When Melissa Zaikos, founder, CEO, and principal of the Intrinsic Charter School in Chicago, was looking for a site for the new school, she visited the former Shannon Lumber Company on West Belmont Avenue in the northwest section of the city. 'I fell in love with the barn when we walked in,' she recalls of the bowstring truss structure (once an open shed) with solid wood columns that rise as high as 30 feet. Constructed in 1954, it is the northernmost extension of two connected structures built in 1911 and 1928, for a family-owned lumber business, that seemed far more suitable to adapt for Intrinsic's innovative curriculum than a traditional school building. With a blended learning program, Intrinsic employs a unique classroom configuration. 'The school is designed particularly to this model,' says Larry Kearns, principal of Wheeler Kearns Architects, the firm that transformed the commercial building into the new facility.
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