The Forman School is a private high school for 220 students located in historic Litchfield, Connecticut. The school was created in 1930 as both an educational refuge for students with learning differences and an incubator for the pioneering of revolutionary teaching modes. Although early focus was innovation in phonics and reading, the arts quickly became a cornerstone of the school’s curriculum. Arts programming was scattered throughout Forman’s campus and in 2015 the school engaged architects to centralize that programming in a single state-of-the-art facility. The result is a pair of connected gabled buildings nestled into the sloping hillside that serve to complete a large, protected central academic green. The simple gabled volumes pay quiet tribute to vernacular architecture of New England.
The total building is 22,000 square feet. One gabled structure houses a 300 seat theater and associated scene and costume shops, loading dock, dressing rooms, control spaces, and two catwalks; the other gabled structure houses dance, photography, video, painting, drawing, and ceramics studios. Social and exhibition spaces are fluidly incorporated throughout the buildings. The Visual + Performing Arts Center opened in September of 2017. Stephanie was the Project Architect while working with Maryann Thompson Architects in Watertown, MA.
Contractor: A.P. Construction Company | Stamford, CT
Photo credit: Chuck Choi Architectural Photography