#PUBLIC ARCHITECTURE PROJECTS
Schools in Montpellier
With indoor patios, nursery spaces, naturally lit classrooms and a long cantilivered area, Dominique Coulon & Associès designed a colorful group of schools in Montpellier, connected with each other.
The school unit designed by Dominique Coulon & Associés is part of Montpellier’s program for development, in order to connect the city to the sea. The school is set on a small triangular plot of land, within the urban policy for building up a new residential area.
The ground floor is taken up by the nursery school and the centre for pre and after school activities. The primary school occupies the second two floors, with a playground on top of the nursery school. The volumes are designed as autonomous elements which appear to slide over each other, with a cantilevering that provides a covered space for the playground. Each volume is colored in a different way and the bays have been designed according to their orientation and the level of light required.
Transit routes receive natural lighting from the patios and tall openings. The first floor classrooms can be accessed directly from the playground, without having to pass through the rest of the building, and are open at each end, facing both north and south. This produces ideal lighting conditions, as well as natural cooling by the passage of air through the classrooms.
