking better with the initial statement on the approach to the building. The arena is now formed from a half circle with the radius point up to the centre of the space. The plan form then extends back towards the pupil entrance and sports block in a tangent to the circle, creating a circulation hub within the sports block and visually linking with the external landscape beyond. The dining hall hangs on the edge to the other tangential side of the courtyard.

Surroundings and External Spaces

Modifications to the external landscape and functional spaces include: 

·          Clearer and better linked car park arrangement linking with the geometry of the building itself. This takes the form of a radiating car park arrangement.

·          Introducing greater formality and a clearer route from entrance into the site to the “front door” with the building set at the end of a vista through radiating floor pattern and radiating tree planting. There is now a real sense of arrival at the front of the school with this formalised approach.