When Northamptonshire County Council decided to close its middle schools, Northampton School for Boys (NSB) was faced with the prospect of accommodating an additional 450 students into an already highly successful but oversubscribed school. The governing body's answer was to provide an exceptional new building that presented a forward-looking modern outlook, while acknowledging the historic context of the main school building.

The new building needed to address the existing buildings' problems of congestion, lack of accessibility, and dilapidation of an old 1964 refectory, as well as providing new classrooms and other facilities. NSB did not fall under the Northampton Review PFI programme and was facing the prospect of stiff competition from two proposed PFI schools in the local area. It wanted to maintain and build on its high academic, music and sporting achievements and the excellent track record it has enjoyed for the past 465 years. Eventually, NSB was successful, with half of the £9.4m project funded by Northamptonshire County Council, and the remainder by a private benefactor; a former student at NSB.

The existing school had developed in piecemeal fashion, with no clear masterplan. The existing blocks varied in age, style and materials. The new building had to act as a cohesive unit that made sense of these disparate elements. The Concourse & Teaching Block, which features 'pods' clad in American red oak, was conceived as a whole school learning environment, providing 16 new classrooms, a refectory, performance, conference and assembly space, team-base offices (secondary subject-related staff rooms), sixth form accommodation, a shop and toilets. Located at the heart of the school, it links four other buildings and even responds to the curve of the sacred cricket pitch adjacent.

Red oak was chosen for its durability and rich colour

The school environment is a harsh test for the durability of materials and NSB stressed the importance of materials and finish selection. Architects Peter Haddon & Partners (pHp) had been introduced to red oak in 1997 when they worked with Stimpson Walton Bond on the design of a new theatre and arts block for the school so it was a natural choice.

“The timber proved robust, durable, sustainable and a delight to behold. We have always loved the rich colour of American red oak and particularly the bold 'flamey' grain of the crown cut veneer,” said project architect Mark Pennington of pHp.

Red oak is the unifying element tying the project together. It is used for the cladding to the pods, stairs, door sets, architraves, skirtings, shop fitting, the deputy head's storage wall, classroom coat and bag racks, balcony cappings and the DNA pattern to the balcony fronts, in honour of NSB old boy Francis Crick, who discovered DNA. 

Having decided on the material, pHp then needed to give each of the 'events' a personality of their own through detail. The team-base pod is like a seed pod that has segments and scales. The sixth form pod is ship-lapped horizontally so the panels step out and form a boat-like hull overhanging the atrium. The “orange peel stair” twists and moves from straight to curved with vertical slats like a paper doily case.

On the staircase, each section of red oak-faced plywood is tapered to create the twisting appearance

During the tender stage there was some concern from potential sub-contractors regarding the buildability of the pods. They were complex geometrically and required a high degree of skill and co-operation. Architectural Joinery Services (AJS) worked closely with pHp, making the geometry not only achievable, but further refining it to suit both the programme and an off-site production process. When AJS came to build the pods, all they had was the concrete floor and the steel legs. They formed a shape from the CAD drawings onto a CNC program, “almost like building an airplane wing,” said AJS commercial manager Mike Culpin.

The timber sub-structure fins were reproduced in plywood at AJS's factory in York and shipped to site where the timber carcass could be site measured, leaving the high quality veneered panels to be installed once the building had progressed enough to safely receive them with little danger of damage.

“AJS used a sophisticated CAD joinery package that enabled the three-dimensional surface of the pods to be 'flattened 'to enable each panel to be cut from a flat sheet,” explained Pennington. “The sheet was then gently eased across the ply fin formers on site to reproduce the curved profile with the minimum of site cutting or modification. 

The resultant finished elements are more like high-quality pieces of furniture than building construction.”

On the team base pod the panels mimic a brick bond

The structures were wrapped in flexible plywood and then the outer finish of 8mm MDF faced with American red oak veneer. On the sixth form pod, which is slightly oval-shaped and slopes outwards, the ribs had to be placed carefully to accommodate the contours of the structures and windows. On the team-base pod the finish mimics a brick bond so V-joints were used on each of the panels to create a smooth surface.

Where the pod is punctuated with full-height glazing, opaque glass masks the floor structures and, as with the horizontal window slots in the sixth form pod, acoustic perforated matting dampens noise from the atrium.

Working at height posed problems but the light weight of the outer skin meant many of the panels could be lifted by a block and tackle attached to the structure, said Culpin.

The orange peel stair also posed some challenges. Each section of red oak-faced plywood is tapered to create the twisting appearance, and the architects wanted this reflected in the shaped and curved handrail capping. To achieve this, AJS placed sections of oak in a press, first testing the technique in a mock-up.

The red oak finish has proved popular. When the building was opened, both staff and students were – and still are – drawn to stroke the pods. “It seems that the tactile quality of the red oak encourages us to handle it in a way that that we don't with any other material,” said Pennington.

---

Click here for more pictures

Picture 1
Picture 2
Picture 3