Awards
2016 – Chicago Building Congress (CBC) Merit Awards, Finalist
Video
A shuttered lumberyard beside a railroad in the gritty Belmont-Cragin neighborhood might not seem an obvious setting for a new STEM-focused charter school. Yet the project reimagined the 175,000-square-foot former Rubenstein Lumber site as a state-of-the-art home for the ITW David Speer Academy, a STEM high school named in memory of David B. Speer, former Chairman of Illinois Tool Works (ITW).
The design creates a new entrance where the existing bow-string truss building meets the new classroom wing, connecting the school’s academic, athletic, and outdoor spaces. The wedge between the two structures forms a student garden used for daily circulation, informal gathering, and instructional activities. Students arriving from Grand Avenue pass through this garden to enter the school.
An original brick storage shed with a bowstring truss roof is transformed into a column-free, multi-use space for all-school assemblies, a lunchroom, and theater. Lowering the original shed floor several feet and adding permanent concrete bleachers ensures that students can enjoy varsity-level basketball and volleyball played on regulation courts. This multi-purpose room is an asset for the entire network of schools, drawing in students from all over the city.
ITW David Speer is the fifteenth Noble campus and the first with a regulation-size football field. After evaluating several layouts, the building was placed perpendicular to Grand Avenue, allowing the west side of the site to accommodate the field. Beyond athletics, the field acts as a barrier between students and the adjacent brownfield, while the gravel beneath the turf provides stormwater detention.”
“WKA, more than any architecture firm I worked with over the past 30 years, is passionate about connecting their designs to the history and spirit of the community the building will serve. Coupling the past, present, and future together in a single ambitious vision for as pace is an extraordinary achievement, and one that they achieved countless times for Noble and the communities we serve.”
Michael Madden, President, Noble Network of Charter Schools
Additional Images
General Contractor: Norcon Inc.
Structural Engineer: Thornton Tomasetti
Civil Engineer: V3 Companies
MEP Engineer: IBC Engineering Services
Acoustical Consultant: Threshold Acoustics
Landscape Architect: Wolff Landscape Architecture
Photography: Tom Rossiter