Newton STEM Classrooms Ludbreg

The educational facility is planned in the area of a former industrial zone in a detached part of the town of Ludbreg. The location once housed a bakery plant with production, management, and supporting economic buildings. The zone that once represented the town’s breadwinner was left to degradation over time following the closure of the plant.

The intervention reactivates a defunct urban space by introducing targeted facilities for the youngest users. Newton – STEM Classrooms in Ludbreg are the first classrooms of the Norwegian educational programme in Croatia. The programme is designed for a practical approach to the education of primary-school-aged children through workshops in the fields of science and technology. The classrooms are also the first facility within the scope of the project.

The physical reactivation of the space is planned by retaining the existing locations and dimensions. The volumes of the former buildings have been repeated and fully abstracted in appearance through a uniform grey cladding. The visibility of the new buildings is achieved with smaller, chromatically emphasized volumes which, by piercing through the achromatic tissue, create contact with the immediate surroundings and represent a link and the main character in both the interior and exterior. Their function is multi-faceted: by their position, the horizontal volumes guide the movement of users through the undefined surface of the future square, while the vertical one, emphasized by its position as a projection on the roof, becomes a kind of landmark in the wider space. At the same time, from the inside, they emphasize the entrance, the brainstorm room space, and the observatory. The interior colours on a neutral background are defined by the Newton classroom standards book, and these same colours have been integrated throughout the design concept.