The Dom-Schule school
at the heart of Lübeck's old town quarter will be
celebrating its 175th anniversary in 2009. It is a
popular and well-known grade school with an
integrative stream and an affiliated after-school
care center housed in the schoolrooms. Children from
an extremely broad social spectrum experience their
first school years at the Dom-Schule, years that
shape them for the future. The school has a large
catchment area comprising both the old town district
as well as the extended inner city. Parents and
children identify with the Dom-Schule and have been
closely involved in the ongoing development and
improvement of the school environment for many years.
Every day, 231 children between the ages of 6-11
populate the schoolyard of the Dom-Schule. They play
in the schoolyard not just during the four breaks
but also before the school and the care center open
and after they close. In years to come, the
schoolyard will play an even more important role
when the Dom-Schule is, as is planned, developed
into an open all-day school.
The schoolyard is extremely small (approx. 1,100 m²)
relative to the number of children, and its location
in the built-up old town quarter of Lübeck means
there is no room for expansion. It is of only
inferior quality as a play area due to the lack of
playground equipment and open spaces. Due to the
resulting conflict potential, many children
meanwhile spend their break in the school building
itself.
The schoolyard was last fully modernized in 1977/78.
In view of the upcoming anniversary of the school,
both the schoolchildren and their parents expressed
their wish that the schoolyard be redesigned in such
a way that it meets the needs of the children. The
planning group within the school association has set
itself the goal of using all the nooks and crannies
of the schoolyard like in an old house and
developing a creative and child-compatible layout.
Guided tours of the city regularly draw the
attention of local people and visitors interested in
history to the special topographic location of the
Dom-Schule school. It is situated on the former
border of the civic and church jurisdiction
districts. Delinquents were able to run through the
"Fegefeuer" (purgatory) street and reach "paradise"
(the gate of the cathedral) if they were
sufficiently familiar with the local geography.
Their flight ended less favorably if they turned
into the "Hölle" (hell) cul-de-sac ...
Playing on the location of the Dom-Schule between "paradise
and hell", the motto for the design of the
schoolyard project is "School between Heaven and
Hell". This gives rise to all manner of associations
and promotes an imaginative and creative approach to
the past and the historic school architecture in the
surrounding area.
The school association started meeting in January
2007 to discuss the scope and necessity of the
modernization of the schoolyard. To ensure that they
too would subsequently be able to identify with
their schoolyard, the children themselves were
involved in sub-projects on the future design of the
schoolyard on an ongoing basis. The planning
specialists at Haberkorn, a firm with wide-ranging
experience in the area of play equipment and
playground design, was commissioned to develop the
final plans for the project.
Schleswig-Holstein Prime Minister Carstensen, Member
of the Board of Trustees and Friederike Beyer,
Member of the Executive Committee, Students of the
"Dom-Schule"
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