Karim Elgendy

In late 2008 the French President Francois Sarkozy inaugurated a new French school in Damascus, Syria. The French school, known as Lycée Charles de Gaulle,  follows the french educational system and is accreddited by the French ministry of education. The school was designed by the French architects Ateliers Lion together with the German environmental engineering firm, Transsolar.

Image 1. Night view of school central courtyard showing the solar chimneys. Copyrights: Adria Goula Sarda, Ateliers Lion

The brief for the design team was to  to develop a campus for the school with a capacity for 900 students ranging from kindergarten to high school. The design team was also tasked to develop a campus that embodies sustainability by using low-technology solutions for ventilation and conditioning of the school spaces, while maintaining the thermal comfort levels required for students in an educational environment.

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