As gun violence in the U.S. continues to hurtle evermore beyond anything resembling acceptability, expanding constituencies are beginning to ask for real action, more than the extension of ‘thoughts and prayers’ that gets offered in the wake of mass shootings—like the one last month in Sutherland Springs, Texas, or two months ago in Las Vegas, or in 2016 at Pulse nightclub in Orlando. As a marker of change, the National Rifle Association has conceded that the bump-stock device that facilitated so much carnage in Las Vegas ought to be regulated, and last month, the Connecticut Supreme Court considered a lawsuit brought by families of Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting victims against the manufacturer of the gun that killed their children. If successful, the U.S. Supreme Court will take up the case.

These shootings always entail the gross misuse of firearms, but they also tend to involve an unexpected breach of a building—a movie theater, hotel, or school—so architects, too, are looking for ways to render buildings and landscapes better able to ward off, or at least mitigate the effects of, the threats posed by active shooters.

In the new Sandy Hook Elementary School, the use of laminated glass technology keeps windows resistant to impact.

Take Sandy Hook Elementary School, for example. After razing the original school, which had become synonymous with one of the worst mass shootings in U.S. history and one of the grizzliest human acts, Connecticut needed to build the school anew. In order to assuage a grieving community and to address the horrific reality of mass shootings in the U.S., security was a paramount concern in the design brief. Connecticut-based architecture firm Svigals + Partners designed the new Sandy Hook Elementary School, and AD spoke with two of its leaders, Jay Brotman and Julia McFadden, about the principles they used to design a safe environment for the students of Sandy Hook Elementary.

Though security was a fundamental part of their design, they set out to make it as invisible as possible. As Brotman puts it, “Throughout the design process, we asked ourselves, ‘What would we be doing here if this terrible incident had never occurred?’” As a result, the school is a safe environment, but it is experienced as what it is: an elementary school. “This is a wonderful, inspiring place to be,” says Brotman.

The design team worked with DVS Security Consulting, and together, they developed a multi-pronged approach to making the school safe. “This is about building in reaction time,” explains McFadden. “We can’t rely on one thing to stop another incident. It’s about building layers to build in reaction time.”

The team considered its security approach in three parts: first, there were hardened architectural elements; second, technology; and third, the operational strategy carried out by trained professionals.

The new school was situated at a higher elevation, allowing the administration to look out over the yard to see the approach to the school.

The first part, hardening, has the most direct relationship with architecture. A rain garden in the school yard, for example, doubles as a barricade. Hardened walls between classrooms and corridors help keep classrooms guarded from events in the more public spaces, and the use of laminated glass technology keeps windows resistant to impact. Sightlines were also a critical component of the team’s strategy. Where the school was situated—at a higher elevation—allows the administration to look out over the yard to see the approach to the school, and keeping the floor levels off of the ground allows students to see out, but keeps them out of view from anyone in the school yard.

For the second layer, technology, the team included a network of cameras and lighting that respond to movement, along with doors that automatically lock and notify the school if left open.

As architects know, buildings are never locked in time, so the design also included provisions to train school personnel in emergency protocol.

Shootings and terrorist acts are, by definition, impossible to predict, so the design team considered the security challenges as comprehensively as possible. “It can’t just be a response to one event,” explains McFadden. “It needs to have a holistic, long-term perspective, with safety integrated in layers.”