Immaculate Heart of Mary School

Design Characteristics

• Along with a new name of Immaculate Heart of Mary, the new school had the old cornerstone built into its entrance; a cornerstone on the gym for 1962 indicates that it was the first section completed before the old school was demolished
• Initially, 241 students from kindergarten to Grade 12 attended classes but two years later the senior high was eliminated and the school settled into its K-8 program; it now offers junior kindergarten to Grade 8, with a before-and-after daycare program
• The school's design was considered "ultra-modern", fitted with many windows for natural light and constructed with high quality materials such a terrazzo floors and fine wood panelling, even wall-to-wall carpeting, to reduce future maintenance costs
• While there have been alterations to the exterior, the school looks essentially as it did upon opening and changes have been done with care and sensitivity; windows have been replaced in each classroom but they are very close to the original type
• There is a two-storey academic wing running eas-west parallel to the street joined perpendicularly to the gym wing; the end walls and all four walls of the gym wing are faced in limestone; the side walls of the classrooms are mostly glass and candidly reveal the steel frame; the south facing walls project out at the window bays (now behind screens)
• Although somewhat constrained in its site, the school has both a paved and grassed play area adjacent and it purchased a lot behind its lane for more green space and a play structure