Michael Gatto, Executive Director of the Austin Community Design and Development Center and 2003-2006 Enterprise Rose Fellow, announces that ACDDC recently won a Non-Profit Excellence Award from Greenlights in the Collaboration category for the Alley Flat Initiative. Learn more at www.greenlights.org
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On October 22, 2009 from 6pm until 8pm, Katie Swenson, Senior Director of the Enterprise Rose Fellowship in Community Architecture and co-author William R. Morrish, Dean of the School of Constructed Environments at Parsons the New School for Design, will host a Growing Urban Habitats book signing. The event is free and open to the public.
Based on the goals of “Urban Habitats,” a design competition held in 2005 by Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville and the Charlottesville Community Design Center for the redevelopment of a local trailer park, this book frames sixteen design opportunities for affordable, dense, compact, and sustainable housing. Case studies selected from the Urban Habitats proposals and contemporary work, by innovative designers such as Anderson Anderson, Koning Eizenberg, Office dA, Onion Flats, Zoka Zola, Pyatok, and more.
Buy this book now, by visiting stoutbooks.com.
Photo by Ben Gates.
The 2009 Enterprise Rose Fellowship in Community Architecture Fall Retreat is a very fond and recent memory, locked in time between September 21 – 25, 2009 in the Southwest USA.
The jam-packed week officially began in Santa Fe, New Mexico where the fellows partook of workshops and tours themed around local affordable housing design, development and politics. Amidst strictly-business programming, fellows found time to process and discuss their new knowledge over meals or while producing awesome silk-screened orginal Rose Fellowship t-shirts (designed by Jessy Olson) at Warehouse 21 . Also of note, exiting fellows, Spencer Haynsworth and Ben Gates presented the trajectory of their three-year fellowships at a reception at the Hotel Saint Francis. Katie Swenson (former Rose Fellow and current Senior Director of the fellowship), Naomi Bayer (Senior Vice President, National Initiatives and Innovation), Ed Rosenthal, (Sr. Director, National, Rural & Native American Program) and David Steele (Program Associate, National, Rural & Native American Program) represented Enterprise Community Partners at the reception. Enterprise has made a commitment to bringing fit, affordable housing to New Mexicans, where eighty percent of the population is unable to afford a median-priced home.
After two days of learning in Santa Fe, the fellows, Katie Swenson, Olivia Vernon and Mary Hale (Rose Fellowship Program Associate) packed up the fifteen passenger van and Ophelia Wilkins’ Subaru Outback and headed for the hills. Or more precisely: for the Ghost Ranch retreat center, nestled within Georgia O’Keefe’s glorious red-sedimented landscape. En route, we stopped at the Ohkay Owingee Reservation in San Juan Pueblo, where Jamie Blosser and Tomasita Duran led us on an inspiring tour that culminated in a presentation of the Tsigo Bugeh Village project.
The project was so inspiring that we lingered almost too long and nearly missed dinner at Ghost Ranch. Nonetheless, we made it just in the nick of time to dine in the cafeteria and then to hike into the sunset. That sunset hike was the first of many opportunities for the fellows to kick-back and get to know each other on a more personal level, one of the most important aspects of the semi-annual Rose Fellowship retreats. Other opportunities to get to know each other included: performing in harrowing Pecha Kucha format presentations; participating in training (led by Drew Tulchin of Social Enterprise) on how to deal with difficult managers; freezing together in minimal un-insulated bunkhouses; singing along to Daniel Splaingard’s original music; and experiencing an amazing landscape on an afternoon hike led by Enterprise’s David Steele. Finally, exiting fellow Katherine Williams found an intimate setting in which to present her fellowship.
On Thursday the un-showered fellows (did I mention that Ghost Ranch had a less than desirable shower situation?) were barreling down the road again, heading north for Ophelia’s adopted hometown: Durango, Colorado. Past the red mesas and into a dry, rugged landscape, we stopped in Ignacio, Colorado for delicious tamales, a talk with Ignacio Town Manager, Balty Quintana, and a tour of Ophelia’s many project sites. Those included the lot where Ophelia’s net-zero house will be built, and the school that inspired Ophelia’s and Jessy’s collaboration to design a new rural classroom.
Durango was the perfect bookend to Santa Fe. The fellows continued to learn about local affordable housing design, development and politics in a new southwestern territory. And after Friday’s programming, the weekend held many precious opportunities for… ”hummus”, on which Seth Welty expounds at the end of this post.
