16 August 2006
Project of the Year, QICA 2006 - City of London Academy

The winning entry in a competition to design a £22 million school for Southwark. A publicly funded, independent school for 1,200 pupils of all abilities, it is also intended to aid regeneration of the area. Facilities include a sports hall, all-weather pitch, hard-surface play area and tennis courts. The brownfield site offered a considerable challenge to the design team: it is long and narrow with changing levels and divided by a bridge. The four-storey building snakes along the site, linking an atrium and an outside courtyard.

The low-energy services strategy included natural ventilation and optimal daylighting. Clusters of three teaching spaces open onto the atrium for cross ventilation, with hot air vented out at high level. The spaces can also be partitioned and used as traditional cell spaces. Daylighting is aided by high floor-to-storey height and large areas of high-level glazing on the façade. Services in the classroom clusters are accommodated in a central tray constructed from acoustically absorbent material that reduces sound reverberation in the spaces, improving speech intelligibility.