A studio based around community, urbanism, and collaboration. The site is in a revitalizing downtown area on Commercial Street in northern Springfield, MO.  The Kitchen, a homeless shelter and food pantry originally acquired the former Missouri Hotel, and expanded its campus to several surrounding buildings. In 2015 it decided to sell its buildings and move to a different location.

Although the area is redeveloping, it lacks services that can support the growing number of loft residents and the surrounding neighborhoods. Groceries, recreation, and public space are limited and distant. 

The project began with an analysis of the Kitchen campus buildings and their condition, of the business in the area, and of possible solutions to the problems on Commercial Street. We then divided into groups to explore different approaches to redevelop The Kitchen campus.

My part was to look at the block south of Commercial Street. I chose to expand the amount and variety of housing options. I combined 18 studio apartments with 6 two bedroom apartments and 2 three bedroom apartments. I also looked at redeveloping the surrounding buildings for commercial use. Converting a Coca-Cola distribution building into retail space and adding 12 more studio apartments above.

Parking is one of the problems we identified in the analysis phase. The community is very reluctant to have a parking garage, but the number of businesses and residents is putting a strain on street parking. I looked at developing a below grade parking lot below apartments. Allowing for density without building above the height of the surrounding buildings.

As the final part of the project we produced a 200 page document for the community. It included the analysis of the buildings and issues, precedents that provided solutions, and our designs which synthesized them.