Not far from Altona Volkspark in Hamburg’s Lurup quarter, a new building has been constructed for the neighborhood school with space for six classes per grade. Previously divided between three locations, the school now has one consolidated home catering to some 1,000 students and 120 teachers. The new building for the neighborhood school offers a diverse assortment of spaces in keeping with an educational concept aimed at helping every child achieve the best possible qualifications. It is anchored in the local setting by the addition of a community school, turning it into a neighborhood center offering youth work and adult education.

The design pays close attention to proportionality and an agreeable sense of scale. In order to blend respectfully with its surroundings, the building is limited to three stories, whose staggered heights create a mediating effect that is visually amplified by terraces and recessed areas. The entrance is set into the junction of the building’s two wings, whose shape communicates a sense of protection and invitation.

Inside, the look and feel of the new school is determined by a sense of lightness and openness. The overall mood is established by playful features, such as spaces inspired by the idea of a market square and other areas bustling with activity. Light floods into two atria, which provide vertical connections within the building.

The school has a diverse spatial program, incorporating classrooms for general teaching and for specialized courses, common areas, staff rooms, and spaces to accommodate the administration and the functions required for day-to-day operations. The careful structuring of these spaces is offset by their varied arrangement in relation to one another. Two sports halls—one single-purpose and one dual-purpose—and a multifunctional room are available for physical education classes or club sports. Rounding out the spatial program are supplemental amenities in the form of a media library and a community school with a parents’ café and youth room: this means that the building is open outside school hours as a neighborhood resource for social interaction. Additional events and offerings are an inviting way of involving and nourishing the community. The school building thus forms a natural part of the local milieu, figuring as a vibrant meeting place and focal point open to neighborhood residents and thus makes an effective contribution to a vision of the future in which different generations interact and cooperate with one another.