Designing Inspiring Communities

Creating places where people can thrive

BY SEAN GOODRICK, AIA

TAKE A MINUTE TO REFLECT upon the places or moments throughout your life where you have felt the most connected to the people around you. That feeling is known as community attachment, and it applies to more than just the neighborhood in which you live. This concept can be experienced anywhere with the capacity for a shared sense of purpose, and these meaningful experiences are the key to fostering a thriving community.

Whether it is your neighborhood, a workplace, or a corporate brand, building upon this sense of community is key to making places where we feel connected. In her research on Conceptualizing Community Attachment, Jennifer Cross proposes that there are three primary factors that create a sense of community attachment: the natural environment, the social environment, and the built environment.

The Natural Environment: Thriving communities complement the natural environment, utilizing those natural resources as a benefit alongside the community’s sense of purpose.

The Social Environment: Constructed from common values, the social environment can be described as the mission statement, or the culture of a community.

The Built Environment: The way in which a community prioritizes and organizes the use of space, and how those spaces feel, is a significant contributor to our sense of belonging.

So how do we design spaces with a sense of belonging? Let’s look at three distinct projects, one in each county of Delaware. Each project is somewhat unique from the next, and each builds a community connection through architecture.

New Castle County: The Salvation Army Campus, Wilmington

On a four-acre former industrial site, at the heart of the Riverfront East redevelopment on the Christina River sits the new Salvation Army campus in Wilmington.

Comprised of approximately 100,000 square feet of retail, donation processing, and residences, this new facility provides the infrastructure for The Salvation Army’s mission to support those in need. The campus provides no-cost housing, food, counseling, community, and employment for individuals who have lost the ability to cope with addiction.

Capturing this important mission through architecture requires a careful balance of cost considerations, retail presence, and the need to create a welcoming residence for the program’s beneficiaries. These three design considerations often felt as though one may overtake the other, toppling the balance needed for these three distinct uses on the site. Ultimately, the design team created a unified sense of place through the scale and balance of the façade materials throughout the campus.

Kent County: Family Court Complex, Dover

Communities succeed, in part, with supportive, safe environments that provide the necessary resources and infrastructure necessary to thrive. The new Family Court complex currently under construction in historic downtown Dover is carefully designed to provide that supportive environment to the community it serves. A multitude of considerations were seamlessly integrated into the building’s design by Tevebaugh Architecture and the project’s justice facilities consultant CGL.

Considerations for the children involved in family court proceedings generated small play areas. These spaces are conveniently located adjacent to open, light-filled corridors that allow for safe congregation outside of the court proceedings.

The main lobby space balances the need for safety and security at the entry point to the building, while providing access to daylighting, and clear circulation paths into the building.

The feel of the spaces that support the Family Court proceedings was a priority consideration in the design. Often, an individual’s experience of a family court experience is inherently complex, with a high potential for stress. Prioritizing safety, security, and comfort in the design of the courthouse spaces provides support to those in need.

Sussex County: Camp Arrowhead, Lewes

Careful consideration of the pristine natural environment in which Camp Arrowhead sits was a priority during the design of this new 10,000 square foot dining hall in Lewes. Since 1958, children have enjoyed summers on the western shore of Rehoboth Bay at the Camp. Today, the Camp hosts 1,000 children from second to ninth grade, along with 75 staff members each summer. This vibrant, thriving community was looking for an opportunity to replace their aging dining hall while concurrently building the infrastructure needed to host conferences and corporate retreats throughout the remainder of the year.

The result is this new facility, complete with a full commercial kitchen, an on-site vegetable garden, and rainwater harvesting, all housed within a place that embodies the joy of being part of this great community.

Sean Goodrick, AIA is an owner and principal with Tevebaugh Architecture, a design studio that enjoys creating inspiring places where people can thrive.