DESIGN CHALLENGE

Replace a church building that had been converted into 16 units of housing in the 1990s destroyed by fire with a new building that reflected the character of the duplex and triple decker neighborhood.

DESIGN APPROACH

The decision was made early in the process to not replicate the historic church building that had been destroyed by fire. However, it was decided that pieces of the church – most notably the prominent round stained glass window – would be incorporated into the facade of the new building. In order to provide 16 units of affordable rental housing, the building clearly had to be larger than the buildings in the surrounding neighborhood – primarily duplexes and triple deckers. Accordingly, we designed the single large building in such a way that the building façade stepped in and out to create the appearance of a collection of smaller triple decker scaled buildings. We also used varying colors and siding types to further break down the scale of a single building into a collection of smaller buildings.