St Patrick’s Catholic Primary School, Mortlake

New Primary School

St Patrick’s Catholic Primary School Mortlake was the result of a master planning process commissioned by Sydney Catholic Schools, initiating one of the most exciting projects to watch come to fruition, the re-establishment of the Catholic Primary School.

The project was designed with the future use and expansion of the school in mind and incorporated two main objectives; the re-emergence of the historical and cultural connection between the Church, local Parish, and the Primary School; and the prioritisation of balancing indoor and outdoor learning environments on a highly constrained site within a densely populated area of Sydney’s inner west. The result is a three-stage development to create a progressive 2-stream School offering students access to new facilities and technology.

Spread across three stories, the response prioritised the balance between indoor/outdoor and active/passive learning areas as well as the immediacy of open space, ensuring that learning spaces maintained an outdoor connection either through direct playground, common area or veranda access: enabling only a single storey disconnection from the main ground plane at any point.

The lower ground floor, fronting Herbert Street encompasses a pickup/drop off zone, parking, services, storage, hydrant and storm water detention, while the ground floor, fronting Adams Lane contains administration areas, canteen, external practical activities areas, amenities and main playground area. The first-floor houses staff facilities and the main collaborative GLA arrangement, overflowing into communal learning commons. This planning seeks to blur traditional learning zones, creating an open and collaborative teaching environment that provides flexible teaching spaces that can be adapted to future needs and changes in educational pedagogy and facilitating a myriad of new opportunities for both teachers and students