Located in the heart of downtown Raleigh adjacent to Moore Square on the City Market block, the Food Corridor Hub (FoCoH) building houses a market, demonstration kitchens, a banquet/dining facility, an art gallery/cafe, a large lecture hall, a seed library/research facility, classrooms, and office space. The program is separated into two wings, with the food- and event-oriented spaces located at the north end, and the education-oriented spaces located at the south end. Each of these wings have a lobby that vertically pierces the overall volume. The roof, constructed of an upturned concrete beam system, houses an intensive garden space for growing produce and educating the community about farming and gardening techniques.

The FoCoH’s urban site strategy is informed by the cobblestone street orientation of the City Market, where
narrow north-south streets flank the Old Market building before opening up onto Moore Square park. Similarly,
the FoCoH creates a north-south, pedestrian-friendly street (also cobblestone) to activate the interior of the
block and draw visitors to the open market space along the south side of the block.

At the north end of this new cobblestone street, visitors pass by the demonstration kitchens, where they can
interact with the chefs and taste innovative culinary delights at the stand-up tasting tables. Each Sunday morning, the kitchens would be used to prepare food for the area’s large homeless and low-income population. Kitchen staff can use produce directly from the roof garden, or they can walk just across the cobblestone street to a greenhouse, where fresh herbs and vegetables are grown year-round. This greenhouse is a formal extension of the gable form of the historic Norwood House (ca. 1870), located at the north of the block.

In each of the lobby spaces, a vertical green wall directs visitors up the suspended stairways to the roof garden,
providing an eye-catching embodiment of the building’s purpose -- to grow, cook, provide, and educate people
about local food. The green wall also visually connects the public outside up to the roof produce garden. In the education lobby, the green wall also serves as a dramatic backdrop for the lecture hall.