The Sarah Hale High School occupies two adjacent buildings which were built around 1931. One was originally used as a trade school for girls while the other was an Albert Kahn designed NY Times printing plant. In the mid 1960’s the NYC Board of Education acquired the printing plant to provide expansion for the school.

The original girl’s school is a limestone and brick clad, BOE design typical of schools of that era. The NY Times building has granite and sandstone facades, and an ornamental copper roof.

As part of a comprehensive reconstruction program, our office designed a two story, 80 foot long, concrete framed enclosed bridge to link the two buildings. The ramped floors of the bridge mediate the different floor elevations of the two buildings. Kalwall and glass block openings on the street side punctuate the stucco finished exterior in a syncopated design that describes the traffic flow within. A new main entrance to the facility was incorporated beneath the new bridge.

Within the existing school building, the classrooms, teaching workshops, laboratories, science and prep rooms and administrative suites were fully upgraded.

The industrial spaces within the Annex were reconfigured and transformed into classrooms, seminar rooms, library, and cafeteria with a full kitchen, and gymnasia with locker/shower rooms.