SPANISH FORT, Ala.—Someone who’s toured the new Spanish Fort Middle School may say it looks a bit different from other area schools.

The facility, which houses 700 students, was designed as a modern school that students would want to  come to five days a week, according to architect Jim Walker of Montgomery-based Goodwyn, Mills and Cawood.

SFMS was a prototype for Foley Middle School and Fairhope Middle School, according to Terry Wilhite, a Baldwin County public schools spokesperson. 

Architects worked with the Baldwin County Board of Education to design a school that was welcoming to students, comfortable, modern and a safe learning environment, Walker said.

“We wanted a more economical design for all three sites,” he said. “We worked with the school board on the color design.”

The school’s interior colors took time and research.

“Part of the idea was to match the interior color palette with the modern outdoor design,” Walker said. “We looked at color palettes online and matched it from there.

“It was a palette that we chose to sort of encourage the intelligence of learning.” 

The color green is prominent throughout the school, especially in the cafetorium.

Apple green was used because it represents intelligence, life, nature and youth, Walker said.

“Early on we wanted to create a building to foster teaching and learning,” Walker said.

“We wanted to create a safe learning environment and I think we did that.”

Day lighting was a big factor into the design of the school; windows were used to ‘open’ the school and make rooms feel bigger.

In a study by the Pacific Gas and Electric Company and the California Board for Energy Efficiency, of 22,000 students in California, Washington and Colorado, test scores increased by 26 percent in reading and 20 percent in math with students who learned in classrooms that featured natural lighting.

The idea when designing the school called for many glass walls and windows, which allow for teachers to have good visibility throughout the school, Walker said.

Sunscreens are located above the windows for when more direct sunlight comes through. 

The 134,870-square-foot school features 44 classrooms with the possibility of four classrooms on the fourth floor, since the school was built with expansion in mind, Walker said.

The family and consumer sciences wing was designed with storage in mind, with focus on the teacher and the ability to entertain a classroom full of students in one central location, Walker said.

Fairhope Middle School opened this fall and Foley Middle School is set to open this December, according to the school board’s site.