Lasting Value
Jul 1, 2010 12:00 PM, By Mark Jolicoeur and Melanie Kahl
Retrofitting historic school buildings can provide benefits beyond the bottom line.
Sidebar: A Tale of Reuse
Lake Forest High School (LFHS), Lake Forest, Ill., is in a residential neighborhood adjacent to Lake Michigan. It serves nearly 1,800 students in grades 9 to12 in Lake Forest District 115.
Constructed in 1935 as a WPA project, it was pieced together through three distinct building programs in 1958, 1966 and 1992. The culmination of the building footprint after 1992 left LFHS with an uneven distribution of technology, building system vintages, educational appropriateness and Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) non-compliance.
A comprehensive study of the facility determined a long-range plan for the campus. The result preserves, modernizes and streamlines the LFHS campus for the demographic and educational needs of today and tomorrow—and imparts a few important lessons in creative reuse.
With historic education facilities, a common complaint is the disconnect between the structure of yesterday and demographic and educational needs of today. Spaces are repurposed over time to fit modern programs. LFHS had two interesting evolutions over the past 75 years.
The original 1935 gymnasium was transformed into the cafeteria in 1992. In 2008, the long-range facility plan concluded that the cafeteria space would be optimized by adaptively reutilizing it as a library. Because it originally was an athletic space, the library’s high ceilings, spacious layout and mezzanine provide an open, collegiate feel for students. To honor the history of the building and community, a student-created mural of the school’s history extends along the base of the northern wall with original windows that overlook the interior student commons. Portions of the original gym wood floor also were restored to connect the media center with its storied past.
The second transformation converted original classroom space into a library and subsequently into a teacher/student office assistance center. The teaching/student center is a space for professional collaboration and interactive curricular development. This is a program element noticeably absent in older education buildings designed to support more traditional, isolated teaching methods. Overall, adaptive reuse has enabled the preservation of the building footprint while evolving to meet current education demands.
One of the most valuable realizations in the case of LFHS was the creative capture of unused space between the North and South buildings. An unused wedge-like area was transformed into a student commons. With skylights and a glass facade, this daylighted atrium now is a sunny place for students to mingle and for community events. It also links the media center and cafeteria.
Finally, the master-planning process led to infrastructure upgrades that increase accessibility and sustainability. The most important step toward sustainability was the thoughtful examination and anticipation of building and community needs.
Other sustainable features:
•Green roofs to capture rainwater, which limits the site’s impact on the municipal sewer system and provides insulation and increased green space.
•A permeable paver parking lot to capture rainwater and reduce runoff.
•A bioswale for stormwater detention and filtration.
•Occupancy sensors, high-efficiency systems and daylighting.
•Highly reflective roofing to limit the urban heat-island effect and reduce solar heat gain.
•Open additions and ADA retrofitting, along with a more thoughtful site plan for building services, improved accessibility significantly.
•Use of materials with low or no volatile organic compounds (VOCs).Jolicoeur, AIA, LEED AP, is a principal and K-12 market sector leader at Perkins+Will, Chicago. Kahl is the national K-12 education research knowledge coordinator at Perkins+Will. The firm was architect for the Lake Forest High School project. mark.Jolicoeur@perkinswill.com and melanie.kahl@perkinswill.com
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