Roosevelt School Apartments

ASK Studio

Recognitions: AIA Iowa 2020 Design Award

Project Description

The Roosevelt High School was built in 1888 in Clinton Iowa. It had been patinaed with over 120 years of constant use when the local school district deemed it too expensive to use and maintain. The neighborhood was built around this structure and its use was gone, but the need for the its presence remained. The challenges were numerous and the rules simple. Respect. The respect for a place. A building. The charge of the design team was the insertion of 16 apartments within a school containing about 14,000-square feet and 7 classrooms and a large gathering area space while maintaining the integrity of the existing walls and spaces. The success of the building is measured in what is untouched, the architecture of the repurposing is to be unseen. The changes in emergency exiting, improvements for accessibility and inclusion of fire protection are all accomplished in a demure manner. It is not a design product of ego, but rather restraint. The efforts and results are extensively creative, but mostly unseen. The transformation is obvious, there was no attempt to “modernize”. The new use is allowed by the building structure, but it remains steadfast in representing it’s past. A classroom becomes a bedroom by purpose and furnishings. The corridors are now home to seating areas. The building has changed little physically. It has become quiet and comfortable to be viewed as a relic. The building is now 130 years old. The expected useful life is at least another 100. It will ground and bind the neighborhood for at least two centuries. The sustainability is palpable and the respect obvious.