It’s a simple idea, worth sharing: Enrich the lives of seniors in affordable housing by locating teen support services right inside their new apartment buildings.

Credit architect Victor Body-Lawson and his team for the prototype Teens x Seniors, just one differentiating aspect of the firm Body Lawson Associates’ Home Street Residences — an innovative, low-income housing development long on community amenities. One of those is the youth support and video gaming center BX Start, operated by acclaimed nonprofit DreamYard.

Among the finalists of Fast Company Magazine’s “Innovation by Design” awards cited for social good — alongside global brands like MasterCard and GE — this winner is a brainchild of an architect, artist and professor in Harlem quietly designing new solutions for affordable urban living in vibrant, healthy communities.

"In this and other housing solutions we create, our goals is to imagine solutions for resident wellbeing and community wealth,” says Victor Body-Lawson, AIA, NOMA, who also won the Leadership in Housing Award this summer from the American Institute of Architects (AIA), New York Chapter.

"Home Street Residences has a teen center, yes, but it also incorporates green terraces and outdoor spaces, ample communal areas and original artworks, all contributing to energizing these senior residents,” adds Body-Lawson. "It creates a special opportunity for them to enjoy the afternoon arrival of the kids or to serve as teen mentors and friends, which boosts neighborhood connectivity and wellness."

Wedged suitably between a tool for avoiding evictions and Google’s Black-Owned Friday program, Body Lawson Associates’ Home Street Residences appears among a global group of finalists for the Innovation by Design Awards, recognized in the Social Good category as “the best designs for social good in 2021.”

The submitting team members include Body Lawson Associates (architect, designer, creator) as well as Ralph Mckoy (development equity partner) and Bronx Pro Group (developer and operator). Building on their successful ideas, the creators are collaborating with multidisciplinary teams on new “community centers for living” concepts that merge low-income housing with:

• Empowerment centers for youth and seniors.
• Community farms with cooperative markets.
• Coworking and recreation spaces.
• Laundry rooms on every floor.
• Extensive facilities and outdoor areas for mental and physical wellbeing — from primary-care clinics and supportive services for the formerly homeless to holistic life centers, yoga rooms, roof running tracks and gyms that open onto outdoor terraces.
• More windows.

About Home Street Residences and Teen x Seniors 

Home Street Residences creates an innovative, low-income housing prototype for seniors, with community amenities including a teen support and video gaming center to enliven and enrich everyone’s lives. 

Maximizing the 75,000-square-foot building, the memorable architecture solution is a contextually sensitive form with 63 apartments averaging an ample 550 square feet each, with high-quality finishes and fixtures unusual for low-income housing.

Creating a unique solution for ‘community wealth and wellbeing,’ Home Street incorporates green terraces and outdoor spaces, ample communal areas with original artworks, and a large community space for a teen support and video-gaming center called BX Start operated by DreamYard, an award-winning nonprofit that collaborates with schools, families and youth in the Bronx. Energizing senior residents and creating an opportunity for them to serve as teen mentors and friends, the multigenerational concept boosts neighborhood connectivity and wellness.

Economical in its construction, Home Street employs passive design systems including panelized steel-stud framing, recessed fenestration, and extra insulation to lower heating and cooling costs and meet its LEED Gold aspirations. Grey brick cladding echoes the schist from the dilapidated church that once stood on the site, and the recessed window openings produce a sculptural quality in the geometric shadows often gracing the facade. The former Presbyterian church’s cartouche of 1909 is embedded in the foundation of Home Street’s structure. The ground floor uses a tessellated and color-variegated stone pattern, contrasting the interior courtyard’s elegant gray herringbone tiles. 

Inside, stone counters, stainless-steel appliances and dark wood finishes offer an appealing, lasting environment. Browns and grays in the hallways, common areas and apartments complement the exterior palette, with original paintings by the architect, Victor Body-Lawson, in corridors and elevator lobbies.

More than merely a home for residents, this affordable housing is a solution for urban communities. Resident seniors interact with neighborhood teens on a daily basis, and they enjoy access to roof patios with dramatic views of Manhattan and the Bronx as well as quiet rear courtyard. Succulents, ferns and other perennials provide needed biophilic touches, shown to positively impact mental health. The mailroom’s elegant finishes and subtle artwork, and also the small gym room, offer other shared resources. 

