Archinect - News

Marlon Blackwell will deliver a new memorial to the Global War on Terror on the National Mall in Washington

2023-07-13T08:00:00-04:00

Marlon Blackwell Architects has been selected as the designer of an important new memorial to veterans and service members lost during America’s decades-long War on Terror on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

The Arkansas-based firm was announced as the project’s lead following a search process that began last summer with submissions from 177 different U.S. and international competitors. Its development will be guided by a newly-created Design Advisory Council (DAC) comprised of Gold Star family members, veterans, and "other stakeholders." The project was commissioned by the nonprofit Global War on Terrorism Memorial Foundation, which was first founded in 2015.

The foundation’s President and CEO Michael “Rod” Rodriguez complemented the designer’s “ability, credibility, and humility to lead the design of an inclusive and reverent Memorial,” adding “Marlon’s proven track record as a world-class designer, combined with his personal experiences in a family with a history of military...

Brooks + Scarpa's “The Six” offers a home to veterans in need

2017-05-22T13:40:00-04:00

Located in Los Angeles' highly dense MacArthur Park neighborhood, "The Six" is a hard-to-miss, 52-unit housing complex for veterans who are disabled and/or were previously homeless. Designed by Brooks + Scarpa for the Skid Row Housing Trust, the building gets its name from the ubiquitous military expression “I got your six” — which basically means “I've got your back”.

Brooks + Scarpa designed the 40,250 square-foot building with public and private “zones” with more emphasis on creating a community-oriented and social space, as opposed to a reclusive, isolating scheme.

Photos: Tara Wucjik. Last photo: Brooks + Scarpa.

The ground level contains offices, support spaces for veterans, bike storage and parking, while the second level features a large public courtyard. The courtyard is surrounded by four levels of housing units with balconies and green roofs to let residents share a secured, open space and connect with the larger community. The highest level features a growing edible garden...

SHOP to design Syracuse University's National Veterans Resource Complex

2016-06-23T13:33:00-04:00

What should a National Veterans Resource Complex look like, exactly? SHOP Architects has been given the official opportunity to find out, courtesy of Syracuse University. The early renderings for this project, which the school in a release is careful to note "are conceptual in nature and may not reflect the final NVRC design" show a rectilinear, sloping tiered structure with a massive central open-air courtyard.

According to Syracuse University, the NVRC "will include classroom spaces to accommodate local and national veteran-focused programming. It will also house a conference center and a roughly 1,000-seat auditorium, which will be available for use by the whole campus and fills a critical space void."

The facility will be designed to be LEED-certitified.

News on other notable military/governmental-themed designs:

D.C. Breaks Ground on Housing for Homeless Vets

2014-11-11T15:14:00-05:00

The John and Jill Ker Conway Residence is a 124-unit apartment building designed by Sorg Architects. The $33 million building is a striking stack of white, metal-paneled blocks, staggered with views facing the Capitol and the Mall. What makes the building truly distinctive, though, is that the space enables case managers and social workers to work onsite with veterans in tandem with the D.C. VA Medical Center. Sixty units will be set aside permanently for homeless veterans [...].

Designing for Seniors and Soldiers, Toward a "Silver" Architecture

2014-11-11T14:25:00-05:00

In a recent opinion piece in The New York Times, geriatrician Louise Aronson advocated for a new type of building, one designed with an aging population in mind, which, she suggests, might be dubbed “silver” architecture. [...] It being Veterans Day, this article got me thinking about architect Michael Graves, who recently designed a pair of houses for returning soldiers that follow through on many of Aronson’s suggested parameters for silver design.

Can a City Really 'End' Homelessness?

2013-12-27T14:29:00-05:00

Last week, the city of Phoenix made a startling announcement. The Arizona capital had previously identified 222 chronically homeless veterans living in the city, more than half of them veterans of the Vietnam War. [...] Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton said last week that every last one of them now had a roof overhead. The city has effectively ended chronic veteran homelessness, according to the mayor [...]. Phoenix did this – prioritizing housing first, then wrapping other services around it.

Architecture for Recovery: IDEO and Michael Graves Design a Home for Disabled Military Veterans

2011-11-30T18:07:10-05:00

Oftentimes, United States' military men and women carry the physical and emotional wounds of their service home with them, "find[ing] workarounds to cope with their surroundings based on individual capabilities and preferences." Today, IDEO and Michael Graves Associates see their work come alive as the U.S. Army Fort Belvoir and Clark Realty Capital unveil a new model for building accessible homes on military installations: the Wounded Warrior home.