ABSTRACT
Designs for school buildings have played a significant role in the relatively brief history of energy-conscious architectural design. St George's School at Wallasey built, in 1958, in the North West of England, with its vast solar wall, was raised to iconic status by Rayner Banham in The Architecture of the Well-tempered Environment (1969). In recent years the theme has been taken forward by other designs, such as Sergio Los's Crossara School in Northern Italy and the work of Hampshire County Council in the UK. Pragmatically, the fact that school buildings are mainly occupied during daylight hours makes them particularly well suited to exploit solar gains for space heating in the winter months at high latitudes. There is also a symbolic appropriateness in the association of naturally sustained environments with the needs of children. Patkau Architects’ design for the Strawberry Vale School at Victoria, British Columbia, sits securely in this tradition and develops the conventions and principles of the low-energy school in a rich and eloquent architectural language.
