FareStart is a nonprofit organization based in Seattle that has been serving our community for nearly 30 years. They work closely with people experiencing struggles around poverty, helping them break unhealthy cycles, and overcoming barriers associated with finding and maintaining gainful employment. Through their efforts focus on food-based job training social enterprises, FareStart delivers more than 5,000 hot meals every day to social service programs and schools around the Puget Sound region.

Community members of the western Washington city of Auburn came together to acquire and restore their 1939 post office with the intent to create a downtown center for the arts. The building is adjacent to an aging dinner theater that’s also part of the area’s revitalization.

Pacific Northwest architecture firm Johnston Architects (JA), designed a solution to the affordable housing challenge in its hometown Seattle and the surrounding “Zoom Towns” by devising award-winning plans for its Twisp Cabin.

Communal space means many things, from the proverbial central gathering table to small nooks and eddies around the periphery of a public space for people to see and be seen. More important than the objective beauty of a work of architecture is how people feel in a space. Places to pause and connect with nature, generate ad hoc run-ins with neighbors, or escape your private home space must be intentionally considered from the outset and nurtured throughout the design process.

The Kirin's character and attributes shaped JA's design of the project which is intended to invoke a sense of calm, serenity, safety and protection for its residents. JA and the developer felt that the attributes of the Kirin also had a natural affinity with the character of Lower Queen Anne.