The Brearley School

Realizing a 25-Year Dream: 610 + 590 = One Brearley!

The Vision for The Brearley School was to imagine a new home that would consolidate the ‘whole’ school and all divisions into a campus of buildings in close proximity to each other. After 85 years in its purpose-built premises at 610 East 83rd St., the school had doubled the student body and outgrown its original building. After a study of the options, it was ultimately decided that the new 85,000 sf building a block away from the original building, would be a gateway to the Brearley School, and accommodate the Lower School and those spaces that benefit from a larger floor plate and the ability to accommodate technical space.

The new 12-storey expansion is conceived as a mini-vertical campus and includes a flexible and multi-purpose learning landscape integrated into the lobby, state-of-the art science labs, a large performance space, the lower school library and common room, and play space at the roof level. The building is designed as a LEED Gold teaching tool, allowing students to actively participate in sustainable features, including a green roof to be planted and maintained by the students.

KPMB Team
Marianne McKenna (partner-in-charge), Luigi LaRocca (principal), David Constable (senior associate), Lucy Timbers (senior associate), David Smythe (senior associate), Talal Rahmeh, Alistair Grierson, Thom Seto, Lukas Bergmark, Lily Huang, Ramin Yamin, Joseph Kan, Peter Kitchen, Rafaela Ahsan, Jessica Juvet, Carolyn Lee (senior associate)

Consultants
Entuitive with Thornton Thomasetti (structural), Tillotson Design Associates (lighting), Thomas Polise Consulting Engineers (MEP), Entuitive (envelope), CCI (code), TM Technologies (AV/IT/security), Longman Lindsey (acoustics), Sound Space Vision and Stages (theatre acoustics), Steven Winter Associates (LEED), Transsolar (climate engineers), Entro (signage)

Material Used :

1. Yankee Hill Masonry – Roman format Iron Spot Brick
2. 9 Wood – Wood Ceilings
3. Carl Stahl – Stainless Steel mesh enclosure at Playdeck
4. Gala Systems – Auditorium Adjustable floor lift system
5. Mosa Tile - Flooring
6. Oko Skin Concrete Panels – Upper Floor Cladding
7. Gala - Sprialift Adjustable Auditorium Floor System
8. Solera Glass – Gymnasium Glazing

Entro designed the signage and donor recognition program for The Brearley School, a prestigious K-12 all-girls school located in the Upper East Side of Manhattan. After 85 years in its purpose-built premises at 610 East 83rd St., the student body and outgrown its original building.
 

In order to meet the needs of its students, the Brearley School set out to design a new 75,000 square foot, vertical campus building. Designed by KPMB Architects, the 12-storey expansion includes a flexible and multi-purpose learning landscape integrated into the lobby, state-of-the art labs, a large auditorium, a library, a common room and play space.

In addition, the building is designed as a LEED Gold teaching tool, allowing students to actively participate in sustainable features, including a green roof to be planted and maintained by the students.
 

Entro’s wayfinding program for the new building is designed to complement the existing building and consolidate the whole school with a unified look and feel. As there is very limited visitor access to the building, only a simple wayfinding strategy was required, with no need for directional or directory signage.

Instead, the focus was on consistent placement of signage and very clear level identification. To that end, the elevator cores had large outlined level identification. Stairwells had supersized playful numbers wrapping around the walls near the doorways.
 

Signage is minimalistic but elegant, utilizing the school’s traditional house red. The school’s colour also appears as an accent on sign edges and has a strong presence in the elevator core with bold red walls.
 

Two fonts from the school’s branding program - used for room identification and donor recognition signage respectively, along with the school crest, complete the brand presence.

Sightlines to the lobby wall made for a perfect opportunity to showcase the school’s crest, which was applied large-scale directly to the wall, creating a colourful, welcoming image that is visible from the outdoors. The Brearley seal is thought to have appeared in print for the first time on the cover of the school catalogue for 1890–1891, but has been redesigned since. The original design had to be maintained, but the detail enhanced enough for the imagery to be blown up to a 6’-6” diameter, and appear clear and detailed enough for people to view close-up.