The project brief for the Flemington
Jewish Community Center called for both school and sanctuary which
would be expandable with the growth of the community. The project
developed as a continuous ramp, in which the various programmatic
elements spiral up, surrounding the sanctuary and an external/internal
garden. The relationship between this continuous yet transforming
section and the sanctuary is symbiotic. As faith and study are
iintertwined, the sanctuary relies on the support programs to
give its shape. The spirals center, the sanctuary, is thus
neither completely internal or external, service or served - a
place where both education and application exist simultaneously.
The sanctuary has no edges of its own, but relies on tactical
co-opting of edges from other programmatic pieces to give size
and shape, thus becoming somewhat flexible and reconfigurable,
depending on the ritual and use requirements.
The spiral houses all of the program
except the Sanctuary. It begins at ground level with the administrative
offices, continues into the entry lobby, and rises as it passes
along the edge of the classrooms, Nursery School, Youth Lounge,
Library, and eventually the Social hall. The future expansion
of the FJCC is also integral to this logic - the spiral would
continue, with new classrooms developed above the existing, and
new nursery school rooms planned above as well. The structure
would be developed to carry the future loads of new classrooms.
The seeming linearity of this
spiral/program organization is constantly fractured with the introduction
of a secondary logic of circulation. A tactical response that
short circuits the spiral and allows for oblique local connections,
and potentially different zoning logics. For instance, the stair
to the roof at the east end of the building would become the communicating
stair for the two classroom levels once the addition is complete,
and through the relocation of the curtain wall enclosure at the
school entry, the now enclosed staircase would alleviate the necessity
of traveling along the spiral to get from lower level to upper
level. Similarly the ramp/stair that connects the social hall
and sanctuary also leads directly to the library at mid level,
making small services easily accessible from either of the two
entries. And finally, perhaps the most significant relationship
that the spiral accommodates is the sectional relationship between
the social hall and the sanctuary, allowing for a diversity of
service sizes. The two spaces which directly open into one another
have the ability to be partially or fully separated through the
use of a moving transparent partition.
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