Olympic College Poulsbo
Poulsbo, Wash.
The Miller|Hull Partnership

MIller/Hull interpreted Scandinavian style for a community college serving a region that’s growing quickly from rural to urban

© Tom Bonner

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By James S. Russell, AIA

One building at 40,000 square feet comprises the entirety of Olympic College’s new branch. Such a small facility makes sense in a largely rural area that’s quickly growing urban, with commuters hustling along the tree-lined highways to nearby military facilities or rushing to catch ferries to jobs in Seattle, a few miles across Puget Sound. Kelly Woodward, the director of Olympic College Poulsbo, explained that the main Bremerton campus was not only inconvenient to reach, but it was densely built out, with little room to expand. With the new structure, she added, the school can serve students who would otherwise have to make laborious commutes to facilities elsewhere.

The building offers conventional two-year degrees, adult continuing education, and distance learning in a combination of 14 classrooms, seminar rooms, and labs. It needed to adapt readily to changes in curriculum proposed by an ongoing local Workforce Advisory Committee. An overstretched state funding system put Olympic College in a bind. Seattle-based architect Miller/Hull started planning for the project in 1996. (It had just completed another small branch of the same college, in Shelton, 40 miles to the south [Record, November 1996, page 90], which went on to win a National AIA award.)

The donated site, unfortunately, offered only one amenity, its shaggy cover of second-growth firs. So Miller/Hull tucked the classroom building tightly to the side of the site that faced a protected woodland. Partner Craig Curtis, who lives nearby, says the firm welcomed the chance to work with a community that was “both active and vocal.” In the program, a requirement to recognize the town’s Scandinavian roots was spelled out. It was challenging, Curtis admitted, to help people understand that Scandinavia’s design heritage is Modern, not just vernacular-style carpentry.

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Formal name of Project:
Olympic College Poulsbo

Location:
Poulsbo, Wash.

Gross square footage:
40,000 sq. ft.

Total construction cost:
$8.6 Million

Owner:
Olympic College / State of Washington

Architect:
The Miller|Hull Partnership, LLP
71 Columbia – Sixth Floor
Seattle, WA 98104
T (206) 682-6837
F (206) 682-5692
www.millerhull.com