Birpai Country
The Nature School Incorporated is an independent school that currently operates an early years, primary and secondary program on the Mid North Coast of New South Wales. The school shares similar petagogy to the Forest School learning programs in Scandinavia.
The studio has completed a number of development stages with the school that improve the staff and student’s connection with the natural environment.
Some of the stages our studio has completed in collaboration with the school include:
- Stage 1 – Master planning - provided the school with a framework to develop indoor and outdoor learning areas in stages that also share a close relationship to the school’s vision, principles and objectives.
- Stage 1, 2 and 3 – Refurbishment of the existing two storey mudbrick building for general learning classrooms
- Stage 3- COLA – new covered outdoor learning area for stage 3 students
- Stage 3 – Amenities building
- Stage 3 – Indoor/outdoor breakout areas
- Stage 3 – STEM learning area
- Stage 1 to 3 – External landscaping areas
Careful planning permits the school flexibility to vary the size of learning areas and control the spaces throughout the seasons without conditioning. The design of each classroom provided seamless connection to a dedicated covered or open outdoor breakout space.
The studio selected a textural palette to compliment the bush environment of the school of exposed Blackbutt timber, metal roof and wall claddings, sandstone blocks and other natural materials. The selected materials compliment the school’s existing material palette, recycle and repurpose materials and further demonstrates the studio’s application of ‘cradle to cradle’ objectives in all of our projects.
BUILDER: EDGE CONSTRUCTION (Stage 2 + 3)
