Mountaintop Montessori is a vibrant and growing academic community in Charlottesville. In their first expansion of their campus, they asked WOLF ACKERMAN to help them plan and design a new 6,000+ SF classroom building to serve their upper elementary students. The budget was a concern and the school wanted the building to not only provide classrooms but to perform didactically - with its aesthetic revealing to the children how its made and how it works as they occupy and use the space. We were intentionally economical in the finishes we employed and we exposed the building systems - playfully color coding them to express their purpose. This approach, in turn, had budgetary benefits and the result has been a new learning environment embraced by students, parents and teachers alike that has become the new ‘face’ of the campus for the growing school.