Design of Ambassador School by Gonzalez Goodale Architects California. The facility’s circulation is continuously open-air, beginning with the entry portal and leading to a grand open-air stair covered by a sky-lit canopy. The scale of this stair makes it an instrument of both circulation and socializing. On circulating between classrooms, or between the eastern and western branches of the school, the two courtyards provide identity and way-finding for students in what could otherwise have been an over-scaled school for children of this age.
In playful contrast to the zinc cladding at the entry is a material collage of painted plaster and perforated metal panels in a palette that combines white, charcoal gray, bright orange, and yellow-green. This vivid composition of the campus is intentional in conveying a spirit that is strong on academic discipline, and equally strong on a sense of ease, a sense of play.
The K-5 Library, patterned in colorful orange and white, is a high-volume space, the most dramatic, and public space in the school, celebrating reading and literacy in a most public way, with double height windows advertising the activities directly to the 8th Street sidewalk.
Architects: Gonzalez Goodale Architects
Location: Los Angeles, CA, USA
Principal-in-charge: Armando Gonzalez, FAIA
Design principal: David Goodale, AIA, LEED AP
Project designer; Chung Chan
Principal/ Senior project manager: Harry Drake, AIA
Project Team: Anthony Tam, AIA, Sheila Mactal, Say-Vun Khov, Bill Ortega, Juan Bermudez
Landscape: ahbe
Lighting: Horton Lees Brogden Lighting Design
Project year: 2009
Photographs: Tim Street, Inta Krukle, Magnus Stark
