HAMDEN, Conn.—Designer Svigals + Partners has successfully completed renovating Quinnipiac University’s Center for Communications and Engineering (CCE). The structure was originally designed as a law library in 1995 before being converted into a building that hosted classrooms, laboratories, lounges and study areas. However, university personnel believed the space could be even better utilized specifically for engineering and communications education purposes.

Svigals + Partners’ scope of work entailed transforming a three-story atrium into classroom space. In their redesign of the entire building, the firm also envisioned “huddle rooms” and computer lab in addition to the modern classrooms. The reimagined lounge space allows for more sunlight throughout the day to enter its open layout.

Additionally, the design and construction team reconfigured previously exposed mechanical systems. To add to the modern feel of the building, a large monitor broadcasts various school news and achievements throughout the day. Other installed wall monitors showcase activities taking place throughout the academic labs and serve to draw people toward the rooms where such experiments are occurring. Nearby, a display case also highlights trophies and various other student accolades.

“The redesigned student lounge turns an underutilized gathering area into a prime meeting place designed for interdisciplinary teamwork and connectivity,” architect Christopher Bockstael, AIA, partner of Svigals + Partners, said of the work. “Each of the collaborative settings draws students and visitors in to pause, stay and engage.”

Added April Gaddis, an architectural designer and associate with Svigals + Partners: “Our ongoing communications with Quinnipiac’s skilled facilities team and with BVH, our engineering partners, helped drive the project forward in timely ways, despite a tight timeline challenged by extended lead times for materials and construction.”

Svigals + Partners worked with general contractor Wohlsen Construction. The firm’s senior director of development, Bob Labanara, said in a statement to School Construction News that as a New England-based firm, Wohlsen is dedicated to higher education work throughout the region—particularly at Quinnipiac University’s School of Computing and Engineering.

“We were honored to collaborate with QU’s facilities team and design experts from Svigals + Partners to help transform a collective vision for the school into tangible, new learning environments that QU students and faculty deserve,” said Labanara.

“These flexible environments for the engineering and communications students and faculty foster a deep sense of community,” said Bockstael. “Showcasing student work in the makerspaces, labs, and across disciplines encourages the student body to visit the lounge and see what’s being done, inspiring more productive collaboration and innovation at the CCE.”

Svigals + Partners, based in New Haven, Conn., was founded in 1983. The firm provides full-service, art, architecture and planning firm dedicated to building educational and other facilities.

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WEST HAVEN, Conn.—A new science and technology building that has gone up at a New England college has been recognized for the innovation of its design and construction, which has earned it a LEED Gold Certified green building certification.

The recently completed Bergami Center for Science, Technology & Innovation was designed by Svigals + Partners, based out of nearby New Haven.  The 45,500-square-foot, three-story structure is designed with a central atrium at its center, thereby allowing it to function as a locus for social activity and encouraging interactions between students and faculty.  The building was named in honor of alumnus Samuel S. Bergami Jr. and his wife, Lois, longtime benefactors to the school.

To make the Bergami Center blend more seamlessly into the existing campus’s motif, the new building connects directly to the existing Buckman Hall, which is part of the school’s engineering school.  Portions of Buckman were renovated to allow the two buildings to perhaps appear as if they had always been joined at the very heart of the University of New Haven.

The Bergami Center is only the most recent collaboration between the college and Svigals + Partners after the designers previously envisioned the Engineering and Science University Magnet School (ESUMS), which sits adjacent to the main campus.

Julia McFadden, associate principal with Svigals + Partners, said that the Bergami Center was envisioned to “stimulate the kind of productive, collaborative interaction currently leading to breakthrough thinking in institutional, corporate and scientific settings.”  Accordingly, her firm’s plans entailed spaces where students can congregate to more easily swap ideas.  Furthermore, Svigals + Partners’ “thematic” elements are meant to echo the notion of starting out with ideas that eventually evolve into hypotheses and experiments.

And as the new facility indeed has the word “technology” in its name, it will be rife with 3D printers, a broadcast studio as well as a state-of-the-art auditorium that can double as a cinema when so needed.

Bergami Center represents the crown jewel in the university’s Charger Challenge, a slate of improvements and various other campus projects designed to coincide with the school’s centennial in 2020.

“At its core, the Bergami Center embodies our university-wide commitment to fostering innovation, cultivating creativity and ingenuity, and educating the next generation of problem solvers,” University of New Haven President Steven H. Kaplan said in a recent statement.  “In creating this space, we have strengthened our commitment to preparing our students to excel in the careers of the future.”

