- Project Facts
- Client: The Gordon School
- Program: Additions
- Completed: 2001
Gordon School, a 100-year-old independent school for nursery to eighth grade, wanted to build a new Field House, a new Library, and a new Middle School Classroom Wing on its East Providence campus. In addition, Gordon needed to renovate and expand portions of its 1960’s Lower School and Early Childhood buildings and to transform the old gymnasium into a new Performing Arts Facility.
The skylit red-shingled pyramid roofs are closely identified with the Gordon School. The challenge for IKM was designing new buildings of diverse sizes and shapes that would fit comfortably among the much-loved original building forms. The architects emulated the scale, materials and motifs of the existing school, adding a few bold interventions: a playful curved wall at the Nursery addition, masonry buttresses and a roof-top light monitor at the new Field House, a gable-roofed mezzanine spanning the new Library from corner to corner, and a Middle School addition with an elevator that manages to link the existing five split-level floors.
Gordon School's new gym was built with a direct link to the existing building for easy accessibility. The new athletic facility includes locker rooms, team facilities and faculty areas. Daylighting was a major part of the design, muted natural light from the roof monitor filters through the brightly painted trusses and ducts. Masornry buttresses and a playful entrance rotunda enliven the exterior.
