The architecture of learning spaces from the perspective of Herman Hertzberger

Abstract

Herman Hertzberger is an architect who has dealt over many years with the design of school buildings, both in terms of theory and practice. Owing to his vast experience in this field, he has established a theoretical framework on designing stimulating learning spaces for children. The scope of this thesis is firstly to present Hertzberger’s theory on the attributes of such spaces and how architects can achieve designing successful school buildings. There are several remarks of his that can be achieved spatially in various manners. After all, in architecture there is not an unambiguous relationship between theory and practice. In this sense, the research question of the present thesis is how Hertzberger’s theory on designing school buildings has been implemented in different ways. In other words, I will try to display the various architectural ‘solutions’ manifesting the same principles. In order to answer the question above, I will analyse schools (kindergartens and primary schools) designed by Hertzberger to serve contemporary learning approaches and teaching practices. The schools that will be selected cover a large time span, starting from the first buildings he designed until recent projects; the objective is to understand in what ways he himself has implemented his own ideas and probably detect elements that he further developed or departed from.