Photo credit: Rockfon.
Bellevue School District in Washington transformed its one-story Sammamish High School into a three-story educational facility. It’s the last phase of the district’s initiative to rebuild all four of its high schools.
The 323,000-square-foot building currently serves 1,060 students, with room for 1,800.
CHALLENGE: Bellevue originally performed minor renovations for all four high schools, but still needed to improve instructional spaces to support new technology. The district rebuilt the first three schools but kept existing gyms, locker rooms and other spaces to minimize costs.
This limited overall design and functionality, so the school board voted to rebuild all spaces at Sammamish (except its performing arts center).
“Sammamish was going to be our largest high school project to accommodate future growth” says Jack McLeod, director of facilities and operations at Bellevue.
SOLUTION: During the four-year construction process, students and staff remained in the original building while the new facility was constructed in the parking lot. The library now features 250,000 square feet of stone wool acoustic ceiling systems, which shields noise generated in the new fabrication studios. Big windows enhance natural light, reducing energy and cooling costs.
Sammamish now has a three-story common area and art and science studios, as well as a glass arts facility. A concession booth and a new two-story athletic building have been integrated with existing sports fields.
“The design team did an excellent job of developing a phasing plan, which was communicated widely and often” says McLeod.
COST: $88 million
COMPLETION DATE: July 2017
PROJECT TEAM: General contractor: Spee West Construction Company (Edmonds, Wash.); architect and interior design: Integrus Architecture (Seattle); acousticians: Sparling, a Stantec company (Lynnwood, Wash.); installing contractor: Forrest Sound Products (Redmond, Wash.); distributor: Valhalla Construction Products (Silverdale, Wash.)
