Lycée Francais de New York

Sciame was the Construction Manager responsible for the construction of the new home for the Lycée Francais that unifies the K-12 school, which was previously housed in five separate buildings.

The new building, located on a thru-block site on the Upper East Side in Manhattan, is comprised of a five and a six-story structure connected by three full-lot floors and a north-south bridge at the second level with a central courtyard. Shared program spaces within the school such as the libraries, gymnasiums, cafeteria and auditorium unify the building at the three lower levels. The central space at each level collectively acts as the heart of the Lycée, providing an opportunity to define a true French Cultural Center for the school. The Grand Escalier, accessed through a double-height lobby, leads to a three hundred-seat auditorium.

Pre-cast concrete visually reminiscent of the school’s original historic limestone mansions and a translucent glass channel system were used for the facades to suggest a deep connection to the past. The contrast in materials invoke not only memories of the masonry traditions of the original school buildings (concrete), but through transparency (glass) suggest a promising new future for the Lycée Francais. Carved into the stone bases are the names of significant French and American historical and cultural figures. A transparent glass entry wall and projecting canopy mark the lobby on both the north and south sides of the building.