What if Every School?
Cornerspring Montessori School
ABOUT
Client Cornerspring Montessori School
Typology Institutional
Location Belfast, Maine
Year 2017
Design Team Timothy Lock, Matthew O’Malia, Riley Pratt, Alexandra Pagán, Michael Bailey
Contractor GO Logic
EUI 3.65
AWARDS
AIA Maine, 2019, Merit Award
FEATURED IN
Maine Home + Design
The first high-performance institutional or commercial building in Belfast, Maine, Cornerspring Montessori School’s new facility represents a milestone for both the school and the city. Combining a boldly contemporary form with subtle vernacular references, and encouraging a free flow of activity from indoors to outdoors, the building supports Montessori pedagogy while also following the stringent Passive House model of energy efficiency and indoor air quality. The result is an inspiring learning environment that also achieves the highest levels of comfort, health, and building durability. Requiring a fraction of the energy consumed by a conventional building, the new structure has dramatically reduced the school’s operating expenses, even as its distinctive profile has raised the institution’s visibility in the community.
The heart of the building’s single-story plan is a bar-like volume that contains the four elementary-grade classrooms, bending at its center to create a flexible common space. The classrooms line the building’s north-facing side, with large windows that deliver ample daylighting. Circulation spaces, administrative functions, and the toddler room occupy a smaller volume at the south, under a barn-like pitched roof that supports a 16kW photovoltaic array. In a contemporary nod to the archetypal rural schoolhouse, a dramatic cantilevered gable announces the building’s main entrance.
The building’s design is deeply informed by Montessori educational philosophy—which emphasizes independent learning, outdoor activity, and interaction among age groups—as well as by essential issues of accessibility, student safety, and building security. Each classroom comprises a sunny, flexible, self-contained learning environment with direct access to the outdoors. The four elementary classrooms and central gathering space can be combined in a variety of ways, facilitating multi-age activities, performances, and community events. The site, which includes two bioswales to collect and filter surface runoff and more than 30 acres of wooded land for future trails, offers limitless potential for outdoor learning.
The new facility incorporates a superinsulated, air-sealed Passive House building shell with R-50 walls, an R-100 roof, and triple-glazed windows—investments that were fully offset by consequent reductions in the size and complexity of the building’s mechanical systems. Decentralized air-source electric heat pumps provide supplemental heating and cooling, while a fully integrated heat-recovery ventilation system ensures a continuous supply of tempered fresh air. The result is a reduction in annual heating cost from $8,600 at the school’s previous location to near zero.
