Gymnasium American School of The Hague

American School of The Hague (ASH) was founded around 1950 as a small-scale international school by parents who worked at the American embassies in The Hague. ASH is now one of the most prestigious international schools in the Netherlands. Paul de Ruiter Architects developed a new design for the sports hall in collaboration with Kraaijvanger Architects. Due to an ingenious construction, the view of the striking building on the A44 has hardly changed visually. However, the interior has been completely renewed.

Housed in an imposing building on the outskirts of Wassenaar, American School of The Hague has about 1,200 students divided into three departments: Elementary School, Middle School and High School. In addition to high-quality education, ASH encourages children to develop as widely as possible and to develop their talents in art, music, theater and sport.

The sports hall plays a central role in this. Here sports competitions are played, special events take place such as the graduation ceremony and of course the daily gym classes. In order to host international sports competitions and to be able to teach the increased number of pupils in sports, ASH needs extra space. Not an easy task since the location itself had relatively little room for expansion. By using the ground behind the existing iconic blue wave wall, the desired space, an extra playing field, a fitness room and a multifunctional room could be realized and we were able to expand the sports hall of 1,985 m2 with 863 m2 to a total size of 2,814 m2.

Because the sports hall attracts a lot of public during various sports competitions and other ASH events, another wish was to make the stands a regular part of the venue. From the point of departure that the students should be able to concentrate optimally on their sporting or creative performances, we created a setting in which the stands are strategically positioned along the playing fields. The loose stands have disappeared and have made way for a fixed stand of birch wood that runs on the wall for acoustic damping. This way, the children can focus on their game and the spectators have a perfect view of what is going on for them.

For the further professionalization and expansion of the fitness room, a completely transparent extra floor has been added on the gallery side. This floor also provides space for a multifunctional room that is used for various sports. The partition of the fitness room is completely made of glass, which provides strong visual connections with the lower playing fields and stands.

To minimize the infringement of the existing design, the red construction has been continued above the roof of the first floor. Because of the position behind the blue wall and the three red frames, the building hardly changes visually.

To connect to the new building, the walls of the existing part of the gym are being refreshed. The outdated installations will be replaced and adapted to the new large numbers of people that can be present in the sports hall during the international events and parties. All installations are integrated in the Frenger ceiling; data, music, lighting (per field) and fire installations. The three fields can be separated by acoustic walls, making separate lessons easy to give. Thanks to this new installation concept, the sports hall meets all the high requirements that are set for the installations of a sports and events hall. The gym is now next to the beating heart of the ASH community, also the new calling card of the American School of The Hague.

The loose stands have made way for a fixed stand made of birch wood that provides acoustic damping