2023
Participants
Team O1
Community Collaborator:
One Lawndale Children’s Discovery Center
Design Contributor:
Studio Becker Xu
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One Lawndale Children's Discovery Center: a new children's museum coming 3140 W. Ogden Ave, providing a dedicated space for play and learning on Chicago's westside.
Studio Becker Xu is a Chicago-based architecture & design practice led by Sharon Xu and Robert Becker. The studio is driven by a collective curiosity for what it means to be human and how we can bring meaning to our experiences through the objects and places that we create. Recent design endeavors include a home in North Carolina that reconsiders the historical dogtrot house and a reimagined two-flat for the Chicago Architecture Center’s Come Home Initiative to support missing middle infill housing in Chicago’s South and West Side neighborhoods.
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Team O2
Community Collaborator:
North Lawndale Greening Committee + YMEN
Design Contributors:
Odile Compagnon Architect + Erik Newman
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North Lawndale Greening Committee creates a greener, healthier, and safer community where people of all ages have places to meet and play as they build a stronger sense of community.
Young Men's Educational Network (YMEN) prepares young men and women in North Lawndale for leadership by helping them grow in their faith and character, develop a love for learning, and use their talents to serve the community and strengthen our families.
Odile Compagnon is an architect and educator at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC), where she teaches socially-engaged studios and scenography in the Architecture and Interior Architecture department since 1998. Odile is also a founding member of the Good City Group, a design collective that promotes participation in the re-imagining of our public spaces and infrastructures. Erik Newman is a designer, fabricator, and educator at SAIC, where he teaches studios in the Designed Objects department since 2007. Erik has developed a line of furniture that incorporates sustainable materials, frugal manufacturing, and efficient user assembly.
Learning from the community engagement that was a signature of all Redmoon Theater spectacles, Odile Compagnon and Erik Newman have since been able to apply their participatory design skills to a multitude of projects, from the design of the Intuit Museum spaces to the design of a Human Powered fabric shredder for the Weaving Mill, and to the 2018 entry to the Ragdale Ring competition where they intended for their project to be taken apart after the summer festival to be reinstalled in North Lawndale.
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Team O3
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I Am Able is a faith-based trauma-informed care agency providing services from birth to the end-of-life.
Akima Brackeen is a designer, educator, and researcher dedicated to promoting justice within the built environment. She is Assistant Professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign School of Architecture. Previously, she worked on multi-family affordable housing at David Baker Architects in San Francisco, and collaborated on a proposal for an art education center with MASS Design in Kigali, Rwanda. Her research focuses on water access and challenging racial perceptions and values of waterscapes aiming to transform engagement with contested sites through speculative interventions, narrative generation, and community activations. She was the inaugural Rowe Fellow at the Illinois Institute of Technology, where she led undergraduate housing studios. Akima consistently leverages design, research, and teaching to serve as an advocate for other women and people of color, and collaborates with organizations that strive to positively impact the community.
Vincent Calabro is a founder and principal of Office of Things. Prior, he worked for six years at Studio Gang where he served in a key role on many of the Studio’s large-scale projects, including significant contributions to the design and construction administration of the University of Chicago Campus North Residential Commons and design for the California College of the Arts Unified Campus. Vincent’s research is focused on the intersection of technology, nature, and design and their impact on society and culture. Vincent earned a Bachelor of Science in Architecture from the University of Cincinnati, and his Master of Architecture from Yale University. He is a registered architect in Illinois and Ohio, and currently teaches at the Illinois Institute of Technology.
Office of Things is a collaborative architecture and design studio with offices based in Chicago, New York City, and Charlottesville. Our work explores the construction and transformation of the built environment. By integrating artful gestures into everyday spaces, we aim to bring a sense of place and community to our work. We focus on heightening the value and sensitivity of the human experience in architecture and cities, at all scales and all aspects of life. Our work reflects our belief that architecture lies at the intersection of many fields and disciplines.
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Team O4
Community Collaborator:
BBF | Building Brighter Futures Center for the Arts
Design Contributor:
Antwane Lee
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BBF | Building Brighter Futures Center for the Arts improves the quality of life for underprivileged youth and their families by providing safe, stable, and nurturing experiences that enhance social, emotional, academic, and career development.
Antwane Lee is an architect and artist in Chicago. He has a B.S. in Architectural Studies degree from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He holds architectural licenses in the states of Illinois and Florida and a National Council of Architectural Registration Board certificate. Antwane has practiced architecture for over 25 years. As an artist, he explores the intersections between history, mythology, and art in a contemporary context with a focus on African cultures. He recently designed and built a large installation called The Solar Shrine at Burning Man in 2022 inspired by the magical realism of Ancient Egypt and Nubia. In 2021 he created a large steel sculpture for the 2021 Bullfrog Biennale at the Goldwell Museum in Rhyolite, Nevada called the Ancestral Totem. He is currently working on an Ethiopian Museum in Chicago. Antwane was a recipient of the 2021 Individual Artist Program Grant through DCASE.
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Team O5
Community Collaborator:
Mishkan Chicago + Lawndale Christian Legal Center
Design Contributor:
Architecture For Public Benefit + Trent Fredrickson Architecture
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Mishkan Chicago: Fueled by Jewish tradition, Mishkan Chicago leads people toward more purposeful, more connected, and more inspired lives.
Lawndale Christian Legal Center provides services, free of charge, to Lawndale’s young people, 24 years old and under, walkin hundreds of juveniles and emerging adults through and away from the criminal justice system
Architecture for Public Benefit is a mission-driven practice founded by Chana Haouzi that is committed to making good design accessible to all. The firm partners with nonprofits and community organizations to create spaces that amplify their services and impact. Each project is guided by a shared vision, community-centered partnerships, and innovative design thinking. Architecture for Public Benefit’s work has been recognized by the AIA Chicago Foundation’s Roberta Feldman Architecture for Social Justice Award and AIA Chicago’s 2023 Design Excellence Award.
Trent Fredrickson is an architect and educator based in Chicago. He founded an independent architecture office in 2021, which operates through collaborations to take on work that aspires to elevate collective life. The office seeks out opportunities in the constraints and contingencies of a project and enjoys finding distinct expressions for the everyday and the familiar. With over ten years of experience, he has previously worked at architecture offices in San Francisco, Boston, and Los Angeles. Alongside practice, Trent teaches architecture studios at Illinois Institute of Technology and School of the Art Institute Chicago.
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Team O6
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Chicago Tool Library provides equitable access to tools, equipment, and information to allow all Chicagoans to learn, share, and create.
Could Be Design creates seriously playful spaces that initiate participation, companionship, and solidarity among multiple communities. Directed by Joseph Altshuler and Zack Morrison, the Chicago- and Urbana-based design practice imagines the built environment as an animate being with agency of its own. From exuberant interiors to interactive public spaces, the practice positions architecture as an active character in the world, enacting a built environment full of vibrant color, shapely form, and intimate encounters. In 2023, Could Be Design was selected as a contributor to Exhibit Columbus and as one of the six winners of the Architectural League Prize for Young Architects + Designers, awarded by The Architectural League of New York. Joseph is also Assistant Professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign School of Architecture.
