AACM designs kindergarten in Italy to feel like "a small village"
An "abstract ensemble" of pyramidal roofs cloaked in terracotta tiles was designed to evoke the feel of a small village at Kinder Rain, a kindergarten in Italy recently completed by local architecture studio AACM.
The 672-square-metre kindergarten is located in Piove di Sacco, Padua, where it occupies a green site surrounded by trees.
Looking to create a form that would feel familiar for both pupils and the surrounding community, AACM drew on traditional Veneto cabins known as Casone Veneto, which informed the kindergarten's pyramidal roofs.
"The idea of building a public piece of architecture made us think about how to link the project to the history of the place, to make it a building that is welcomed and understood by locals," AACM co-founder Rodolfo Morandi told Dezeen.
"The shape is an echo of the traditional fishermen's houses called Casone Veneto that, with its sloped roof, is a sort of a monument in the culture of the Piove di Sacco area," he continued.
"The school appears then as a small village, an abstract ensemble of pyramidal 'houses' gathered around a central square, the 'agora', an inner playroom faced by each classroom."
Kinder Rain's classrooms are organised around this central playroom, which acts as a connecting space alongside a hall and cloakroom to avoid the need for any circulation corridors.
In each classroom, the pyramidal roof forms are expressed by steep, high ceilings culminating in skylights, which AACM hopes will "ignite the imaginations" of those inside.
A minimal palette focuses attention on the building's geometry, with wooden floors, white walls and wood fibre panel ceilings, which both control acoustics in the taller spaces and nod to the traditionally thatched roofs of Casone Veneto.
Around the building's perimeter, three courtyards or 'external classrooms' open out onto the surrounding site through large openings, where a paved walkway and concrete bench seating wrap the edge of the building and expand into an entrance plaza to the south.
"The main idea is to not have any corridors and to transform the circulation spaces into teaching and playing spaces," explains Morandi.
"Every classroom is connected through the central agora, so children can overlook one another knowing they are part of a 'society' bigger than their own single classroom."
"The outdoor classrooms act like a filter, an 'in-between' – it's outside, but it could also be inside. From the central agora, there's this idea of visual permeability where you always see the surrounding greenery," he added.
Externally, both the walls and roof of Kinder Rain are clad in terracotta tiles, with the external concrete benches and window frames finished in a matching shade to create what Morandi calls a "reddish unity".
AACM, which stands for Atelier Architettura Chinello Morandi, is a Milan and Padua-based architecture studio founded in 2020 by Morandi alongside Nicolò Chinello.
Other kindergarten projects recently featured on Dezeen include the updating of a prefabricated 1960s building in Hungary by local studio Archikon and
The photography is by Alex Shoots Buildings.
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