Big Sky Pk-8 School Grand Opening August 10, 2026

I had the pleasure of attending the Grand Opening ceremony for the new Big Sky PK-8 School in the St. Vrain Valley School District. The event was great fun with high energy from students, parents, and teachers. It reminded me that I’ve had a productive working relationship with the district since my first project there in 1991. On that project in Lyons, my firm was still quite small, so I was the Project Manager, Project Designer, and Partner in Charge. What a change to today working with the inspired team at Cuningham of Kari-elin Mock, Jackie Squires, Kelly Ryan, Brian Rogers, John Pfluger, Hailey Wrasman, and many others. I thoroughly enjoyed working with them and contributing ideas for energy efficiency, envelope design, and daylighting for the Big Sky design!  

I am especially fond of the centrally located Commons space, with its three-fold sawtooth skylighted roof. The daylight from those high monitors is complimented by the carefully articulated western facing window wall. Although the western window wall provides fantastic views to the west, including Longs Peak, there is the possibility of too much light and glare in the late afternoon. For that, the design includes motorized shade cloth blinds, which are partly closed in the photo below.

Big Sky Commons, with north facing clerestories

One feature of this space that I really appreciate is the use of vertical glulam columns between each window. A wall like this would typically incorporate heavy vertical mullions made of extruded aluminum. Because aluminum production releases a high amount of embodied carbon (12.03 pounds CO2e per pound of finished product, A1-A3) avoiding its use reduces the total embodied carbon of the building. 

Aluminum is so impactful environmentally that:

It is approximately 7% of the total embodied carbon of an average building.

Globally, aluminum production emits approximately 1.1 billion metric tons of CO2e annually

Aluminum production is approximately 2% of total global CO2 emissions.

In the photo below, the glulam columns can be seen.  Not only do they substantially reduce embodied carbon, they add much visual appeal to the space and reduce glare.  I’d call that a win-win!

Interior view of west wall of Commons, with glulam curtainwall supports