Said the nonprofit affordable housing policy and advocacy organization, New York Housing Conference, the Home Street prototype “transforms an underutilized site into a vibrant affordable housing project for seniors living in the Foxhurst Neighborhood of the Bronx, and “the facility space provides services for residents and community members.”

About 50,000 individuals applied for housing at Home Street. Said Metropolis Magazine, “The architecture enhances the lives of its lower-income residents.

Innovation and Social Good in Architecture 

Today’s cities and communities need affordable multifamily housing and mixed-use concepts that incorporate innovative, community-enhancing amenities and programs. Invigorating neighborhoods and redressing decades of disinvestment, these new directions in urban development increase “community wealth and wellness.”

The Home Street prototype proves this investment is essential and valuable. Addressing senior low-income housing needs is only the start. Home Street employs community engagement in planning to lead a complete rethinking of how housing can be more responsive to shifting urban needs. “Given the change in national housing dynamics due to the pandemic, social distancing and advancements in remote communication, there will be a need to rethink affordable strategies,” says the architect and creator Victor Body-Lawson, who recently spoke at a panel on these housing trends, “Our Fair City,” convened by the Museum of the City of New York.

With ground-floor spaces zoned for commercial use, many housing developments miss their opportunities for community impact. For Home Street, a church facility was considered but gave way to the multigenerational community arts center which would create a positive impact for all residents and many area families. The project team selected local nonprofit DreamYard for programming, incorporating their mission of building “pathways to equity and opportunity through the arts.”

• The Home Street concept expresses community connections through architecture and creates lasting, low-cost solutions through passive building systems that reduce energy use and maintenance costs.
• High-quality materials selection and visual transparency are essential to affordable housing, where those details are often overlooked. In Home Street’s residential public spaces, daylight and views facilitate connections between a community room, rear courtyard, and terrace.
• A bespoke painting by the Home Street architect at each elevator lobby serves as wayfinding and creates a visual identity. In each residence are stone countertops, stainless-steel appliances, and luxury vinyl tile floors that mimic wood, all rivaling the finishes in market-rate units. Individual HVAC units give residents autonomy over thermal control.
• Mixed-generation, mixed-use communities strengthen and enrich city neighborhoods, says Body-Lawson. “In Home Street, the multigenerational occupants create an environment of support and mutual reliance. Our goal as the creators and architects is to collaborate with our clients and communities directly to create better cities for all people.”

Building on the ideas behind the successful Home Street, the project’s creators are collaborating with multidisciplinary teams on new “community centers for living” concepts that merge low-income housing with empowerment centers for youth and seniors, community farms with cooperative markets, coworking and recreation spaces, and laundry rooms on every floor. The affordable developments also integrate more windows and extensive facilities and outdoor areas for mental and physical wellbeing — from primary-care clinics and supportive services for the formerly homeless to holistic life centers, yoga rooms, roof running tracks and gyms that open onto outdoor terraces. 

“Our main goal is to create new urban solutions that support community wealth and wellness,” says Body-Lawson. “This is a systematic and carefully calibrated approach for building social equity and wellbeing that many local government leaders will champion also.”

Project team:

Body Lawson Associates (architect, designer, creator) 
Ralph Mckoy (development equity partner)
Bronx Pro Group (developer and operator) 

Other team members: 

Owner and creator: Home Street Partners
Design architect: Body Lawson Associates Architects & Planners, New York -- Victor Body-Lawson, AIA (design principal); Ralph Mckoy (design partner); Antonia Walker (project manager); Eni Kodhima, Luis Chacha, Gloria Bautista, Melissa Hernandez (project team)

Structural engineer: Christie Engineering
Mechanical/electrical engineer: Rodkin Cardinale Consulting Engineers
Civil engineer: Sullivan Group Design
Energy/environmental consultant: Steven Winter Associates
General contractor: Home Builders 1
Construction manager: C & S Construction and Consulting Group
Landscape design: AtomsECO
Expediter: RPO Inc.