PERSPECTIVES

Tom English’s bar and the adjacent Dorchester Market— two longtime businesses on a prominent Dot Ave corner in Columbia-Savin Hill— are under agreement to be sold this summer with the next owner eyeing a mixed-use project for the site.

RODE architects, which is working on several other nearby projects, is attached to the Tom English redevelopment plan. The site location — near the JFK/UMass T stop with solid foot traffic passing through the area — means “it falls into this category of transit-oriented development,” said Kevin Deabler with RODE Architects.

The site abuts College Bound’s property at The Little House on East Cottage Street, which is also where the Columbia-Savin Hill group meets monthly during general session.

“We know that’s a special building, and it’s been a special building for the whole community,” Deabler said. “So the fact that this is one of their key abutters right here, we’re just working hand in hand with them, but we’re just not at a point right now to sit down and say what it is."

Stay tuned for more information!

For more information, check out the original article by Jennifer Smith at the Dorchester Report, here.

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A shift in social behaviors is drawing people back into cities and our brightest urban centers are rushing to accommodate the influx with a surge in new housing construction. These residential buildings comprise a significant portion of the built environment; they represent the architectural vernacular of our neighborhoods. Within this sector, the extruded rectangle – the double loaded corridor – is the most ubiquitous of the multi-family building typologies, offering a model familiar to construction methods and pro formas alike. The price of land acquisition and the cost of construction make it difficult to deliver affordable middle-income housing, adding to the appeal of a typology that maximizes every available square foot of rentable real estate.

The challenge to designers lies in how to suitably apply the ‘extruded-rectangle’ in our cities. The typology is inherently monolithic. As urban planners, our daily experience on the streets of Boston tells us that there is strength in the continuous street wall. It helps to define the 'urban room' of the street, defining the margins of urban life and giving structure to our cities. But within this structure, are there opportunities to vary from a strict rigidity, and add richness to the built environment?

What happens when you fold a wall?

• Enrich the senses  – Much as the spires of cathedrals lift the spirit of the observer towards the heavens, or the long horizon lines of Wright’s country houses instill a sense of grounded domesticity, so should our urban housing reflect the dynamic neighborhood setting in which it is found.
   
• Respect and Enhance the Surroundings – The visual lines of a building can elegantly resolve irregular lot conditions, transition around a street corner, and acknowledge prominent neighbors or important view corridors; these gestures help a building become integrated with its environment.
   
• Reduce the visual bulk of the building – Breaking the continuous edge of the building can reduce the overall impact of a building’s mass. A larger building can be made to feel contextual among smaller neighbors.
   
• Delineate entry – From the igloo to the skyscraper, a visual indication of a building’s entry orients the user, grounds the building, and instills a sense of balance.
   
• Expand the public realm – The bustling activity of our urban thoroughfares benefit greatly from even the slightest occasional relief. A bench tucked among landscaped planters adjacent to – but apart from – a busy sidewalk offers just the needed respite to foster a vibrant mix of activities.
   

Architects are responsible for creating buildings and spaces that both satisfy the client and enhance the lives of all who experience them. We are the arbiters of the inherent conflict between richness of form and economy of means.

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When it comes to the many details involved in designing a building, smaller  elements like branding can often fall by the wayside. This is not the case at RODE, however, where creating a unique brand image is  a core aspect of the design process. We believe that incorporating interesting graphics into a design attracts people to the space and allows a building to stand out from the crowd in a world where new buildings seem to be going up on every corner. A client’s overall brand image is also a great source of inspiration during the initial design process and can be integrated in elements like signage, which showcase the style of the client’s company long after the building is completed.

For us, it is important to focus on how our clients want their brands represented and to apply our knowledge of the latest industry trends  in graphics. Bright colors, bold typography, and hand drawn graphics are just a few of the latest “big things.” We have also noticed that the average consumer is seeking something more eclectic and creative  inspring our clients to  add some vibrancy to their projects. Interesting “duo-tones,” authentic images, and Google fonts are a few other trends rounding out our predictions for 2017.

Duo-tones create a more dynamic look in signage by using one vibrant color alongside its deeper neutral partner. Graphics companies are also showcasing new digital printing techniques that can turn any image into a vibrant and unique wall graphic. We are seeing these types of graphics frequently used as wall features in in commercial and hospitality spaces.  Google fonts, which have grown to include more than 800 font types, work across a number of platforms, making it easier to create individualized aesthetics for interior design, exterior signage, and marketing.

