Concept designs for Blenheim’s new intermediate school have come off the drawing board this week.

Designed to suit adolescents, they feature a U-shaped hub of classrooms around a common green space, and lots of room for sport, arts, performance and cultural activities.

The designs are another milestone in the long-awaited project Te Tātoru o Wairau, a rebuild of the Marlborough Boys’ and Girls’ Colleges side-by-side on McLauchlan St, that requires moving Bohally Intermediate School to College Park to make way for the development.

Nicky Cameron-Dunn, principal at Bohally Intermediate School, said the designs featured classrooms that would be flexible rather than open-plan, where children could be overlooked, distracted or stressed by noise.

Each classroom of 30 students would have small spaces for quiet learning, and could also be opened into common spaces for shared activities such as expos or hub assemblies.

“It’s exciting and wonderful,” Cameron-Dunn said.

“Peers are so important for this age group that is often more focused on impressing their friends than the teacher.”

The school’s main entrance would be on Stephenson St. Visitors would move through a semi-covered walkway to reach teaching spaces.

A second entrance on Redwood St would lead to Noninga Kumu, a place reflecting tikanga values where visitors would be welcomed, and specialist Māori learning would be based, such as te reo Māori, weaving with harakeke/flax, and kapa haka. The design included a kitchen where food could be prepared, reflecting manaakitanga/hospitality.

Local iwi chose the name Noninga Kumu to describe a “home settlement”, welcoming to all people. The name was a placeholder with an official name likely to be bestowed later in the project.

For Cameron-Dunn, highlights included a multipurpose hall big enough to hold all students and staff, space for indoor PE, and specialist rooms with sinks where art and science classes would be alternated. There would be plenty of space in new music and drama rooms for musical instruments, now crammed in a classroom cupboard, to be spread out.

Large sports fields, plus tennis and basketball courts, would be shared with the community, she said.

The concept designs also showed high windows on the classrooms to capture the sun and provide good ventilation, and easy access for students with disabilities.

There was no pool in the plans, Cameron-Dunn confirmed. Students would be bussed to Marlborough Lines Stadium 2000 in central Blenheim for swimming lessons taught by stadium staff.

The design would accommodate 600 pupils, catering for growth from the current roll of 530.

Construction at College Park would start next year, in stage one of Te Tātoru o Wairau, and was expected to be completed in 2026. Stage one also included the rebuild of the College Park hockey turf and pavilion on the Nelson St/State Highway 6 edge of the co-located college campus, which was now underway.

Learning would continue at the intermediate’s existing McLauchlan St site until the new buildings were finished. Teachers and students would then move, freeing space for construction of the co-located colleges.