International School of Prague - Then and Now

When I visited ISP this year, I was surprised at how much the school changed. I knew ISP has gone through a major paint job over time, but now it had additional renovations done that changed some of the school structure.

When I visited the school again, I brought a camera with me and took photos. I also had several old photos of the school lying around, so I thought it would be fun to do a "Before and After" of ISP.

Dear ISP people who left/graduated before 2008, this is probably how you remember the school entrance:

And this is how you remember the school logo:

So imagine my surprise when I went back to the school and was greeted with this:

Wait... what is that colorful thing blocking the school building?

 And found the school logo looking like this:

What happened???
Here's the new front entrance of the school in closer view:

A gate on the right door?

And when you go inside, it's the same main entrance with security and such, except...

There's a new door on the right side of the photo! It used to be just windows before!

So when you peer through the newly-made door, you see this long corridor you've never seen before. If you wondered what the new colored block was at the front of the school, it's this!

Not pictured: various classrooms and offices along the new corridor.

Seriously, this was a long-ass hallway. It leads to the 1st floor hallway.

The 1st floor hallway now has a gigantic sign that shows where you need to go! You can also see that the stairways leading to the 2nd floor has been painted blue.

On the left of the hall is the "Landau Theater", before and after (The Landau Theater sign was put up shortly after I graduated from ISP):

A shot of the new theater from further away:

This was taken in 2009. There are no chairs anymore.

The school trophy cases are now colored (and have moved to the lounge area!), and the mini lounge area on the 1st floor has expanded:

The original lounge, now with new colorful sofas.

they made more room for a second lounge with more sofas!

This is the only photo I have of the old first floor lounge, back in 2006 (Hi Lianna, Hitomi, and Kasumi!).

We were hardworking students.

This is the Middle School Hallway, before and after:

So colorful.

This is further inside the Middle School Hallway (yeah, I know, it's not the exact same location):

Before: white walls and beige-y floor, After: lime green walls and lime/blue floor.

And we now go upstairs to the Upper School, where my friends and I attended/graduated.

The good old Upper School hallway! Remember when it was all pristine white? Well, not anymore!

The two photos are taken from opposite sides, but you get the idea.

More of the old and new hallways. (Hi Shuto, Tatsuya, and Ken!) What kind of bugs me about the new Upper School hallways is that the yellow and blue reflects less sunlight, so the hallways look significantly darker than they used to be.

The other end of the same hallway - they have now added actual benches and mini-tables. On one hand, this is practical because kids were dragging leftover desks and sitting on them all the time in this spot anyway. On the other hand... they look like bar tables.

Now we move onto the lounge area. Gone are the plain tiles, now it's a rainbow floor!

The new lounge has a red wall, as well as new sofas and tables. And a series of graduation photos from each year (starting from 2008)!

Class of 2008! Oh the memories!

I MISS ALL OF YOU.

BTW, the hallway to the teachers' area and nurse's office is like freaking Rainbow Road on Mario Kart:

The student mailboxes are now outside the mail room. And the Upper School Counselor's office went through renovations and is a lot bigger.

Spiffy new entrance of the Counselor's office. Remember when it was a dingy room?

This is the end of the Upper School hallway, where Mr. Crane's Psychology classroom is on the right. I don't have photos of it before the paintjob in 2009. Just imagine the whole thing being whitish :P

But the point is, remember how there were talks of connecting the hallways so that the end of the Psych classroom hallway will lead to the Science classrooms hallway? Well, they finally did it; the Upper School hallways are no longer crescent-shaped, but is now a fully connected circle.

Left: photocopying room. Right: No more photocopying room!

It felt so odd to continue walking across the hall in a full circle. At least it will be much easier for students with Psych and Sciences class to walk around now!

RIP, old photocopy room and old Biology classroom. You were sacrificed for easier student commute.

The Chemistry classroom is still there! (I know many took IB Chemistry, though I didn't.)

And last but not least, the Upper School senior lounge! Okay, so I took this photo after I graduated, but it looked pretty much the same minus a few posters.

Please ignore my silly long hair.

And this is the senior lounge, 2013 style:

Nothing much has changed except for the yellow walls.

This is the new staircase leading down to the gym, now colored in rainbow:

This used to be all... whitish before.

The ISP Falcons logo changed too!

The gym itself, however, looks pretty much the same other than the new Falcons logo.

Goddammit blurry Tae Yong, you blocked the old Falcons logo!

Now, the library. The library hallway is largely unchanged, save for the minor paint job, and the fact that they changed up part of the right side of the wall.

The inside of the library hasn't changed too much either overall. They painted the pillars in rainbow colors, changed the carpet, and rearranged the bookshelves, but it's essentially the same library. (The photos aren't so great at showing it though)

More photos of the new library. I'm glad they decided to keep the high ceiling and not divide the library into two floors like rumors said. The high ceiling is the main charm of this place IMO.

The school cafeteria has also gone through a major change. When I was attending school, this is how the cafeteria looked like - blue pillars and plain brown chairs:

Hi Fumiko, Mai, and Tomoyo! 

Me looking dorky at grade 12.

This is how the cafeteria looks like now - EXPLOSION OF RAINBOWS!

SO COLORFUL.

The lights also changed.

 The cafeteria itself has changed quite a bit (more snacks you can buy!) but all in all, it was the cafeteria that we remember.

Remember how there was a small table outdoors so you can have lunch just outside the cafeteria? I don't have older pictures of the old table, but I do have a photo from 2009 when they installed the new tables, and this is how it looks like in 2013:

Difference in school structure!

And this is the lovely pond that took away a third of the nice grassy hill. It's mostly unchanged.

The hill is such a nice place to run around in.

I also took some pictures of the art and music rooms on the first floor:

Upper School art room! So many memories! (The inside went through a paint job)

The music and drama room are largely the same.

Though I didn't, most of my friends took band in Middle School.  The old band room.

The new structures made room for extra band practice rooms on the side!

Lastly, here are more photos of the newly added structures in the school:

So that was it! Going around the school made me feel like a middle/high school student all over again. It was fun seeing what changed and what didn't!