New Horry County schools may have brightly colored entryways

Visitors to Horry County’s five new schools will get a burst of color when they enter the brand new buildings.

The Horry County Schools facilities committee met Monday afternoon to check up on the construction of four new middle schools and one elementary school. Robbie Ferris, CEO of First Floor Energy Positive – which is contracted to build all five schools by August 2017 – kicked off the meeting with a discussion of pepping up the schools’ entrances.

Originally, each school was designed with an enormous steel canopy to mark the entry ways. First Floor wants to spice up the canopy by adding colored stucco to the bottom of the canopy, but Ferris wanted to hear the committee’s opinion before approving any changes.

“As we work through the design, we’ve modified and significantly improved the entry feature,” Ferris said.

The colored stucco will not add any additional cost for the district, Ferris said, unless officials want to eventually change the color.

Ferris presented a canopy rendering with lime green stucco contrasted with gray and white aluminum on the school, but said there’s plenty of options for other colors.

“The schools are pretty strong on their school colors, and they tend to like that color be a prominent color in their schools,” said Holly Heniford, board of education member.

Some school colors, such as Myrtle Beach’s forest green, may not be the best choice for the canopies, Ferris said.

“The challenge for us would be to look at the school colors and see if they work,” he said.

The point of adding a pop of color is make the entry ways distinguishable from other parts of the school, Ferris said. Mark Wolfe, director of facilities, said that no matter the color of the canopy, visitors will know exactly where the entrances are located.

“This is a very prominent architecture feature,” Wolfe said.

The canopy’s color can be changed when needed – since it’s just stucco – so currently trendy colors don’t have to last forever. Janet Graham, board member, said she values the ability to “freshen up” the entrance every few years, if needed.

Though there’s no cost to include the stucco in the design, the district will have to pay if new colors are wanted in the future, Ferris said. Those costs will me minimal, he added.

“That’ll save us a lot of money in the long run,” Graham said. “It can change, it’s not hard to change, and it’s very inviting.”

Construction on the schools is still on schedule, Ferris said, and First Floor is still tweaking the final designs. Some of the school sites have already been cleared, and crews expect to lay foundation for the new Carolina Forest middle at the end of the month.

Land and construction approvals – from both the county and state – are on schedule, Ferris said. So far the S.C. Department of Transportation has approved four of the schools, and three land disturbance permits have been issued. The Office of School Facilities has approved structure and mechanical penthouses for four schools as well, Ferris said.

The only school behind schedule is Socastee middle, mostly because the district hasn’t finalized the land purchase yet, Ferris said. However, First Floor officials are “doing everything we can to expedite that fifth site so we can meet the May 1 construction deadline,” Ferris said.

This story was originally published February 23, 2016 at 5:47 PM with the headline "New Horry County schools may have brightly colored entryways."