Read on for trip highlights in the fellows’ own words:
JESSY OLSON The part I most appreciate about the Rose Fellowship retreats is the opportunity to see and to learn about such a diverse cross section of community development ideas and issues. Especially amid this lingering economic recession, where I have been struggling over the past year with a lack of funding and a dried up investor pool, it was more than uplifting to have exposure to projects that are full-tilt. It’s like that anthem of happy-hour, “It’s always 5pm somewhere”…well, I’d like to counter with, “There always a Rose Fellow project that’s moving forward somewhere”. To see Spencer’s Elder Grace project almost completed, after so many years of hurdles, left me with a feeling of inspiration and renewed dedication to the projects that I’m struggling to get going. It doesn’t matter that the projects aren’t identical in funding or program, and in fact the diversity of the project types that we are exposed to only adds to the sense of possibility that I’m hoping everyone took home with them.
Rose Fellow retreat in the Southwest: the chance to spend a few hours walking in the intense quiet of northern New Mexico, to the moonscape at the top of Kitchen Mesa with my fellow Fellows. Our daily work is design and development with real people in real neighborhoods all across the country. It is intense and often intimately close to the lives of individuals, families and communities with whom we work. Witness: Spencer’s work in Santa Fe and meet the elders who will live in the co-housing project she helped to make a reality, and Ophelia’s work in Durango and the paradigm shift she has been working toward with developers, town managers, and school principals. But the chance to talk and walk in a landscape of such drama, to talk about our work, or to create space around that work and connections with each other: invaluable.
THERESA HWANGBeing out in the pure beauty of Ghost Ranch, I had the rare chance to reflect on where I’ve been and where I will be going for the next 3 years. As the “freshman”, meeting such dedicated, talented, and genuinely kind-hearted people that comprise the Fellowship family, I immediately knew this was a special community I had been accepted into.
I never imagined I could piece together discrete experiences as a community organizer, arts educator, and architect- but the Fellowship provides the nurturing space to synthesize and apply all these past lives. I cannot imagine what the next 3 years will actually shape into, but the path is visible and I’m excited for the journey.
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LAURA SHIPMAN Jamie Blosser’s Tsigo Bugeh Village project epitomizes the struggle to align local community goals, design excellence, and layered financing to implement a progressive development. Seeing the work and hearing the process of veteran fellows inspires and challenges us to push our community projects to have the greatest impact possible. Though our communities and projects are all diverse, the framework constructed by the years of fellows that came before us has enabled us to seek to elevate affordable housing design and development towards even more progressive models.
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OPHELIA WILKINSExactly two years after I first became aware of the Rose Fellowship, first looked up my location on a map, first took a cross-country train trip and road trip to interview for my position, and saw the southwest as a place to call home for the first time, the Rose Fellows came to visit me on my at this place I now call home.
I can only hope that the message I wanted to share with them was indeed communicated through a whirlwind two and a half day tour of La Plata County, Colorado. I wanted to share how rural growth hubs like these may seem, at first, isolated, disconnected and lost in space, but at their best, can serve as models of cohesive, self-sustaining communities with highly invested citizens.
I am hoping that the staid commitment in Ignacio Town Manager, Balty Quintana’s hour-long expose into the inner workings of a small town demonstrated the hardy spirit of rocky mountain southwest. I am hoping that Durango City Planner, Tim McHarg’s tour of the Three Springs development embodied the down-to-earth irony of greenfield development which housing developers grapple with here on a daily basis. I hope the Fellows were simultaneously inspired by the open space surrounding us, as well as the vibrance of our communities.
I can only guess. But, without a doubt, La Plata County was a livelier place for two and a half days for being recognized and legitimized by a visit from the Rose Fellows.
DANIEL SPLAINGARDRetrEATing the Southwest
A Bit of Prose
After a few awkward phone dates it was great to finally meet my fellow fellows and to see their smiling faces and hear their own stories from the front of affordable housing development. Loaded in our fifteen passenger van, my memory melds good conversation with excessive consumption of gas station gourmet and the occasional ipromptu accapella country song. We ate a lot of food, thats one thing I’m sure of, and most of it was delicious. And in the southwest, the apple trees bear fruit in late September, thats another thing I’m sure of. The Ghost Ranch days were well spent hiking and eating, then meeting then eating, and a little stargazing. There was a goodly amount of singing as well, and it got louder as it got later, then finally it was silent. And now I’m home, and the me of now is richer than the me before I retreated and its good to have new friends, and its good to be a Rose Fellow.
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ESTHER YANGThe Fellowship Retreats brings refreshment and renewal of ideas and strategies that are not available to us during our day-to-day grind.
As much as we are professional colleagues, I think first and foremost we are a group of good friends. Within the freedoms and comfort of being friends, we open up and allow our unique personalities posit fresh ideals into our localized perspectives. It is amazing to have a group of people investing in you and supporting you during your 3-year journey of the Fellowship and most likely beyond.
The element I enjoyed most this year is two-fold: Getting to know Fellows better (current and new) and the amazing landscape as the backdrop to rather intense discussions of change within our work environments.
