Design Build: LAB NEST A Playhouse
The Nest wins AIA New England Merit Award + AIA Vermont Citation Award!
The NEST Outline
The NEST is a 200sf outdoor classroom and playhouse, designed and built by 10 undergraduate architecture students. The NEST was envisioned as a space for physical exploration and imaginative play, as well as an experiential learning lab for educational programming, such as science classes about food cultivation and productions.
NEST serves as the centerpiece of a complete renovation of Montpelier, Vermont's public elementary school playground, which had been designated as a brownfield site due to the contaminated soil. The renovation aimed to remediate the environmental damage while transforming the neglected playground into a vibrant community greens space that would offer Montpelier families a gathering place where they could engage in healthy outdoor activities and enjoy a connection to nature.
NEST's most important stakeholders - the children, parents, and teachers who now use the structure every day - acted as key consultants throughout the design process. Through a combination of structured dialogue, observation, and feedback sessions, the architecture students who designed and built NEST developed a thorough understanding of the culture, values, and inspiration motivating the project. The resulting structure, constructed of environmentally-friendly and child-friendly materials, balances a sense of enclosure and refuge with strong visual connection to the environment and community, and invites curiosity, cooperation, and joy with whimsical geometry and integrated play features.
Designing and building the NEST provided incredible learning experiences when the students were in the eye of the multitude of challenging situations that emerged in the process. They were forced to problem-solve, think together, and make real design innovations in the field.
NEST an outdoor classroom
Description
Project Type: Public Benefit Project, Small
Size: 200 square feet
Program: Outdoor Classroom, Play Space, Science Learning Area
Responsibility of the Architect: The architecture students designed and built every detail of the project, save the concrete columns on which the structure sits. Structural details were designed by the architect / students in collaboration with the engineer.
Location: Local Elementary School, Montpelier, Vermont
Client: Local Elementary School, Montpelier, Vermont
Completion Date: May 2018, Installed August 2019
Total Construction Cost: $13,000.00 with approximately $5,000.00 in donations
Design+Construction Timeline: September 2017 - May 2018, Installed August 2020
Sustainable Design Principles:
Off-the-grid
Hand built
Sustainable, natural, local materials
No tree removal
Zero-low VOC finish
Few adhesives
NEST IN PLACE
Seeing children playing on and in the NEST is thrilling. They delight in the unique structure and fully embrace the interactive peg wall, the netting, the hammock, the helix and the open space. Classrooms use the NEST for special science gatherings, quiet moments reading can be seen in the hammock and dowdy games of peg pushing can be heard. The students who designed and built this project put a tremendous amount of love and time into the NEST and in return, it is beloved by the students, teachers and community.
ËÄ»¢Ó°ÊÓ + Union Elementary School
The 802 Lab at ËÄ»¢Ó°ÊÓ, in partnership with Union Elementary School, is focusing on how Montpelier, VT views an outdoor play space. This will be implemented in a playhouse built for Union Elementary School students, named The Nest, and placed during their playground renovation. The 802 Lab consists of both 3rd and 4th year students in ËÄ»¢Ó°ÊÓ's architecture program. The overall project is set to be completed by end of their Spring 2018 semester.
The Nest Installed
Precedents
As an introduction to the project, the 802 Lab analyzed existing precedents with distinct features.
Each person in the team chose a precedent from a list of structures, which they then did in depth
research on and built a physical model. The information learned was later presented to the
committee at Union Elementary School. The parents, teachers, and students in attendance were
able to share what they felt were strong aspects from each precedent and in return would like to
see in the playhouse design.
Building and Fabrication Progress
Inspiration + Community Outreach
We meet with Union Elementary School to present our precedents and compile a list from both parents and students on what their aspirations were for the playhouse. The main desires consisted of:
- Climbing space
- Colors
- Nooks
- Holes to see down
- Shapes
- Interactive structures
- Elevated spaces
- Multiple entrances
- Durability
- Open space
- Enclosed space with roof (water-resistant)
- Environmental Education
- Supervision
- 17-20 child occupancy
- Shaded space
- ADA accessible
We then spent class time with a 1st grade art class at the school where we asked the students to draw a treehouse for their favorite teacher
drawings from a 1st grade art class at Union Elementary School
Design
Meeting with Chris Temple from DeWolfe Engineering Associates, who donated his time and assistance.
Design
Drawings
Build
Union Elementary School Visits ËÄ»¢Ó°ÊÓ
After months of hard work by the 802LAB NEST team, the studio was able to present their
progress to a group of Union Elementary School students. Through a workshop, the 802LAB
students worked with the UES Students to paint and assemble pegs for the Interactive Wall in the
NEST. It was great to reconnection with the fact that the structure is being built for the
elementary school students.
