Waring School
LOCATION: Beverly, MA
SIZE: 12,000 sq ft
COMPLETED: 2021
ARCHITECT / DESIGNER: OPAL
CONSULTANT: Peel Passive House
GC/BUILDER: L. D. Russo
“This new 12,000 square foot academic building represents a watershed in the history of Waring School, a private liberal arts middle and high school school in Beverly, MA. Serving as a new campus entry point for the school’s faculty and 150 students, the building will house classrooms, informal spaces for independent study and small-group sessions, and an auditorium designed around the All School Meeting, a daily touchstone at Waring since the school’s founding in 1972.
Meeting the Passive House standard of energy efficiency and indoor air quality, the design also addresses longstanding site-circulation and environmental challenges on the campus. The building replaces a repurposed residential structure that was plagued by periodic flooding. Sited above the flood plain, and spanning a 12-foot vertical slope, the new building will provide a fully accessible path—as well as a visual and programmatic bridge—between the school’s lower and upper campuses.”
