On a wooded, 15.5-acre site adjacent to a neighborhood of upscale single-family homes in Fairfield, Connecticut, the Burr Elementary School comfortably blends into the landscape, functioning as a “good neighbor” with its unintrusive scale and subdued, clean-lined presence. Burr Elementary, designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM), is one of two new schools recently built to support current and future growth in the township of 54,800 citizens.
Accommodating 500 students, the school’s design creates a variation on the traditional double-loaded corridor school layout, locating the communal library, art, science, and cafeteria spaces at the center of the two-level plan. Existing trees perforate the footprint, within a series of amoeba-shaped courtyards that function as outdoor classrooms contained in the building volume.