Staying up-to-date in graphic design trends and incorporating them in other aspects of architecture and interior design is essential to our process and we have seen the positive impact this approach has on our client’s projects and in creating spaces with their own unique flare.

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Original article by Jennifer Smith, The Dorchester Reporter.

A tunnel cap that sits above the Red Line tracks as they run underground through Dorchester from Fields Corner to Ashmont station may see a new life as a biker and pedestrian greenway.

At the Greater Ashmont Main Street’s annual meeting on Tuesday, community members weighed in on an early look at a possible design for the stretch between Park Street, where trains from Fields Corner slip into the tunnel, and Shawmut and Ashmont stations.

The proposed greenway would run along the top of the Red Line beginning with a small section north of Park Street and then south across Mather Street, Centre Street, and Welles Avenue up to Peabody Square at Ashmont.

OJB Landscape Architects, the real estate developer Travis Lee, and RODE Architects had been toying with the idea for some time when Greater Ashmont Main Street executive director Jenn Cartee raised the greenway discussion with Lee. Renderings in hand, they presented their preliminary designs to the Main Street group in St. Mark’s church this week to initiate the gathering of local feedback.

“This presentation really represents more of a seed of an idea at this point,” Cody Klein, a Savin Hill resident and landscape architect with OJB, told attendees. “We know it’s got a long way to go, so it really deserves a lot of your input.” Conceptually, Klein said, such a greenway would connect people to each other, to transit, and to local amenities.

“Obviously we want to respect and address the historical character of Dorchester,” Klein said. That’s something we all are very passionate about.” He added, “More than anything it provides this opportunity for community engagement and active programming... It’s not just to convey people from one point to another. It’s where we run into each other. It’s where we engage, have community activities.”

The team is looking at different design conditions along the route, including the overlook where the train enters the tunnel at Park Street, areas of narrower open space with existing walls and natural elements, and wider stretches of underutilized land on the borders of the cap. There is not enough room for a full park, but small grassy gathering areas could be placed at varying points along the greenway.

Space for both pedestrians and cyclists would be essential, Klein said, and the community would be welcome to offer suggestions as to whether there should be separated lanes or more of a small boulevard design.

The design group is in contact with the MBTA, which approves of their general proposal, pending additional structural planning. “They have looked at all these concept plans, and they are content with them to do a 99-year lease for a dollar,” said Ashmont Main Street’s Cartee.

She proposed forming an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit to handle management of the greenway site after the securing of easements and licenses from the state and city.

On the city’s end, if the plan is approved, it could present the opportunity for additional tie-ins with the Emerald Network’s series of connected greenways. The 30-year bike plan is also a useful guide for greenway connection points within the neighborhoods it traverses.

Attendees offered a warm reception to the proposal, with abutters saying they were “excited” about the possibility of a revitalized community throughway behind their houses.

“I feel like I died and went to heaven and you’re my angel,” said Ashmont resident Donnell Graves. Recalling resistance to the idea of revamping the tunnel cap in the 1970s, Graves said he has long been one of the community members who see the cap as “wasted space. This could be a beautiful park and greenway.”

Several attendees said a greenway could form a connection between village centers currently divided by major roadways.

Bryan Bryson, who heads the main street group’s Beautification and Public Spaces committee, is an abutter. “I live right on the tunnel cap, so this is something I’m very connected to,” he said, drawing a parallel to the paths around Davis Square in Somerville, adding, “I’d love to just walk out of my backyard and hop on.”

As the team continues with outreach to civic groups around the proposed greenway path, its members took note of questions on funding, safety, traffic connections, and basic pathway fixtures that will have to be hashed out in ensuing discussions.

“The abutters are the most important part of this whole thing,” said Lee, an Ashmont resident. “So I think with this simple amount of work, we can get a feel from the seven-odd community groups as to: Is this something we should put time and energy into advancing or not? And that’s, I think, where we’re at.”

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What is Design Excellence? This past Friday, RODE volunteered Katie Cressall to be a jury member for the BSA Small Firms/Small Projects Design Awards. She, along with two other architects and one structural engineer, reviewed submissions in a variety of scales and project types. There were some awesome projects and it was great to be part of a conversation about what Design Excellence is and how small firms in Massachusetts are contributing to it.

RODE encourages its young staff members to be engaged members of the design community and experiences like this one help shape our team members through lively discussion and reflection.

Learn more about the BSA Project Design Awards here.

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