Haskell Architects’ design for Wyndham Vale Primary School promotes interconnected learning through open spaces with flexibility and visual transparency, all with contemporary design flair.

Haskell Architects have been awarded top honours at Shaw Contract’s 2016 Design Is…Awards for the work carried out on their Wyndham Vale Primary School project. The school, judged by an international panel of architecture and design experts, was graded on a detailed design story encompassing sustainability & environmental goals, as well as innovative design solutions, and the flooring’s contribution to design objectives.

Located on Melbourne’s western fringe, the challenge for the Wyndham Vale Primary School project was to produce a new facility that offered a civic space in a residential area, as well as generating a campus design that supported the school’s desire to deliver technologically advanced teaching and learning across a broad curriculum.

Haskell’s final design response addresses these objectives through the creation of a cluster of buildings or ‘learning neighbourhoods’, designed to cater to different year levels. This allows for a variety of flexible learning spaces that can be configured in different ways to meet particular teaching and learning modes. Students and teachers alike can move between shared learning areas and acoustically isolated spaces that encourage interconnected learning.

The design offers spaces that allow for easy recognition of place, a philosophy that the design team hold dear when it comes to memory and learning. Shaw Contract’s Hexagon carpet tile collection was vital here, creating non-linear forms and clusters that influence the way students move in and around the space. The flooring design has provided a blurred transition from individual classrooms to open learning spaces that is fun, engaging and memorable.

Shaw Contract’s ‘Design Is…Award’ is a global design program open to all professional interior design and architecture firms, as well as end users who feature Shaw Contract products in their projects. The 2016 Design Is…Award Global Winners were judged from 450 total entries, from 32 Countries, and represent the highest caliber of work within industry segments across the globe.

Entries are now open for the 2017 Design Is…Awards.