It's been a busy start to 2021 as Storefront for Community Design welcomed a new Executive Director and Center Director. The Board of Directors and staff have taken this time to reflect upon the progress we’ve made and establish a vision moving forward. This edition of Notes from the Field will catch you up on recent program highlights and upcoming program opportunities.
City Builders Design Workshop
Design Workshops
The City Builders Design Workshop convenes project-based learning opportunities that focus on real world issues in the built environment and encourage youth and young adults to discover and design solutions that create effective change in their lives and communities.
Winter Session
We would first like to acknowledge and pay homage to a community member and contributor at Six Points Innovation Center (6PIC). At the beginning of this year, the center mourned the loss of a long-time collaborative partner who was lovingly referred to as Miss Virginia. She played a valuable role in 6PIC’s day to day operations and interactions with the youth. Our deepest condolences to her family.
During the winter session at 6PIC, the studio quickly evolved into a resource hub to serve youth and families with immediate needs. Thanks to funding from the Robins Foundation, the Parent Support Program was launched and wellness check-ins were held in partnership with the Richmond Association of Black Social Workers. Community 50/50, Saving Our Youth, and GroundworkRVA all assisted in food deliveries, financial assistance, and wellness checks for youth participants. Additionally, Saving Our Youth created a safe and socially distanced space for area high schools students to attend virtual school and receive additional tutoring.
YEER Program final virtual presentation
The City Builders programming continued virtually. Three teams of youth, who participated in the Youth Eviction Empowerment Research program (YEER), presented their research findings via Facebook Live On February 18, 2021 around eviction and housing instability in Richmond. The teams were formed through a partnership between the VCU School of Social Work and VCU Wilder School’s RVA Eviction Lab with three community organizations: Advocates for Richmond Youth, Virginia Community Voice, and Saving Our Youth, a partner at 6PIC.
Our success is dependent upon the deep collaboration between our partners who help recruit, engage, and impact the youth and residents at 6PIC. In the coming months, Storefront for Community Design will be developing a robust curriculum for its Youth Innovation program that will focus on design and project-based learning opportunities. This curriculum will not be developed behind closed doors and the community will continue to help guide the design and implementation of programming. In addition, we will continue to build curriculum elements through a youth-led initiative and engage our 6PIC partners, and the greater community, to implement upcoming program opportunities. Stay tuned for more to come.
Design Session
Low-cost Design and Planning Assistance
Design Session provides community members design and planning assistance at an intimate, approachable level including one-on-one advice, conceptual sketches, and plans of action from volunteer design and planning professionals.
Northside Community Tree Planting
It’s never too late to highlight a project that makes an immediate impact to our neighbors while building awareness for sustainable design. Last year, Northside resident Daniel Klein came to Storefront to partner on a Love Your Block (LYB) Grant that proposed planting more trees along Cliff Avenue near Brookland Park Boulevard.
We decided that this would be a great opportunity for the Design Session Studio, including students from mOb studio, to collaborate with Daniel to envision and create community engagement tools to help enhance the streetscape in the neighborhood. Students worked over the course of the semester to develop a foldable booklet and postcards to educate residents about native species in Central Virginia and provide specific street trees to select for their neighborhood.
Foldable booklet developed by mOb studio students (left); trees planted and ready to thrive on Cliff Ave. (right)
Recently, we got an update that the seeds we planted a year ago are finally blooming and trees have gone into the ground in their new home! Spring on Cliff Avenue is about to get a bit more colorful in the coming years.
Take action and download a customizable version of the toolkit to use in your neighborhood!
Community Visioning
Low-cost Design and Planning Assistance
Community Visioning provides community-based design and planning assistance that inspires community members to take action, leverage their creativity, and realize a shared vision that strengthens our neighborhoods.
Reimagining the Bank of America Building
Storefront for Community Design led a community engagement process to receive feedback and ideas from residents for the new intended use of the former Bank of America building located at 1307 E Brookland Park Blvd in Northside’s Highland Park community. The Bank of America building closed in 2017 and ownership was transferred to the Richmond Land Bank, a program of Maggie Walker Community Land Trust (MWCLT), in the hope of finding a suitable use and tenant in the coming years.
Storefront developed a creative digital and physical outreach plan to frame an accessible, culturally responsive community listening approach that amplified the ideas that Northside residents have regarding the intended use of the building. Data and responses were collected and presented in a final report for the MWCLT Citizen Advisory Panel to consider as they determine future use of the building.
Posters and flyers developed to spark the interest of the community including links to the online community survey.
MWCLT staff are preparing a draft RFP and will be gathering comments on the report published by Storefront for Community Design. To share your comments, impressions, and questions, check out the Richmond Land Bank website to review the report and discover next steps. In addition, if you are interested to participate in future engagement opportunities as the building development progresses, submit your contact information in the form on the RLB Bank of America webpage.
To learn more about Storefront’s engagement effort on the MWCLT Bank of America project and download additional materials, check out the full blog post, Reimagining the Bank of America Building: Community Engagement in Highland Park.
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