In recent years, many schools are making the transition from eating indoors to eating outdoors. In fact, encouraging staff and pupils to enjoy outdoor dining creates a healthy and inviting environment.
If you work in a senior school, then an outdoor dining canopy is a great way to elevate your outdoor space and encourage pupils to eat and socialise outside. Being cooped up indoors, especially on their lunch break, can be detrimental to their focus and approach to lessons.
Luckily for you, here at A&S Landscape, we have a wide variety of dining area canopies, encouraging your students to dine alfresco and embrace the outdoors. This blog will showcase some of our favourite canopies that are sure to inspire you and make that investment.
So, let’s get into it!
5 of our Best Outdoor Dining Canopies
Here at A&S Landscape, we pride ourselves on our extensive range of outdoor dining canopies. If you’re after an outdoor dining canopy but don’t know where to start, these ideas might give you a bit of inspiration.
With that being said, let’s check out 5 of our best outdoor dining canopies!
Motiva Expanse™
The future of school dining, the Motiva Expanse™ is one of our most extravagant outdoor dining canopies. This canopy is the answer to helping overcrowded schools, adding extra seating and dining tables for hundreds of students.
Whether you choose a standalone or attached structure, you can also opt for extra features such as flooring, lighting, heating, and seating, creating an incredible dining experience. You can also choose from various door options as well as side panels and wide span beams.
Motiva Vista™
The latest addition to our wide range of canopy solutions, the Motiva Vista™ creates a versatile space, ideal for outdoor dining and adding extra space. This structure can be used throughout the year due to its snow-safe and wind-safe properties.
Again, a choice of lighting, heating, flooring, and seating is available, creating the perfect finish. Glass side panels allow natural light to flood in, a great way for students to bathe in that all-important vitamin D. Let your students enjoy outdoor dining all year round with this innovative and weatherproof design!
Motiva Linear™
For an elongated outdoor space, invest in our Motiva Linear™ canopy. The ‘Linear’ is our monopitch (asymmetric) straight roof variant where one side is higher than the other, most commonly used for canopies located against building elevations such as outdoor dining areas.
Widths of 10000mm are easily achieved and can be even wider with additional design features. This dining canopy is a great way to encourage pupils to eat outdoors while utilising the building space that you already have. Choose from our impressive colour range, with choices of steel, polycarbonate, fabric and post-pad colours!
Motiva Duo™
The Motiva Duo™ is our duopitch (symmetric) curved roof variant, where both sides are at the same height, making it the most common configuration for standalone structures or structures against low roofline buildings. Ideal for an outdoor dining area, this structure is completely weatherproof and wind-safe 3.
Virtually any dimensions are available, so please get in touch if you feel this canopy is for you! Choose from side panels with various infill options, as well as clear or opal roofing. This canopy is a great way to get pupils outdoors, providing them with a safe space to spend their lunch break.
Maxima Tepee™
Finally, another of our favourite outdoor canopy ideas is our Maxima Tepee™. This canopy is incredibly visually appealing due to its pointed design and bright colour options. These units are manufactured in galvanised and PPC steel, boasting an integral gutter system and UV-resistant and fire retardant fabric.
Snow-safe and wind-safe, this tepee is available in standard modular sizes from 3 metres up to a massive 15 metres with multiple unit possibilities, ideal for housing pupils during their lunchtime. Adding a bold and bright canopy means that pupils will want to spend their time outdoors, eating and chatting with their friends.
The Importance of Eating Outdoors
Now that you’ve explored our range of outdoor dining canopies, you might be wondering why you need one. Eating outdoors is actually very important for pupils, as it exposes them to fresh air, enhances their concentration, and increases socialisation.
As we already know, there are several reasons why nature benefits our mental health. Therefore, by providing a safe and inviting outdoor dining area, pupils can enjoy their break time properly in a calming and relaxing environment.
An outdoor dining area can:
- Improve health and well-being
- Increase vitamin D intake
- Create an enhanced learning environment
- Increase social interactions
- Provide extra space in a crowded school
- Be used all year round
Check out these 5 benefits of an outdoor dining area to find out more information.
See How an Outdoor Dining Canopy Transformed This School
Kingsmead School, in Staffordshire, installed an enclosed dining canopy so that students could have a fantastic space where they could socialise, eat, and take time away from their studies.
The secondary school wanted an outdoor dining shelter that could revolutionise its outdoor space and reduce pressure on its existing facilities. They decided on a fully enclosed canopy with a retractable roof as well as heating and lighting so that it could be used throughout the year by the entire student population.
Read the full case study here!
Invest in an Outdoor Dining Canopy With A&S Landscape!
Hopefully, this blog has given you a better understanding about the benefits that an outdoor dining canopy could have on your school. Not only do they encourage pupils to eat and socialise outdoors, but they can also help with overcrowding issues.
At A&S Landscape, we are proud to design, manufacture, and install a wide range of high-quality canopies across schools in the UK, including completely bespoke canopies. With our experience spanning over four decades, we are proud to offer tailored solutions to each of our customers both existing and new.
If you have any canopy related questions, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. A member of our expert team will be more than happy to get back to you!
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