Ahead of the curve

Bray designs striking school addition for growing suburb

All you need to know about the addition to Wilmot High School can be found in the school’s cafeteria.

The striking space includes a 240-foot-long skylight that runs the length of the room and a stylish floor design that looks more like an office or college building than a place for high-schoolers to eat lunch.

“It was designed to create a more adult environment and to encourage the students to respect the space,” said Matthew Wolfert, a principal with Bray Associates Architects Inc., which designed the addition.

The new cafeteria is part of a $37.9 million project to renovate 72,832 square feet at Wilmot High School and add 212,276 square feet in new construction.

Aside from its appearance, Wilmot’s new cafeteria is practical. Natural light through the skylight lets the school avoid using lights in the space most days, and the flooring material requires little waxing or maintenance.

The cafeteria also serves as a central gathering space for major events at the school. The entrance to Wilmot’s new auditorium and gymnasium is off of the cafeteria, and windows on one end overlook the school’s new football field, built with synthetic turf.

Wolfert said the 750-seat auditorium is Wilmot High School’s first dedicated performance space. In the past, the school used a stage in the gym or the cafeteria to stage shows, he said. The new auditorium was built to support high school and local performances as well as national shows touring through the area.

The new gym includes a 160-meter track and seating for 2,200 people. The addition also includes new space for the school’s music programs, technical education classes and several new classrooms and science laboratories.

Construction took about two years. Crews worked while school was in session but kept the work areas separate from students.

“It was a very safe project,” Wolfert said.

One of the biggest challenges of the project, Wolfert said, was smoothing out years of additions to the school without any sort of master plan.

The project included replacing the school’s entire heating, venting and air conditioning system, which required working through numerous older sections of the building.

Crews broke demolition work into phases, knocking down part of the school and building new in its place.

The method proved efficient. Wilmot taxpayers got a new high school by retrofitting the old building, and the school got a modern building that corrected student flow and space problems that come with an aging facility.

“They’re a growing community that’s attracting many families [from] northern Illinois,” Wolfert said. “This brings their facilities up to speed. It’s a building that wraps the excellent educational programming they’re delivering.”

— Dustin Block