Designer Robert Gaukroger has completed three wooden classrooms on stilts in a forest clearing in the Lake District, UK.

Designed for the [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] in Windermere, the three pod-like structures are clad in wooden shingles made of English chestnut.

The structures comprise a ribbed timber frame, elevated on Douglas-fir stilts.

The structures comprise a ribbed timber frame, elevated on Douglas-fir stilts.

A deck connecting the three rooms is made of recycled plastic milk
bottles and wood shavings, and will be used as an outdoor classroom in
summer.

The structure is meant to be used as a gallery and event venue outside term time.

Photographs are by [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.].

Here’s some more information from the architect:
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Rob Gaukroger’s design practice has just completed the Forest School
project at ‘Elleray Prep School’ in Windermere, in the Lake District
National Park and this is just the start of a new wave of low impact,
upcyled and architecturally aware project’s he has designed.

Made chiefly from timber and other materials such as the deck board
made from a composite of recycled plastic milk bottles and wood
shavings, this is low tech architecture at it best.

Rob Gaukroger tells us how it all came about “it wasn’t a state
funded project and the budget has been tight from day one, I didn’t
charge a design fee for the three years it took to take this project
from an idea, through the planning process to the built solution today.
I have constructed a lot of the building myself with a small team of
joiners on site. The bursar at the school has kept a tight hold on the
purse strings and he has got good value for money.”
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Rob Gaukroger has worked closely with the ‘Lake District National
Park’ planning authority, who were once seen as a stuffy authority with
no appetite for modern architecture, but they are now beginning a new
architectural era in the’ Lake District National Park’.
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With a number of current projects on the drawing board and with the
blend of form and materials in Rob Gaukroger’s work, will make exciting
viewing in the future. ” I am working on a group of interesting project
at the moment, I have just up-cycled part of a 1970’s private house,
which is now clad in shingles, Thermowood and cedar, by highly
insulating the building externally and reducing some of the window
opening’s this building now has a new lease of life and is
architecturally unrecognisable from its existing white rendered
concrete walls and felt roof “.
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”Up-cycling is the way forward, there are many 1960’s, 70’s and 80’s
building made of concrete, which are not considered worth saving, but
with some careful thought, a lot of insulation and some designer flair,
these building can be saved from land fill and given a new beginning,
by insulating the existing concrete buildings on the outside, this then
creates a thermal mass from the existing concrete structure, recreating
how they react and perform thermally”.
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Rob Gaukroger’s practice is based in Windermere and he is
anticipating his principles will become the way ahead as part of this
process he is setting up a larger studio in the Lake District,” I will
be appointing a design team with in the next 12 months, concentrating
on up-cycled, re-cycled and low impact Architecture and design”.


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Posted by Rose Etherington from dezeen.com