Svigals + Partners worked on the Bermani center in conjunction with general contractor Consigli Construction Co., civil engineer Westcott & Mapes and landscape architect Richter & Cegan.  Other partners included MEP engineers BVH Integrated Services, structural engineer Michael Horton Associates and energy analyst Karpmann Consulting.

“The university’s leaders understand that their students need to be prepared for life after college,” added McFadden. “Bergami Center combines advanced technology with the collaborative modes that produce transformative thinking, offering students a place to acquire both the skills and the competitive edge they will need.”

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HARTFORD, Conn. — Young students in New Haven can take advantage of learning in a 21st century school environment now that the new, 19,000-square-foot expansion to the existing Riverside Magnet School has reached completion.

Designed by the New Haven, Conn., office of Svigals + Partners, the new building offers inspiration through innovative learning spaces and expands the former early-childhood facility to accommodate pre-kindergarten through fifth grade students.

The project scope for Riverside Magnet School included an expansion of the existing early-childhood school — which Svigals + Partners designed and opened in 2013 — to accommodate students up to grade five and an integration of the newer facility with a 1960s-era adjacent school building.

“Being tasked with creating a state-of-the-art school in the shell of a 1960’s building was a unique challenge,” said Lynn Brtoman, NCIDQ, IIDA, associate principal at Svigals + Partners. “One important aspect of the renovation involved introducing new lighting systems and display elements for showcasing student work to enliven circulation areas.”

The integration was achieved through the application of complementary exterior building materials and unifying design motifs, successfully creating a cohesive aesthetic for the school.

Over the past five years, the Riverside Magnet School has expanded significantly and planned for additional space to house growing demand from area families. This new facility offers specialized instructional spaces for programs including instrumental music as well as additional classrooms, a project center, a new kitchen and a dividable multi-purpose room.

Both the previous building and the expansion are designed to support the Reggio Emilia teaching method, which concentrates on self-directed, experiential learning in relationship-driven environments as well as the significance of nature.

The original design of the early childhood school utilized colors found in nature and corresponding figurative sculptural elements of distinct leaf species to provide easy-to-follow wayfinding for very young children, guiding them to their assigned learning “pods.” The expansion builds on this language, creating a new identity that integrates with the existing school and supports the Reggio Emilia teaching model.

Another major design component is the new multipurpose room, which brings students and staff together and strengthens the school community.

“We were able to build upon our previous experience with the school facilitators while drawing input from new faculty, resulting in the creation of new spaces to support evolving educational practices,” said Brotman. “Flexible spaces with furniture that both students and staff can easily move and manipulate as needed supports the school’s experienced-based learning approach. Additionally, the ‘bridge’ corridor connecting the two buildings offers an ideal gallery space for projects and presentations.”

According to the school leadership, the building expansion helps support new academic and enrichment programs including an orchestral music program as well as a new project center for encouraging literacy and technology skills.

Each classroom also utilizes interactive electronic white boards. Students also have access to laptops, which they take into break out spaces such as the gallery to complete individual assignments

“Learning happens everywhere, so we focused on creating flexible spaces that would allow for growth and a variety of teaching and learning modes. Also, the media center space supports project-based learning, a current trend impacting K-12 design,” concluded Brotman.

Construction began in August 2017 and was completed in August 2018 with FIP Construction of Farmington, Conn., serving as the general contractor.

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WEST HAVEN, Conn. – Yale School of Nursing students will now gain real life experience with the school’s new high-tech teaching space following the completion of its new Simulation Lab and classroom expansion project.

The $5 million project, led by Svigals + Partners with construction manager Shawmut Design and Construction, began in January 2018 and marked completion in July, transforming the space in less than one year, just in time for the fall semester’s start.

The Yale School of Nursing sought an expansion of the existing program to integrate the latest technology and include a wider range of simulated environments as well as expanding curricular offerings by utilizing comprehensive teaching modalities.

According to Ann Kurth, dean of Yale School of Nursing, the new, state-of-the-art teaching spaces are designed to help prepare future Yale nurses to address where health care is going – including outpatient, disaster and telehealth care.

The full scope of the project includes nearly 8,000 square feet of newly designed space; with an enlargement of the Simulation Lab, nearly double the size of the previous facility.

The design includes two new classrooms, a primary care assessment lab, six standardized patient exam rooms, two new debrief rooms, the addition of high-tech observation and control rooms, student and faculty work stations, a 500-square-foot, one-bedroom apartment for home care simulation as well as updates to the Center for Biobehavioral Health Research and first floor café.

Under this design, the expansion offers both new and realistic primary care and home care settings; used for the high-fidelity simulations featured in the curriculum.

