BUILDING WORK is progressing steadily and on target and will see all of the city’s 33 high schools rebuilt or refurbished by 2013. Seven of these will be specialist academies supported by Manchester based sponsors. Arguably, the flagship project was Newall Green High School in Wythenshawe.

One of Manchester’s priority areas for regeneration is Wythenshawe in South Manchester. Newall Green High School, originally built in 1951, is a co-educational school with 900 pupils and post 16 places.

An £18m package of new build and refurbishment works was recently completed at Newall Green earlier this year with a delivery team including Balfour Beatty Construction and Aedas Architects.

The phased project was completed over two years and covers a 9,000 sq m site. Particular focus was on providing a brand new science and technology teaching block, kitchen and dining accommodation, art room, hall, administration block,
learning resource centre and a special educational needs base.

A site master plan was developed with the following principles:
• Retain half the existing buildings
• Compact building developments for site optimisation
• Compact form for security
• Compact from for environmental performance
• Refreshed image and identity for community focus
• Clarity about entrance and approach
• Clarity between pedestrian and vehicle routes
• Maximise social and recreational space
• Develop an enclosed and secure courtyard
• Clarity of internal circulation about the central space.

Working alongside the city council, Aedas identified a number of priority areas for change in the school, including an existing very long and winding corridor that did not lend itself to social gatherings, conversations or ad-hoc study space.

Similarly, the external spaces offered few opportunities for social or learning development, characterised by a confusion of vehicle and pedestrian accesses.

The new building wraps formal teaching spaces around a central heart comprising a courtyard with an amphitheatre (with a learning resource centre and ICT suite as its education focus on stilts on the first floor) and hall, dining and external entrance threshold space. The courtyard has a number of uses such as outdoor performance, prize giving and dining, as well as general community use. An ETFE roof, much like that at the Eden Project, maximises the potential of the space.

ETFE (Ethylene TetrafluoroEthylene) is a transparent, recyclable foil that is anti-static and therefore selfcleaning.

It is a better insulator than glass, but weighs as little as a tenth as much. It is very strong, transparent to UV light and is not degraded by sunlight. The material is made up of a regular patchwork of pillows that can be pumped up with air on cool days to increase insulation and deflated on hot days to allow the space below to cool more easily. The pillowed membrane is held in place by steel supports. Its life-span is approximately 25 - 30 years, after which it can be replaced in a process that promises to be much easier than conventional re-roofing.

Pupils were encouraged to articulate their ideas about, and vision for, their school and to develop these into viable designs for incorporation into the new school environment. The concept for the entrance and courtyard façades were co-designed with pupils and developed in collaboration with Aedas.

The hall and dining area was designed to express the vibrant school community through a combination of clear glazing, allowing views through to the heart of the school and acting as a strong visual feature from the street. Cladding to the hall frontage was designed as part of an artist-led pupil involvement project during the design phase and is based on a seasonal colour theme.

The approach to the school now features an attractive plaza and a striking multi-coloured curved design for the hall.