Client
Union Gospel Mission of Dallas |
Center of Hope is a homeless shelter and educational
facility for homeless women and children operated by the Union
Gospel Mission, a non-profit, faith-based program serving the
homeless community in Dallas for 45 years. This is a new facility
to serve only women and children, located in a brownsfield project
in central Dallas. The abandoned warehouse had to be abated of
hazardous material, gutted and shored to allow for the new construction.
The program called for a variety of uses housed in one secure
building to allow for the nurturing and protection of the inhabitants.
Since there were many types of uses besides the living areas
which could become confusing to inhabitants, a simple organizational
system similar to a village was implemented. The bisected building
had the living units on the “private side” and all
other uses on the “public side”, intersected by a
grid of wide corridors and sky lit nodes utilizing color for way
finding. The public side has a dining hall, kitchen, chapel, child
care center, library, classrooms, clothes “store”,
computer room, self serve and staff laundry. Staff offices are
accessed off wide, circulating corridors or streets with intersections
becoming more recognizable nodes.
For the residential uses, the Mission wanted to provide private
sleeping rooms in lieu of areas with beds assigned each night
so that individuals and families would have a sense of home and
security. Most of the units are located on the perimeter to allow
for natural light from enlarged windows and face inward to group
living areas, which are either larger open areas or smaller semi-transparent
dens serving two rooms where inhabitants stay for extended periods.
The design had to be flexible enough to allow for any furniture
since the donation from a large hotel chain that was remodeling
of all the furniture had not been available when it was in the
design phase. Natural light was brought to the interior by large
skylights and interior “windows”. The challenge was
to make this institutional facility look and feel non-institutional
with a variety of spaces, so that the space would not only provide
a space for the different uses but enlist a sense of hope and
of being nurtured for both adults and children. |
