stairs within the atria
offer a vantage point of seeing other levels
Stairs are a dominant feature of vertical schools.
Students and staff members use the stairs several times a day to move up and down between the different levels.
Students move between classes, to go to their lockers, to go to the toilets, the library, the café, or the gym, to get their equipment or put it away.
There are a few different types of stairs in vertical schools.
bleachers
wide stairs that are also seating during breaks, class, or for special events
back stairs
are out of public view, used for emergency evacuations
While each school has a set of lifts, access to the lifts is reserved for students with additional mobility or other needs who could apply for a lift pass. Staff members may also have use of the lift passes for moving equipment between levels.
Several times during the day the stairs are a high traffic area. Transition between lessons or to breaks, arrival and departure times there are people moving both up and down the stairs.
The designers considered wellbeing in the use of stairs as:
- Stairs invite people to stop and rest in adjacent informal seating areas
- Include views through the school and to vistas outside of the school.
- Feature aesthetic elements like wood or decorative metal screens.
School leaders consider wellbeing by:
- Minimising the number of transitions per day with 4 lessons each day
- Not having school bells, so transitions are spread out with natural flows as classes finish
- Creating cultural values like stair etiquette of moving to one side, memes like "everyday is leg day", and teachers modelling how they use the stairs.
"There's like a jillion different levels to it."
Stairs are more than transit spaces.
Students tagged stairs as...
Fun
Social
In Control
Relaxing
But stairs can also require effortful management
Stairs often entail...
Time
Safety
Senses
Energy
Frustration
Tiredness
Crowdedness
thriving story
It is a good place to relax
Managing the together/alone paradox. In an urban vertical school there is close proximity of people to one another, so socializing on the stairs can enable small groups to gather, but still keep an eye on what everyone else is doing.
“It is a spot where students are allowed to relax in breaks and sometimes we use it as a place to work in.”
What do students value, be, do, and feel?
Students shared that even when they want to do the right thing and be on time, they may arrive late. They want to feel safe not stressed.
“You do get locked out easily and kids also, they just, like, close the door just to lock their friends out as a joke. But then, like a bunch of other people just get stuck like trying to get through the door. And they don't wanna be late for class and everything.”
Students want to feel psychological comfort.
“if you're not good with like, um, being in crowded spaces, it can stress you out a bit.”
Students want to be inspired.
“I think that is important because while you're walking to your different classes, you can like the big window that's at the front of the school. It lets in a lot of light. So while you're walking through the hallways, you just get to look outside and look at the nature and different things and you can have a breather and not think about class. You can just look at the plants and animals and stuff.”
But how do you manage the time-space paradox?
In a vertical school the atrium and open stairways make several levels visible at once. That can make the spaces feel quite close. However it can take more time than you think to get up or down to the spaces on different levels.
steep stairs
lockers on a different floor
noise
cafe lines
not enough time
crowds going up and down
room changes
toilet or eat
anxiety about getting in trouble
door locked
Stop. Strategize.
arrive early. take friends to the cafe or toilet. pretend to have a limp to catch a lift. put books in someone else's locker. watch when others move. don't be late or you will get in trouble. don't trip.
too tired to learn
In the mapping data, the stairs created lots of comments. As this diagram shows, most of the comments to do with stairs were about them being a 'not thriving' space. So what can be done?
Stairs were mostly tagged as not thriving spaces requiring effortful manageability.
Why?
Don't students have stairs at home?
Why are stairs so important for salutogenic wellbeing?
Stairs are a daily reminder of the importance of wellbeing. As students travel up and down stairs to classes and in and out of the school they can experience a sense of meaningfulness when they can see out to a view, see friends, hear music or feel a sense of growing fitness. Stairs were often social spaces where groups could meet, sit on bleachers, relax and play games. However some students can find the effort of regularly climbing up and down crowded stairs hard to manage. Younger students and students with disabilities, visible or invisible, are more likely to feel tired and uncomfortable in the crowd. The restricted options and flow of people up and down led to many students being concerned about arriving late to their class. Students made strategic choices about which stairs to use at what time, or which stairs provide the best strategy to arrive at a destination with minimal effort.
Managing challenge can create a sense of wellbeing, with a feeling of accomplishment or growing fitness and friendship. But where the stairs are unpredictable the challenge may lead to a lack of thriving as the stairs become less comprehensible. Designers prioritised comprehensibility by using wayfinding colours, adding in rest areas, and acoustic dampening materials. School leaders prioiritised manageability and comprehensibility when they put direction arrows on the stairs, opened up firestairs for more options, and created cultural memes like 'everyday is leg day'. More can be done with the design briefs for vertical schools to prioritise stairs being manageable, meaningful and comprehensible.
Personal
Thriving is enhanced when there is a sense of adventure and motivation. Stairs can be seen as a source of helpful exercise and fitness if they are a right level of challenge.
“Um, well, you know, yeah, the stairs are good for walking. You get exercise in.”
“What if I just fall down. They get so literally like, there are so many people, so many people.”
Social
Thriving is enhanced when the design of the stairs convey a message that is not contradicted by social rules. Does it make sense?
“Let us use all the stairs. We aren't allowed to use one staircase. I don't know why but it is a good staircase and gets us where we need to go.”
Environmental
Thriving is enhanced when there is a sense of vitality and sense are engaged. Stairs that have views and colour become more meaningful.
“The stairs being too small and the walls being a little dull since it gets crowded on the stairs and it feels boring without anything on the walls to look at.”
Thriving is enhanced when temperature, sound, smells, light and crowds are manageable.
“Make them better because they always smell and are annoying to walk up everyday.”
Environmental/Social
Inclusive thriving is where there are opportunities for belonging and students have choices about how to get from place to place.
“I would change the stairs and have a ramp so people with injuries and people in wheelchairs can feel included too, not just in a lift to go places.”
And one of the things that the builders talked about was, and the architects, was that we would be able to stand outside and look up and see on the inside you could see the different colors. So a lot of thought went into the colors and which level would be which color. And for the kids to pick up on that was significant. I thought that was really quite perceptive.
How do we make stairs more thriving places?
Sensory Experiences
How might we control the sensory experience within stairs?
How might we design for a feeling of choice and openness?
How might we design for relationship with stairs to change over time?
What about colour, novelty, openness, diffusers for smells, art, or views?
What about more variety in gradient of stairs, smaller stairs on lower levels, choices of routes?
Can we create more choices for routes, share maps, engage with social etiquette?
Time and Hurry
How might we holistically design stairs within schools?
When in design process are stairs considered?
How might we make the sensory and aesthetic experience more pleasurable?
What about relationships to building code, timetable, what types of rooms open onto stairs?
Adding width or a mid rail to help direct up and down flow?
Can we prioritise views to reduce a sense of hurry?
Safety
How might we make stairs feel safer for students?
What about acoustic treatments, stair surfaces, signage, colour, predictability, wayfinding, promoting a sense of control?