Schul- und Kulturzentrum Feldkirchen an der Donau
During construction, it was necessary to scatter the elementary school throughout the town. Today, it forms part of a vibrant civic center together with the music school, a sports hall, and a 1970s middle school that has been respectfully renovated.
Feldkirchen an der Donau, with a population of around 5 500, is a medium-sized town in the suburbs of Linz. As early as 2006, the idea emerged to expand the existing sports hall by adding a music school and making it more suitable for events. At the same time, the adjacent primary and middle schools were slated for renovation. When planning began, however, the primary school’s building fabric proved too deteriorated to justify renovation, so a new building was undertaken—modeled on the existing middle school, a 1970s Hallenschule typology. The two schools are arranged as mirror images along an imaginary axis, joined by a new central corridor that connects all levels.
The centerpiece of this hall is a large learning and reading staircase that leads from the ground floor to the first floor, where the school library is tucked into wall cabinets. These seating stairs function primarily as a learning landscape, a place for reading and conversation. The seating steps are a vibrant red, which adds a lively energy to the space.
The school’s building history also includes an inadvertent experiment on the question of whether a new building was even necessary. Shortly before construction began, the company contracted to supply temporary classrooms during the construction phase went bankrupt. Because it was impossible to find replacements at such short notice, it was decided to distribute the school classes throughout the community: one in the town council chamber, and others in vacant shops and unused workshops. The outcome was surprisingly positive; rarely had there been so much exchange with local residents or such enjoyment in appropriating spaces as during these months of “diaspora.”
In the new building, however, there is more communication among the teachers: The Feldkirchen primary school was the first in Austria where the walls between the clusters are made largely of glass. Retreat spaces and niches can be created using movable furniture and cushions. And even if some walls have now been taped over, teachers value the visual connection to the neighboring classrooms and to the central marketplace, not least in relation to the school’s recently developed child-protection concept. By contrast, the decision to have only one source of water per cluster—rather than including a sink in each classroom—has been criticized as impractical.
From the outside, with its wood-clad balconies and large areas of façade glazing, the structure could almost be mistaken for an office building or boutique hotel. A place of work crossed with a place of hospitality: perhaps an apt combination for a contemporary school.
[ Feldkirchen an der Donau Primary School, Middle School, Music School, and Cultural Center ] Architecture: fasch&fuchs.architekten. Client: Verein zur Förderung der Infrastruktur der Marktgemeinde Feldkirchen an der Donau & Co KG. Structural engineering: Werkraum Wien Ingenieure ZT GmbH. Procurement procedure: School and cultural center (Construction Phase 1): EU‑wide invited competition; middle school renovation, new elementary school (Construction Phase 2): Direct award of contract by the State of Upper Austria. Planning and construction period: 2008–2011 (Construction Phase 1); 2012–2014 (Construction Phase 2). Gross floor area: 7 851 m². Address: Schulstraße 12, 4101 Feldkirchen an der Donau, Upper Austria.