Client: Christ the King Catholic High School

The Situation:
Christ the King Catholic High School was opened in 2013 by the Diocese of Charlotte, as their flagship private school in the Charlotte, NC area. Christ the King is a college prep, co-educational Catholic high school operating under the direction of the Diocese of Charlotte. The school is open to students of all faiths, ethnic, social, and economic backgrounds. One of our Charlotte area account managers reached out to the Diocese at a time that happened to be very early in the school's planning stages. A relationship was born, and the Diocese entrusted Connecting Elements with the design and space planning for the furnishings of their new private school.

The Problem:
The challenge was -

• As the first private school sponsored by the Diocese of Charlotte, presenting a facility that portrayed a welcoming, fresh, and modern outlook with a conservative buffer was imperative. 
• Since it was a new school, there was a very important timeline to stick to in order to allow the school to open on time and fully functional.
• Being contracted to design and plan all the commercial furnishings, we needed to be able to provide everything from lockers, to kilns, to lab exhausts while still maintaining the aesthetic cohesion.

Our Solution:
First, we utilized our space planning and design department to plan every area of the school, keeping the strict lead times as well as the modern and changeable aesthetics at the forefront of our goals. Then, using the school color scheme and working with the building structure, we were able to choose from some of our most dependable yet more cutting edge manufacturers, using lots of light maple wood with pops of fresh color throughout to achieve a rich yet modern and upbeat feel that students really enjoy learning in. Mill work came to the forefront in several departments, such as art, chemistry, physics and more which makes for easily re-purposed areas and quick expansion.

The Result: 
The Diocese was able to open the new school on time and complete, and continues to have a happy and active student body. They are continuing to expand and we are looking forward to working with them on those in the near future.

• Modular Millwork manufactured product for the bulk of the desks, cabinetry, and lab stations for Art, Chemistry, and Physics departments, in standard Maple laminate
• Integra built product for the student lounge seating
• Furniture Lab created chairs, stools, and tables for the cafe.
• VS America made product for most the general student desks and chairs, lab stools, and general teachers' desks
• Lesro handled some of the lobby, lounge, and waiting area seating
• Salsbury made the beautiful Maple lockers that line the hallways
• Virco also made many of the specialized student desks
• A wide assortment of additional furnishings were provided by an array of specialized manufacturers such as Special T, Office Source, Amaco, Air Master, Moore Co/Balt, Diversified Woodcrafts, Safco, Stance, Bluebird Manufacturing, Carolina Science, Flinn Scientific, RFM Seating and more.