Clusters of buildings enclosed by a tall, white wall form an educational campus for children with disabilities that was designed by Chilean studio Sebastián Irarrázaval Arquitectos.
The Juan Luis Undurraga Integral Stimulation Center is located in Talagante, a town on the outskirts of Santiago.
The Juan Luis Undurraga Integral Stimulation Center is located on the outskirts of Santiago
The school was designed for the care and education of children with a range of disabilities, including autism, Down syndrome and extreme epilepsy. It was commissioned by the Isabel Aninat Echazarreta Foundation, a charity started in 1986.
"Through its initiatives, this institution seeks to contribute to generating positive changes that translate into a better quality of life for the community," said Sebastián Irarrázaval, who leads an eponymous studio in Santiago. The school is formed from a cluster of buildings, informed by walled citadels
The architect was charged with designing a series of facilities ? classrooms, laboratories, a gymnasium, a chapel and a heated swimming pool ? for a large, L-shaped site.
While conceiving the campus layout, Irarrázaval drew inspiration from engravings by Eduardo Chillida, the 20th-century Basque artist whose abstract work explored spatial relationships.

Overall, Irarrázaval sought to achieve variation in the campus through three elements: a balance between repetition and difference, an alternation of full and empty spaces, and the treatmen...