Project name:American School Foundation of Guadalajara | High School
Project overview:Ramps, stairs and garden terraces connect each floor physically as well as visually to provide accessible, easy, free-flowing circulation, As these elements weave in and out of the building, it becomes clear that the school has no true interior. There are classrooms, which are enclosed, but the circulation space remains open to the elements, further enhancing the feeling that this is not merely a stacked progression of floors but rather a campus arranged vertically. From the outside, these floors look like exceptionally thin, almost floating, sheets of concrete cutting across glass volumes and two solid concrete circulation and mechanical cores. They appear like a single, continuous surface, with the concrete overhang like a slender fin reaching outward. The glass volumes that themselves seem to float amidst these fins house classrooms, each lined at the ceiling level with operable windows that allow for cross ventilation. And the floors themselves serve as climate-control devices—in Guadalajara, where the night can fall quite chilly and days can be warm and dry, concrete’s thermal mass keeps school spaces comfortable even when the sun beats down. For additional shading, a large trellis perforated in a triangular pattern wraps the top and one side of the building, casting geometric shadows onto the upper terrace and the building’s concrete vertical surface with the future of the campus flanking, it on one side and city views extending from the other, the new high school is positioned, both literally and architecturally, to usher students into whatever comes next.
Project location:Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico
Firm name:Flansburgh Architects
Architect of Record:
Completion: 2023
Client:American School Foundation of Guadalajara
Jury comments:Elegant, bold, and bright, this high school is incredibly confident in its approach. The open vertical campus frees the ground plane while sculptural ramps blur indoor and outdoor spaces, creating a continuous open-air campus in the sky. Thin, sandwich concrete plates read as beautifully transparent and laser-cut, pairing structural ingenuity with delight. Rooted in Guadalajara’s modernist lineage, the project integrates thermal mass, cross-ventilation, and layered shading, elevating the student experience through social connection, wellbeing, and a strong sense of belonging.
Associated Architecture Firm:GVA Arquitectos
Images/Photographer(s):Local Architects; Robert Benson Project or Construction Manager:Cushman & Wakefield Mechanical:Profinel Electrical:Profinel Plumbing:Profinel Interiors:LAB [3.2] Architecture
