A Playbook for School Architecture Nathalie Putri Supervisors: Helen Duong & Tim Pyke
Nathalie began with the pre-COVID speculation that public schools have the potential to do more than provide places for structured education and play. Post-COVID, she has found it a useful way to reimagine the role of civic institutions as public assets and more importantly as public space. This is tested through a set of infinitely reconfigurable components. Each customisable part has been tested on two locations, Mernda and Carlton Gardens, each with specific site constraints. It deals with the civic in the suburbs and the connectedness required in tight inner-city schools and universally the contentious fence. You will see all the other combinations in her Kit of Parts catalogue in her file. These elements are mass-producible and can be applied at multiple scales on multiple sites. Her project imagines the school and playground from the eyes of children to have agency over what they participate in and to actively explore numerous possibilities in learning, play and interaction with the public. Beyond the child, the parts extend opportunities for parents and teachers to interact at the edges of the school. Her speculations into the playground and other school infrastructure aims to augment and adapt the ‘space’ between the school’s buildings, which is usually ad-hoc and undefined. Click here for book