Buffalo Rising Online

Jul 6th 2007, 9:48am By Elena Cala Buscarino

Buffalo Rising was granted an exclusive walk-through of Hutchinson Technical High School where the two-year, nearly $30M remodel is near completion. While the outside of the building is being restored, the inside of the structure, built in 1913, has undergone drastic renovations. Hamilton, Houston and Lowney Architects—the firm responsible for the Martin House restoration--created the school's design in accordance with the guidelines of the New York State Board of Historic Preservation.

Bill Mahoney, Project Executive with LPCiminelli Inc., and Ted Fyda, Associate Architect with the Buffalo Public Schools took us through, along with Donna Brown, LPCiminelli Director of Communications, and Rob McDow, JSCB Project Administrator. Mahoney said, "There is not one space that didn't get touched. We have fresh air ventilation and new heat inside, while the exterior was preserved. The hallway walls and window walls stayed the same, yet each classroom in the building was expanded by at least 50 per cent."

Renovations included tearing down walls to make room for larger classrooms. A science lab that was once three classrooms is now one long, well-lit laboratory. It connects to a small hazardous waste room that connects to another lab. Likewise, a computer room has been outfitted with an outlet for each desk. This may sound elementary, but not when one considers that until now, the teachers and students had to make do with extension cords that ran trough hallways and other classrooms. Now every classroom will be outfitted with at least six computers, a necessary fixture in a technology school.

"This is a technology specific school, and we customized it to the design of the building. Our goal was to enhance it. Rather than fixing the existing building, we recreated the building around the concept of the school and all of the equipment coming in," McDonnell said. As an extra high-tech feature, all of the electrical grid work has been left exposed in the ceiling, giving the hallways an edgy, new age look.

The school cost $300K to build in 1913, the same year that Grover Cleveland and City Honors were built. In its new state, the school is built-out in wings to accommodate specific curriculum. There are computer science, architecture, electrical engineering and mechanical engineering wings. Chemistry and physics labs are also grouped together so that there is a flow relative to the program. Depending on a student's course of study, they may only have to leave their designated wing for required extras and cafeteria. It wasn't uncommon for students to have to run to classes a floor or to away in the past. With the new designation of wings, the students' travels between classes will be shorter and--depending on their curriculum--there will be floors they never need to visit.

The front entrance is going to have brand new approach steps, and the foyer has been restored. Visitors will still be greated by the relief characters that grace each end of the ceiling beams in the grand entrance. (Are they Chaucer's characters from the Canturbury Tales?) Where there was once a trophy case to the left, and opening now leads to a ramp that descends to the new cafeteria.

The cafeteria has been moved from the fourth floor to the first. Aside from making life easier by eliminating the need to transport massive amounts of products up and down through elevators, the cafeteria is now adjacent to the gymnasium and auditorium, making it accessible to extra-curricular sports and arts programs visitors.

While the auditorium was restored to its original beauty, right down to the wooden and wrought iron seats, the gymnasium was fully, and most dramatically redone, but more on that later. Fyda described what they found when they started work on the ceiling of the auditorium. "When we examined the ceiling, we realized that it was all glass that had been painted over," he said. "When the theater needed to be darkened for performances, the engineers would go up on the roof and roll out a huge canvas that obscured the daylight. We uncovered the glass." There are also stained glass medallions in the corners of the theater.

Technical renovations were made to the stage so that they can fly scenery and lights, along with the addition of a catwalk, but the seating and moldings were kept and partly restored. The walls were painted a buttery yellow, a definite upgrade from the schools other color, burgundy, which will now be assigned to the velvet drape that graces the stage.

The gymnasium used to be part 4-lane, 20-yard lap pool, and part hardwood floor. Not only did they fill in the pool and turn the gym to run east and west from its former north/south layout, but the new section 6 regulation sized court will allow other schools to have their tournaments at Hutch Tech rather than holding them at facilities outside the BPS system, which never fully allowed them to have home court advantage.

The gym is housed at the bottom level of the three-story box addition that can be seen from Whitney Place, and will soon be covered with drive-it. This addition is the only sign from the outside of the school that anything has changed about the structure. Steel supports at four corners hold the two levels above the gym that will house four good-sized classrooms each. The original building surrounds the new gym on three sides, and a good view can be had from the library, a hallway and various classrooms.

Hutch Tech is one of four other Buffalo Public Schools that have pass admissions tests for in order to be eligible to attend. The others are City Honors, Performing Arts and McKinley's advertising art program. Hutch Tech students have been attending school at Kensington High since reconstruction began.

Peter LoJacono, an Italian teacher at Hutch said that he hasn't been through the school yet because he wanted to be surprised. There's no doubt that he will. "It was drab, dull and lifeless except for the people in it," he said.

It's going to be a very different September for the 1,200 students who attend Hutch Tech and the people who see to their educational needs.