In recent years, Stuttgart's Körschtal School had grown steadily until the community school had almost 600 pupils, some of whom receive full-day lessons in primary school and all of whom receive full-day lessons in secondary school. The existing premises no longer met the requirements for a pleasant and contemporary learning environment. In order to create more space, the city of Stuttgart commissioned Plan Forward, the architectural subsidiary of the Stuttgart-based Wolff Group, to build a new extension. Implemented using modular timber construction, the construction time was significantly reduced compared to a solid construction and the architecturally sophisticated new building was opened on time for the start of the school year in fall 2021.

The two-storey building is free-standing, with no direct connection to the existing buildings and is accessed via a new barrier-free entrance. The rooms required for the all-day elementary school and the community school are accommodated on around 1,200 m². A total of twelve additional classrooms are now available at the Körschtal School. There are also rooms for special differentiation and inclusion measures as well as an area for the teachers. The central areas of the spacious corridors provide space for all-day activities. The efficiency of the modular timber construction method was particularly evident during the implementation of the construction measures during ongoing school operations: It took just four weeks to assemble the prefabricated modules once the structural work was complete. And this is how the modules for a classroom were assembled: Divided into three transportable individual modules, each was given a thin cross-laminated timber floor slab, beams in the middle of the room and side or partition walls to the adjacent room. The ceilings were designed as horizontal slabs and connected to the walls in a shear-resistant manner, which transfer the loads to the floor slab. While the individual modules were temporarily supported during construction, continuous reinforced concrete and cross-laminated timber walls stiffen the overall system. Particular emphasis was placed on sustainability in this new school building. The flat roof was extensively greened and equipped with a photovoltaic system. Part of the energy concept is ventilation with heat recovery using highly efficient cross-flow heat exchangers, which, in combination with the well-insulated building envelope, ensures a significantly reduced energy requirement compared to conventionally built schools.

www.plan-forward.de

Photos:

Markus Guhl
www.architekturfotograf-markus-guhl.com

(Published in CUBE Stuttgart 03|22)