“The expansion design reflects the increasing importance of simulations in healthcare education, which allow instructors to observe and record interactions between nursing students and the trained actors who play patients. Discussions of these interactions in debrief sessions that follow are a growing part of medical and nursing school pedagogies. The range of settings included in the new design distinguish this simulation lab from those in other schools, as does the new recording technology integrated into the lab,” said Doug Lovegren, associate principal with Svigals + Partners.

The new facility also features advanced video capture systems integrated into the lab, which allows the faculty to monitor simulations remotely and to play them back for critiquing and discussing with students.

“By investing in the expansion of the simulation lab, Yale School of Nursing is committed to ensuring that the next generation of nurse leaders, scholars, and practitioners are fully prepared for the future challenges in national and global healthcare. This exciting venture will help us maintain our status as one of the top graduate nursing programs in the world,” said Ann Kurth, school dean.

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NEW HAVEN, Conn. –– The Connecticut Building Congress (CBC) recognized the nationally renowned architecture, art and advisory firm Svigals + Partners of New Haven by awarding the firm for two of its projects based on team partnership and collaboration ––  one of which was a STEM school. The double CBC honors was presented at the organization’s 2018 Annual Project Team Awards Banquet on June 12 for “outstanding collaborative efforts” of the project teams, including the owner group, designers, construction firms and other participants.

The first-place award went to Svigals + Partners for its work on the Engineering and Science University Magnet School (ESUMS), a school that opened in 2017 and has become recognized as “an innovative makerspace campus” for grades 6-12. Gilbane Building Company of Providence, R.I., joined in as the construction manager partner, along with the client group that included the University of New Haven and the New Haven Board of Education. The unique collaboration resulted in a contemporary and advanced learning environment by consulting stakeholder groups, while even allowing students from the school to participate in the process through their Kids Build! Program, which helped them better understand the components of the building as it was being designed. Many of the ESUMS workshops, classrooms and lab rooms are enclosed with operable glass partitions, creating bright and inspiring learning spaces that can be opened up to adjacent hallways for larger informal gatherings and team-based work.

“This unique collaboration with the university and the school board has resulted in a state-of-the-art learning environment that affords greater access to educational resources for the more than 600 students it serves,” said Julia McFadden, AIA, associate principal with Svigals + Partners, in a statement. “Our team worked closely with multiple stakeholder groups to achieve ambitious results — a construction project emblematic of the New Haven Board of Education’s commitment to the community and to superior education.”

Creating flexible and accommodating classrooms was a key component of the design, with glass dividers opening up into hallway learning spaces that widen on each end, offering a space where ESUMS students can study or work together on comfortable chairs and couches. The engineering laboratories are equipped for innovative STEM education while offering views to the University of New Haven campus, with the idea of providing inspiration to the students’ pursuit of a continued education. The building is designed to join prototyping technology with CLABs located throughout the school with a central makerspace accessible in the heart of the building.

The five-story facility offers boundless access to educational resources for their 600-student body, and a first-hand learning representation for STEM education, featuring state-of-the-art labs, computer and 3-D printers. Svigals + Partners designed ESUMS to match the school’s rigorous science and technology curriculum while also incorporating a special focus on integrating arts education. The out-stretched, cantilevered wings are made up of high-performance glass and louvered blinds to help regulate solar heat gain. The exterior also includes sculptures bearing the faces of inventors and scientists from the area, including Eli Whitney and A.C. Gilbert. The design element was specifically tailored with the ESUMS curriculum in mind, which encourages proficiency in self-discipline, critical-thinking, open-mindedness, risk-taking and creative problem solving.

“ESUMS is a wonderful example of what can take place when local municipalities, the state and higher education collaborate to create a school that is the first of its kind in Connecticut. This innovative school will enable generations of students to become tomorrow’s leaders in a wide array of scientific and technological fields, and it will directly benefit the citizens of our region, our state and our nation.” said Steven H. Kaplan, the president of the University of New Haven, in a statement.

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Six years later, the numbers tell a different story about the site, and though they will never and should never eclipse what occurred there, they point to a future that is inherently safer and hopefully happier.

Debuted in time for the 2016-17 school year, the new, 86,800-square-foot Sandy Hook Elementary School accommodates about 450 students from kindergarten through fourth grade. It was two years in the making, following an intensive process on the part of stakeholders, including Svigals + Partners, the New Haven, Conn., firm that designed the new facility under the direction of Managing Partner Jay Brotman, AIA.

