The Urban School

Location – San Francisco, CA
Client – The Urban School
Architects – PFAU Long Architecture, Studio Bondy Architecture

Over the years, MBC has provided structural design services for multiple renovations and additions for the Urban School in San Francisco, CA.

While working with PFAU Long Architects (now part of Perkins+Will), MBC designed a new 60,000 square foot addition. The four-story building includes two lower levels of parking, two levels of classrooms, and a double-height gymnasium with a rooftop playground. The structure consists of reinforced concrete two-way flat slabs at the lower levels to maximize headroom. There is also a steel superstructure above the parking levels with long-span structural steel plate girders above the gym to support the playground. The seismic lateral system for the structure included reinforced concrete shear walls and structural steel concentric special braced frames. To accommodate the new building on its urban site, a historic Victorian-era residence was moved onto a new foundation at an adjacent site and was seismically retrofitted to meet code requirements.

Subsequently, MBC partnered with Studio Bondy Architecture for a renovation of the school’s St. Agnes Gymnasium. The scope of work included seismic strengthening and alterations to the existing structure for use as a new theater and performing arts center, with a new basement below. Due to limitations at the existing site, the temporary shoring and underpinning of the existing structure were incorporated into the new retaining wall and foundation system.