Special education centre | Innerschwyz
Special education centre | InnerschwyzProject competition, 1st Prize | 2013
Architecture: Daniele Marques & Rainer Schlumpf
Collaborator: Ioannis Piertzovanis, Dipl. Ing. Arch. Univ.
The property designated for planning is situated on a former landslide area in the community of Goldau. The forest and the tree population spatially define the location to be developed as a kind of forest clearing. The planned special education centre should serve handicapped children not only as a place of learning, but also as a place to live. The new centre consisting of several buildings is freely grouped around the large topographical elevations and incorporates them into the facility as characteristic landscape elements. The new centre is mainly developed on two levels. The different room groups are divided into common zones and teaching areas. The arrangement of the two zones is conceived on two ground floors that are fluently connected by ramps. All classrooms and areas for small groups are orientated towards the southeast, providing a view of the landscape. The therapy rooms, workshops and two kindergarten units are organised along the line of the forest. The covered main entrance runs along the lower ground floor to a central foyer outside the common rooms, which also provides access to the gymnasium and administrative offices. Clear access to the upper ground floor with the classrooms is provided via an open, central hall. The exterior grounds are mainly divided into three areas: an expansive park, a large playground, break and garden zone on the sunny side of the school building, and a large garden pavilion opposite the dining room. As a reference to the forest location and the existing timber houses, as well as in contrast to the concrete school buildings, the façade is clad in double-layered wooden boards. The materialisation, the roofs, the simple building structure and the compact volume are intended to have a sustained effect while permitting appropriately economic operations.