“We recognized immediately the importance of an inclusive and open design process,” said Brotman. “Before even the first drawing, we met with community officials and families to hear their concerns, to listen to what they wanted from a new school, to discover what was important to the people there about their town and to hear from them what the original elementary school meant to them.”

In the end, Brotman said his team became intimately involved with the people of Newton and as a consequence, “became very protective of them.”

From the get-go, the firm committed to an inclusive and collaborative process, which included a committee composed of Sandy Hook Elementary School teachers and staff, parents, Newtown School District staff, members of the Board of Education, town staff, community representatives and the design/construction team at its core. This body coalesced as the School Based Building Advisory Committee (SBBAC), and its involvement continued into the construction phase, said Brotman.

“We believed — rightly, I think — this would be the only way to design a school building and campus that would stand as an expression of the needs, aspirations and spirit of Newtown, Sandy Hook in particular,” said Brotman. “Schools must provide a nurturing, welcoming and healthy environment for children to learn, and they must support community activities of all kinds. In order to fulfill this dual mission, our design solutions addressing safety and security had to be seamlessly integrated into an architectural aesthetic that says, ‘Welcome, come on in and join us,’” said Brotman.

To wit, the safety measures were implemented in a manner that rendered them essentially invisible.

“For Sandy Hook Elementary School, we explored how to prevent intruders from gaining access to the building, starting with a campus plan that delineates the separation from the street and surrounding areas while directing traffic flow strategically so that potential threats may be detected early,” Brotman explained. “We also located active public areas near the front of the building towards the arrival area so that they could easily observe approaching visitors and report any unwanted activities.”

Other strategies, according to Brotman, focused on delaying a potential intruder’s progress by locating the classrooms such that they were remote from any likely points of entry. Locks and automatic doors were also engineered to impede progress, and the landscaping was designed to be eco-friendly while driving visitors toward “preferred points of entry.” The surrounding landscape also informed the design as Brotman and his team actively integrated the school into the environment.

“The local ecology and geography of the area are important to the community’s identity. Our team worked to weave inspiration from the site and its surroundings into the design, establishing physical and symbolic connections with nature, in a way that would help organize the site to address security, vehicular access, pedestrian connections and so forth,” said Brotman.

Among the safety features incorporated into the project are impact-resistant laminated glazing on a variety of strategic spots throughout the building as well as hardened interior walls and doors. The hardware on classroom doors is engineered to automatically deadbolt upon closing.

“The school building also includes a number of technological strategies such as security cameras and lighting that are motion-sensitive. But the true strength of the design is in the planning, landscaping and layout that increase the available reaction time for identifying and responding to potential intruders,” said Brotman.

To read the entire article, check out the May/June issue of School Construction News.

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Launched in 1995 to support the rebuilding and expansion of the Edgewood Magnet School in the New Haven Public Schools district, KidsBuild! proved an immediate success. “The Edgewood School project experience created a process template that shaped a nearly $2 billion school construction program, and we saw an opportunity in this to expand the involvement of the students themselves,” said Julia McFadden, AIA, an architect and associate principal with Svigals + Partners, in a statement.

To that end, Svigals + Partners is expanding KidsBuild! as part of the design and construction of the Engineering & Science University Magnet School (ESUMS), which opened in West Haven, Conn., in February 2017. This year, the firm intends to present the KidsBuild! modality to charter schools and independent education leaders throughout the nation.

Thus far, KidsBuild! has been introduced in eight Connecticut public schools, including Columbus Family Academy in New Haven, the Discovery Magnet School in Bridgeport, Jonathan E. Reed School in Waterbury and the new Sandy Hook School in Newtown — all designed by Svigals + Partners. The latest KidsBuild! and ESUMS collaboration is a “maker school” for grades six to 12, located on a university campus site in West Haven, and will consist of nine workshops over a four-year period and impact approximately 35 students from various grades each year.

“We worked with two ESUMS teachers and the principal, Medria Blue-Ellis, who championed this successful program,” said Svigals + Partners Project Architect Katelyn Chapin, AIA, in a statement. “The workshops included teaching about the architectural design process and specific topics — like cantilevers and sustainability, devising ways to integrate art into the new building and imagining how adjacent wetlands could affect the engineering and construction process.”

Other workshop sessions introduced careers in architecture and engineering with site visits led by design team members that enabled students to track the construction process itself. Among the concepts learned by participants were surveying, groundwater flow, structural engineering and construction sequences. Furthermore, students are subsequently involved in the design and maintenance of their schools and are encouraged to impart their learnings and values to younger classmates.

The firm has discussed the program across the United States in professional forums and publications and is eager to expand its implementation into a variety of educational settings on a national level.

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