When you travel a 415-mile corridor, in the desert, packed in a large white van or other tight residential quarters with all of your closest professional peers, you’re bound to get to know yourself and these individuals really well. You’ll discover a range of professional and life interests to junk-food preferences. We might convene for conversation around fires, tables, or raucous sing-a-longs, but regardless of the setting, the group’s vibrancy and strategies towards life’s moments is something definitely worth cherishing and savoring in tailor-made snippets within our personal and professional lives.
Although we only have three-years of organized gatherings, this is a group we should not take for granted.
SPENCER HAYNSWORTHI was struck immediately by the perseverance and commitment of each individual, the amazing work he/she was doing in his/her community, and the support and strong bond shared among the entire group. This is the Fellowship at its core. I remember 3 years ago how I was first welcomed me into this amazing community with open arms.
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CAREY CLOUSEWe took the train from the tiny town of Silverton down into Durango, the four-hour journey winding through some spectacular and rugged mountain scenery. Sheer rock faces nearly grazed the elbows of our overzealous photographers, and all around us the aspen leaves were changing en masse. We wowed the whole train car with our stunning rendition of “Here comes the Silverton, up from Durango!” and knitting and pearling, slowly descended back into civilization.
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SETH WELTYOn the sixth day, we were Silverton bound- up from Durango, shovelin’ coal/
The Rose Fellowship retreats always seem to be thoughtfully structured around training workshops and discussions that provide us with a greater understanding of both public interest design in general and regionally-specific projects, programs, and characteristics. As useful as these sessions are, I have increasingly found the greatest utility of the retreats residing in the non-structured interstitial time between everything else- informal moments where we open our shells to talk about ourselves, our challenges, and successes. For me, it’s the humus that matters- the complex, elusive substance in between definable elements that ends up being the most valuable portion of the week. These moments occur throughout the week, but on the sixth day, roaming around Silverton, Colorado, there was no scheduled structure to the day, leaving vast amounts of this interstitial ‘humus’ time to explore the best part of the Rose Fellowship; fellowship.
/See the smoke and hear the whistle blow!
It’s a little strange being on the other side now. I had a great time at the retreat and am so glad I got to see another part of the country. It was great seeing Spencer and Ophelia’s project in real life, in their context and as physical three-dimensional works. We have seen drawings and plans but I know for both of them it is a wonderful experience to have those ideas become reality.
One of my favorite memories will be climbing the rocks at Ghost Ranch. It is such a wonderful landscape and an environment unlike anything I have seen. For me those views are a testament to the wonder of nature and as creative as we architects claim to be, the beauty and nuance of the natural environment can always offer inspiration. Thanks for a great time.
The Frederick P. Rose Architectural Fellowship announces its new name as it embraces and highlights its collaborative partnership with its parent organization, Enterprise Community Partners. The program will now be called The Enterprise Rose Fellowship in Community Architecture.
The Rose Fellows have nearly ten years of history, expanding and increasing the capacity of their host organizations. The Fellowship has been bridging the gap between past and present development practices with fresh perspectives that support progress through active community engagement and input processes. Together, Enterprise and The Fellowship will continue to serve low-income communities through the creation and/or provision of much-needed affordable housing across the nation.
The newly baptized Enterprise Rose Fellowship in Community Architecture will amplify Enterprise’s commitment to the power and importance of high quality design in the provision of sustainable affordable housing, stabilizing communities, and creating homes for the most vulnerable. As field agents of Enterprise’s mission, the Enterprise Rose Fellows’ efforts will significantly magnify the organization’s ability to reform policy, improve design standards, increase construction quality, and elevate property management protocol to better serve both the residents and the local/state/national housing agencies who execute such work.
Current Rose Fellowship efforts are already positioned to impact markets targeted by Enterprise:
Rose Fellow / Enterprise Office Locations
(Rose Fellows — Pink; Enterprise Offices — Blue; Current Rose Fellows — Labeled Cities)
- Many Fellows are currently working across the nation with individuals and communities to better serve the elderly, the homeless, and constituencies in regions affected by natural disasters and foreclosures.
- There are 4 Fellows collaborating with tribal and/or rural communities in new design and environmental policies that simultaneously preserve cultural identities.
- There are 5 Fellows engaged in new construction and rehab work within dense urban city centers.
- Many Fellows test and implement sustainable strategies that will increase building performance in efforts to keep operating costs and tenant rents at affordable levels.
- All Enterprise Rose Fellows engage and serve as project managers for developments complying with Enterprise Green Communities (www.greencommunitiesonline.org) and, consequently, serve as field agents that relay information to 3 Fellows who work closely with Enterprise to help inform their Green Team in the administration and execution of Green Communities Criteria.
Together the Enterprise Rose Fellowship and Enterprise will increase the depth and breadth of each entity’s long-term goals. Be on the lookout for blog updates about collaboration efforts.