The Garden S.E.N School
The Garden School is a new £14m building serving 150 pupils with Special Educational Needs (SEN) at the extreme end of the Autistic Spectrum, built as part of Hackney’s Building Schools for the Future programme.
It sits on a restricted urban site surrounded by two storey Edwardian terraces in Hackney, with two street elevations. The building is a zig-zagging structure which describes two play spaces. White brickwork and glazed curtain walling are the main materials which contribute to the sense of calm and light in the building.
With its limited street frontages and staggered form, New Horizon will be only visible in parts – and that suits its users who will encounter the building in stages, starting with the perforated facade on Wordsworth Road, then zig-zagging through the long site. The zig-zag responds to the proximity of neighbouring buildings and also creates the two outside courts which serve in one case Primary aged pupils and the other Secondary.
White brick and white perforated metal are the main materials of a building which aims to make a calm, well lit and naturally ventilated environment with strong connections between inside and out.