Friends

Seattle, WA

A Call to Smile

We were asked to join a team as interior design architect, including Baylis Architects (executive architect) and GLY Construction (builder), to assist in the renovation of a Rainier Valley commercial space for use by Friends of the Children, a national non-profit supporting at-risk youth.  We agreed to accept a cost-only fee, while all profit was donated back to the institution.   

A program development exercise began with storytelling by the users of their individual experiences of “home;” a collection of gripping urban paradigms from the transitory and predacious to multi-generational occupancy at or below the poverty line in Central Area neighborhoods.  We distilled these compelling stories and their reciprocal hopes and dreams, into an interior “neighborhood” of activity and rest stations for safe healing, learning, and growth.