The project for the new Scientific High School in Sesto Fiorentino represented a major design challenge for us. With this project, we set ourselves three goals: to create a center of higher education in a strategic area, to provide the high school with a new safe, efficient and innovative facility for teaching, and to support local economic development through the creation of new jobs.
We developed the high school around three distinct blocks: two dedicated to educational-scholastic functions and one intended for the gymnasium. This configuration was designed to integrate harmoniously with the bicycle path, the pedestrian and vehicular road system, and the surrounding green area. The presence of the university laboratories to the east, with their rigorous and functional character, led us to reverse the proportion between transparent and opaque surfaces, favoring large glazed walls on the east front to improve natural lighting and internal comfort control.
The building has three floors around the south court and two floors around the north court. We took advantage of the rotation of volumes to generate panoramic terraces, which face the large glazed walls, providing quality outdoor spaces and greater visual connection with the surrounding environment. Spaces dedicated to frontal teaching we placed them mainly on the eastern front, where they can benefit from optimal conditions of natural light and comfort.
We also provided a CONI-certifiable gymnasium and a flexible auditorium, further enriching the high school's offerings. The entrance system was designed to allow the collective spaces to be used outside school hours, thus serving not only the school but also the local community.
Throughout the project, we focused on environmental aspects. We focused the design on reducing operating costs through very low energy consumption and mitigating environmental impact. With the new Scientific High School in Sesto Fiorentino, we not only want to create a place of learning, but also an example of how architecture can contribute to the sustainability and well-being of the community by creating spaces that serve both education and community life.
Big See Award winning project 2022
Project finalist at The PLAN Awards 2019