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World

UK post-war schools listed into national historic wonders

2017-10-18 11:56:58

LONDON, Oct.17 (Xinhua) -- Britain's 12 post-war schools with innovative design were given special historic listing by the cultural department, the country's heritage guardian public body announced Tuesday.

A plastic classroom known as 'the bubble' at Kennington Primary School in the northern England city of Preston was among the best examples of the post-war schools to earn official Grade II listing by the British Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS).

The schools were listed on the advice of Historic England, a public body sponsored by the DCMS that looks after England's historic environment.

The highly innovative plastic "bubble" classroom was built in the 1970s as a prototype for a system of pre-fabricated mass production of schools. It makes early use of computer-aided design to produce the complex geometrical designs needed for rigidity.

The classroom also has educational interest as its look reflects "teaching in the round" with freedom of movement and fluid arrangements of space to engage pupils, said Historic England.

According to Historic England, post-war Britain was an innovative period in school design with school building driven by the "baby boom", the raising of the school leaving age, planned new towns and estates and the reconstruction of bomb-damaged buildings.

Duncan Wilson, chief executive of Historic England, said the schools added to the list expressed imaginatively the new approaches to education in the post-war period.

"Careful and innovative use of materials distinguishes the buildings and reflects the investment at the time," he said.

The list also includes Vanessa Nursery School in London, designed to represent an infusion of pop architecture with the early use of brightly colored glass-reinforced plastic pods.

Being placed on special historic listing gives the school buildings a special status, protecting and preserving them for future generations.

Also included is Fleet Infants School in Hampshire in southern England, which stands out as a high-tech, cost-effective solution for a school design.

Editor:Jiang Yiwei