To provide a durable and sustainable school complex to meet a diverse range of educational and community requirements for a new development of 1200 homes close to a prehistoric trackway that, in medieval times, provided a thoroughfare for pilgrims bound for London.
In accord with its historic rural setting, the complex is designed as a low profile development with an open community focus to its frontage and classroom wings to the rear. Distinctive shingle-clad mono pitch roofs help the buildings merge gracefully into the surrounding landscape, whilst characteristic use of brickwork and matching coloured mortars creates an earth-like architecture. With its subdued palette of yellow and grey hues, Ibstock’s Funton Old Chelsea Yellow, manufactured locally at Ibstock’s Ashdown factory, further defines the brickwork and reflects a reclaimed appearance, in keeping with the semi-agricultural vernacular.
